Effects of literature circles on the comprehension of reading expository texts

Comprehension is the main purpose of reading a text. However, science textbooks found in elementary classrooms are difficult for many students to comprehend because a different skill set is required to understand and interpret expository text. This results in poor performance on standardized tests that are designed to assess student comprehension, among other things. To help prepare students for high stakes tests they must be taught how the information inside an expository text is organized and how the concepts relate to one another. Literature circles, a strategy used frequently with fiction literature in language arts classes may be a useful strategy for teaching comprehension of nonfiction text. This teaching tool is used to support the development of various reading strategies, while providing the social context to actively learn and make deeper connections among facts, concepts, and ideas. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine whether literature circles improve student comprehension when reading expository, scientific text. The participants were 26 fifth grade students in a suburban public school located in north eastern United States. The study lasted six weeks during which students engaged in literature circles discussions. Data were collected through a pre and post-test, teacher-observation checklist, and a 4-point Likert scale survey. The results of this study indicated that literature circles may be an effective cooperative learning strategy when reading expository, scientific text.