Factors Contributing to Teachers' Judgments about Students and Decisions about Grouping Students for Reading Instruction

Abstract

In a policy-capturing study of the planning of reading instruction, teachers and student teachers read descriptions of 32 hypothetical students who varied on five dimensions: standardized reading achievement score, self-correction of errors during oral reading, class participation, social competence, and classroom behavior. They judged each student's probable mastery of the reading curriculum and impact on classroom life, placed the students in three reading groups, and described the reading groups and strategies used to form these groups. While most participants used the academic cues in judging mastery and forming reading groups and the nonacademic cues in estimating impact on classroom life, decision policies differed with respect to the number of cues used and size of each cue's effect. Some variability in cue use was explained by teaching experience and conceptions of reading. For example, teachers' policies were more complex than those of student teachers for the mastery and grouping decisions. However, no differences were apparent for the impact judgment. Additional insight into differences in grouping strategies was provided by participants' written descriptions of reading groups and strategies used to form these groups.