The Iea Study of Reading Literacy: Achievement and Instruction in Thirty-Two School Systems

Many different views exist about the best way to teach children to read, yet little is known about which countries are the most successful in this aim, or what the most productive strategies are for doing so.

This report addresses these issues by building on the pioneering work of Robert Thorndike in 1973. Data are presented on the relative achievement levels of comparable samples of students in each of 32 school systems in all continents of the globe - making it the largest IEA study to date. Attempts are made to elucidate the reasons for the differences that were found and implications are drawn about the likely effects of different policies.

Many advances have been made since the previous IEA reading survey, students were asked to tackle a wider range of reading exercises, prodigious efforts are made to minimise any cultural or linguistic biases, and the statistical machinery of the Rasch model was systematically used, for the first time in IEA surveys, both to help identify troublesome items and to create defensible international scales.

Greater efforts are made in this study to assess the volume and character of students' reading, to explore their beliefs about learning to read, and to compare the effects of teachers' beliefs and instructional emphases on student achievement.

Within each country specific findings have emerged which will give policy makers pause for thought and prompts for action.

...a very definitive study of the development of reading literacy...a valuable resource book for people interested in the field of communication
Gifted Education International
Clive Whitehead
...it is a mine of information and a valuable addition to the field.
International Journal of Educational Development
Steven A. Stahl, University of Georgia
I was impressed with the care taken by the authors...The research in this volume will be used for years to come, not only by international policy makers, but also by scholars interested in using the lens of international comparisons to view questions of interest to them.
Comparative Education Review
Christina E. van Kraayenoord
...a well-written book...the authors have done well in explaining a very large study in a way that it is accessible to many.... This book is a must for policy makers in language and literacy areas, as well as an essential book in university libraries and libraries of education institutions.
Australian Journal of Education