Abstract

The effects of an instructional programme for deriving word meanings from the context and through morphological analysis for grade 4 primary‐school pupils with poor versus average reading comprehension were examined. The programme is based on the principles of direct instruction and reciprocal teaching. A pre‐test‐post‐test control group design was used to measure the effects of the programme. The results showed the programme to have a significant positive effect on the ability of the pupils to derive word meanings. Transfer of this ability to more general reading comprehension was not, however, found to occur. Finally, the readers for whom the programme is primarily intended, namely poor reading comprehenders, were found to benefit more from the training than average reading comprehenders.