Abstract of

A Multicase Study in the Middle School: Complexities Among Young Adolescent Readers

Gay Ivey

Middle school students' reading behavior is a timely issue given the recent interest in the education of young adolescents. Previous research has provided information about middle school readers' strategy use, attitudes toward reading, and time spent reading. However, this research is limited in scope because it does not address the multitude of factors, both from within individual readers and from outside contexts, that influence reading behaviors. The present study extends the research on young adolescent readers by focusing on three individual sixth-grade readers and how they experienced reading day-to-day in their classrooms over a period of 5 months. Participants in the case studies included a successful reader, a moderately successful reader, and a struggling reader. Constant comparative analysis of data, including classroom observations, interviews with students, one-on-one reading periods with individual students, and the researchers' reflective journal, revealed that all three students' reading performance and dispositions toward reading varied according to the context of their reading, the materials they read, and the purpose of the reading. Despite the range of success with inschool reading among the three students, none could be accurately categorized as skilled or unskilled, motivated or unmotivated. Rather, each student was quite complex as a reader.

Abstract from Ivey, G. (1999). A Multicase Study in the Middle School: Complexities Among Young Adolescent Readers. Reading Research Quarterly, 34(2), 172–192. doi: 10.1598/RRQ.34.2.3