Teaching online reading strategies using the Think Aloud technique. Evidence from an experimental study

The present study aimed to investigate the value of the teacher Think Aloud (TA) instructional technique in providing young readers with effective strategies to enhance the comprehension of online texts. Eighty-nine participants from 10 to 14 years of age were sorted into two groups based on the type of training they had received: the experimental group (n = 47) had been taught with the TA strategies, while the control group (n = 42) had not received any specific training. Both the experimental and control groups were examined twice, before and after the period of training. Pupils had to find the correct answer to a specific question (Access) and to critically analyze online texts, expressing different opinions on a topic (Analysis). The findings indicate a positive effect of the TA technique, mainly in the transferal of strategies aimed at a more correct evaluation of the websites’ reliability. Indeed, while for the control group only a marginal, if any, improvement was recorded from pre-test to post-test, an outstanding amelioration was observed in the experimental group (from 19.1% to 48.9%) when requested to evaluate the reliability of a web site.