Läsförmåga bland högstadieelever utan och med läs- och skrivsvårigheter
The study?s aim was to examine reading ability in secondary school students. The participants; 30 grade 7 students (13 years old) and 30 grade 8 students (14 years old) without literacy problems, and eleven grade 8 students whom either had documented literacy problems or received special education for it, were selected through convenience sample. Text comprehension was tested by three texts which are called the Skobigotexts. Three reading settings were applied: listening, silent reading and silent reading with textsupport. Following the texts, literal and inference questions were asked. The first text was read out loud to each participant, the next text was read silently and the last text was also read in silence but the participants were allowed to have the text in front of them whilst answering the questions. Further, phonological awareness and decoding ability was examined. Whether the comprehension differed within and between the groups regarding reading setting and type of question was looked upon. The results showed that all groups were benefited by silent reading with textsupport and performed better on literal questions. Furthermore, it was found that participants without and with literacy problems performed equivalent regarding text comprehension. However did grade 7 and 8 perform significantly worse than standard average for grade 6. Although the study generated low scores, a conclusion was drawn that secondary school students without or with literacy problems didn?t have any substantial difficulties to interpret and answer questions regarding these texts. Due to the fact that the participants without and with literacy problems performed equally on the Skobigotexts, does not the authors of this study consider these texts as clinically reliable for investigating literacy problems in secondary school students.