THE VALIDITY OF THE POTENTIAL LEVEL VIA LISTENING COMPREHENSION: A CAUTIONARY NOTE

Historical background and relevant research were examined to determine whether the commonly recommended procedure of determining the reading potential level via listening comprehension is valid in the primary grades. No support was found for the unstated assumptions necessary for this procedure's validity. And three major studies conclusively revealed that use of this procedure to identify children for remedial instruction would drastically over‐refer and would include vast numbers of primary grade children progressing normally in learning to read. Based on this evidence, it was concluded that listening comprehension definitely not be used to determine the reading potential level in grades 1‐3.