TO UNDERSTAND HOW TO LEARN TO READ

As part of an experiment on the normalization of the Kaufman Assessmen t Battery for Children, the present study stresses the relationship of reading comprehension to decoding as well as to the battery's other a ptitudes in 216 first and secondgraders in Lausanne primary schools. C hildren had to read to themselves and execute orders given in sentence s of progressive complexity. An analysis of variance shows a strong gr ade effect. A multiple regression analysis confirms the close link bet ween understanding and decoding and, moreover, shows that written comp rehension also depends on oral language factors. A qualitative analysi s tracks the progression of the comprehension of written sentences acc ording to their grammatical complexity.