PICTORIAL SUPPORT FOR DISCOURSE COMPREHENSION

Discourse comprehension often involves the construction of a mental mo del of a situation and its updating as the discourse progresses. Theor y suggests that a picture which depicts the initial physical situation in a story could help young children construct a functional mental mo del which they might maintain as the story progresses, thereby support ing comprehension. This was tested with young children, 4 to 6 years o f age. The ability of those who saw the picture to model the final sto ry event was enhanced and, even though the picture did not depict the main character's goal directly, recall of the goal was increased. This could be explained in terms of the creation of a functional mental mo del and the increased opportunity that it provides for linking goal-di rected events with the goal as the model is updated. Mental representa tion theory was found useful here for predicting how to support compre hension in ways which could translate readily into practice in the cla ssroom. Some potential applications of the findings in teaching young children are described.