The teaching and learning of multimeaning words within a metacognitively based curriculum.

The study explored the effects of an 8-week intervention in which a teacher/researcher used direct instruction to show the multiple meanings of 7 words to 4 deaf students ages 11-13 years in a school for the deaf. Applying conclusions from emerging research that links knowledge and strategy with metacognitive skills, the teacher/researcher used specific metacognitive strategies to facilitate both the acquisition of the concept of multimeaning words and the ability to distinguish one meaning from another while reading, and thus improved the students' reading comprehension. The study participants were able to increase their vocabulary of multimeaning words as well as their reading comprehension in general, and, overall, experienced an improvement in their observable understanding and confidence when approaching the task of reading.