Journal of Educational Sciences > Volume 27, No. 3, 2015

The Reading Level of Illustration included in Science Textbook for Fifth Grade Students in Saudi Arabia / Lina Al-Rewaili, Sozan Omar

The current study aimed to determine the fifth Grade student skills of reading illustrates included in science textbook, as well as identifying the distractors related to designing these illustrates which obstruct the students to read them properly. The researcher applied the test instrument of open essay type questions to measure the skill of: recognizing, description, interpretation and assessment for a sample consisting of (269) students who read three illustrates, and conducted an interview with sample of them (27 students) to recognize the distractors related to the designing of these illustrates. The study results showed that there are poor levels in illustrated drawing reading skills: description, interpretation, and assessment. The most important distractors which obstructed the students from reading theses illustrate properly were: Art impacts of these illustrate and elements which don’t serve these illustrates. In the light of the above results, the researcher provided some recommendations, such as training the students on using the images and illustrates properly in science textbooks, as well as create simple designs of illustrates and they should be free of crowded elements and impacts which don’t serve the illustrates.
Key words: Reading comprehension, Reading illustrates, Distractors, Elementary level, Science textbooks.