The development of comprehension of main ideas in narratives: Evidence from the selection of titles

The authors investigated readers' ability to identify main ideas in narrative texts and the development of this ability. In particular, the authors explored students' sensitivity to the goal structure of narratives. Third-, 6th-, 9th-, and 11th-grade students read narratives in which goal statements were systematically varied on 2 structural dimensions: position in the text's hierarchical structure and number of connections to other statements. As a measure of main idea comprehension, students selected titles for the narratives from among the goals or associated outcomes. Hierarchical position, but not number of connections, influenced title choices. Even the youngest students were able to identify the main ideas, but they did so less consistently than did older students. These findings have implications for theories of text comprehension development and for educational practice.