ABSTRACT

Although narration is frequently recommended for students with reading deficits, benefits of narration have not been empirically investigated, particularly during the multimedia learning instruction. This study was designed to examine the effect of multimedia instruction on the comprehension of students with and without reading deficits. In experiment 1, the comprehension abilities of grade school and college students with typical reading ability and college students with reading deficits were compared on comprehension tasks using a simultaneous narration+picture presentation. In experiment 2, the multimedia conditions were varied: narration+picture, narration+picture+text, narration-only. The performance of college students with reading deficits was affected differentially by the multimedia presentations. They performed as well as their reading able peers in the narration+picture and narration+ picture+text conditions while they exhibited significantly lower comprehension scores than their peers in the narration-only condition, supporting the premise that multimedia presentations facilitate learning in students who face academic challenges.