Reading Competencies of Fourth-Grade Students: Comparing Print and Hypertext Literacies

This text presents an outline of research and publications on two studies comparing print and hypertext literacy of fourth-grade students. This set of studies, named Reading at the Computer (RaC), consists of two consecutive assessments: a pilot study (RaC-2001), conducted in 2001 as a supplementary study to the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS-2001), and an advanced study (RaC-2003), conducted in 2003 in the context of the first cycle of a longitudinal assessment in the Federal State of Hamburg called Kompetenzen und Einstellungen von Schulerinnen und Schulern Jahrgangsstufe 4 (KESS-4)(1). KESS-4 applied, among other instruments, some of the tests and background questionnaires from PIRLS-2001.