Bottom Up Vs.

Top Down
Reading Models
READ 8345
The Debate
Bottom Up
Reading words from part to whole
Or
Top Down
Reading words from whole to part
Bottom Up
Reading in this view is basically a matter
of decoding a series of written symbols
to make sense of the text.
Thus: a 'bottom-up' view of reading.
Bottom Up
A reading model that emphasizes the ability
to decode or put into sound what is seen in
the text.
Associated with the Simple View of Reading
Associated with the “Science of Reading”
movement
Outside-In
McCarthy
Describes 'outside-in' processing,
referring to the idea that meaning exists
in the printed page and is interpreted
by the reader then taken in.
Whitehurst and Lonigan
◦Inside-out (code focused) skills
◦and
◦Outside-in (meaning focused) skills

◦Two critical domains of emergent

literacy.
Whitehurst and Lonigan
Outside-in skills refer to oral language ability as
evidenced by development in contextual
knowledge and semantic skills.
Inside-out skills refer to understanding the
phoneme and grapheme units of language.
Phonological awareness (PA), particularly phonemic
awareness, is a necessary precursor to fluent
decoding and conventional reading
FEATURES OF BOTTOM-UP
MODEL
• The reader needs to:
1. Identify letter features
2. Link these features to recognize letters
3. Combine letter to recognize spelling patterns
4. Link spelling patterns to recognize words
5. Then proceed to sentence, paragraph, and text-
level processing
BOTTOM-UP READING MODEL
The first task of reading is learning the code
or the alphabetical principle.
The meaning of the text is expected to come
as the code is broken based on the reader’s
prior knowledge of words
The reader first processes the smallest
linguistic unit, gradually compiling the
smaller units to decipher and comprehend
the higher units.
Bottom Up
Philip Gough
Reading is a serial process
Lexical, syntactic and semantic rules are applied
to the phonemic output
The phonemic output is decoded from print.
Drawbacks of Bottom -up
•The idea of linear processing
•Underestimated the contribution of the reader
•Fails to recognize that students utilize their
expectations about the text based on their
knowledge of language and how it works
•Failure to include previous experience and
knowledge into processing
Top-Down

Associated with the following models

Cognitive
Sociocognitive
Psycholinguistic
Transactional
Sociocultural
New literacies
Critical literacies
Psycholinguistic Approach
Goodman
Presented reading as a process in which
readers sample the text, make
hypotheses, confirm or reject them,
make new hypotheses…
The reader rather than the text is at the
heart of the reading process.
Schema Theory
Rumelhart
Described schemata as "building blocks of cognition"
Used in the process of…
Interpreting sensory data
Retrieving information from memory
Organizing goals
Allocating resources
Guiding the flow of the processing system.
Schema Theory
Rumelhart stated that if our schemata
are incomplete and do not provide an
understanding of the incoming data
from the text we will have problems
processing and understanding the text
The Importance of Strategies
Dole et al. (1991)
Flexible, adaptable strategies are used
to make sense of a text and to monitor
understanding
FEATURES OF TOP-DOWN
APPROACH
Readers can comprehend a selection even though
they do not recognize each word.
Readers should use meaning and grammatical cues
to identify unrecognized words.
Reading for meaning is the primary objective of
reading, rather than mastery of letters,
letters/sound relationships and words.
Scribner and Cole
Sociocognitive Approach
Emphasize the effects of social context
on cognitive components
◦Activities
◦Knowledge representations
◦Goals
Mental Models
A mental model is an abstraction from
everyday, often spatial or visual, perception
that allows people to think about a situation
without the clutter of unnecessary details or
the requirement of manipulating physical
objects (Johnson-Laird, 1980).
See "mental maps" used on shopping trips
and in giving visitors directions
Metacognitive View

Interactive Reading Model

The readers attempt to form a summary
of what was read.
Metacognition involves thinking about
what one is doing while reading.
Metacognitive View
Strategic readers attempt the following while
reading:
Identifying the purpose of the reading before
reading
Identifying the form or type of the text before
reading
Thinking about the general character and
features of the form or type of the text. For
instance, they try to locate a topic sentence and
follow supporting details toward a conclusion
Interactive approaches draw on bottom-up
and top-down approaches to reading
(Samuels & Kamil, 1988).
Both top-down and bottom-up are seen as
strategies that are flexibly used in the
accomplishment of the reading tasks
(Grabe & Stoller, 2013).
THE INTERACTIVE READING MODEL
The reader simultaneously uses all
levels of processing even though one
source of meaning can be primary at a
given time.
Kenneth Goodman

The reader interacts with the text,

selectively using cues from text to construct
meaning.
Rumelhart

Reading is a perceptual and a cognitive

process.
A skilled reader uses sensory, syntactic,
semantic, and pragmatic information to
accomplish the task.
STANOVICH
Interactive-compensatory model
Readers rely on both Bottom-up and Top-down
processes and depend on:
-Reading purpose
- Motivation
- Schema
- Knowledge of the subject
References
Balmuth, M. (1982). The roots of phonics: A historical
introduction. McGraw-Hill.
Dole, J. A., Duffy, G. G., Roehler, L. R., & Pearson, P. D. (1991).
Moving from the old to the new: Research on reading
comprehension instruction. Review of Educational Research,
61(2), 239–264.
Glaser, R. (1984). Education and Thinking: The Role of Knowledge.
American Psychologist, 39, 93-104.
Goodman, K. (1970). Behind the Eye: What Happens in Reading.
In Reading Process and Program. Urbana: National Council of
Teacher of English.
References
Grabe, W. P., & Stoller, F. L. (2013). Teaching and
researching: Reading. New York: Routledge.
Johnson-Laird, P. N. (1980). Mental Models in Cognitive
Science. Cognitive Science, 4, 71-115.
McConnell S. R., Bradfield T. A., & Wackerle-Hollman A. K.
(2014). Early childhood literacy screening. In Kettler R. J.,
Glover T. A., Albers C. A., & Feeney-Kettler K. A. (Eds.),
Universal screening in educational settings: Evidence-based
decision making for schools (pp. 141–170). Washington, DC:
American Psychological Association.
References
Paris, S. G., Lipson, M. Y., & Wixson, K. K. (1983). Becoming a
strategic reader. Contemporary Education Psychology, 8(3),
293–316.
Rumelhart, D. E. (1980). Schemata: The building blocks of
cognition. In R. J. Spiro, B. C. Bruce, & W. F. Brewer (Eds.),
Theoretical issues in reading comprehension. Hillsdale, NJ:
Erlbaum.
References
Samuels, S. J., & Kamil, M. L. (1988). Models of the
reading process. Interactive approaches to second
language reading, 22-36
Scribner, S. & Cole, M. (1981). The Psychology of
Literacy. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Stanovich, K. E. (1999). Toward an Interactive-
Compensatory Model of Individual Differences in
The Development of Reading Fluency. Reading
Research Quarterly,32-71.
References
Storch S. A., & Whitehurst G. J. (2002). Oral language and
code-related precursors to reading: Evidence from a
longitudinal structural model. Developmental Psychology,
38, 934–947. Tierney, R. J., Readence, J. E., & Dishner, E. K.
(1995). Reading strategies and practices. Boston, MA: Allyn
& Bacon.
Whitehurst G. J., & Lonigan C. J. (1998). Child development
and emergent literacy. Child Development, 69, 848–872.