This article establishes a broad framework from which to interpret and evaluate the reading–science learning–writing connection. The presentation of breakthroughs, barriers, and promises is intended to outline the established links between, to identify current bottlenecks in thinking about, and to highlight productive inquiries into, print‐based languages and scientific understanding. The ideas presented come from various disciplines connected to science education. The ideas are meant to be informative, provocative, integrative, supportive, and without hidden agenda.

Despite the heavy reliance on textbooks in college courses, research indicates that college students enrolled in first-year science courses are not proficient at comprehending informational text. The present study investigated a reading comprehension questioning strategy with origins in clinical research based in elaboration interrogation theory, which outlines how to encourage readers to recall relevant background knowledge while reading text materials. The theory suggests that the strategy increases the likelihood that readers will integrate what they read with what they know to make new knowledge. The setting for the study more closely resembled classroom conditions compared to similar studies in the past. Unlike previous studies on reading comprehension, students read a challenging passage from the textbook used in a science course in which they were enrolled. In addition, the text was longer than that used in clinical research. The college students (n ¼ 294) in this study were randomly assigned to either a questioning strategy treatment or a rereading placebo-control. While reading, treatment students were presented with statements taken from regular intervals in their textbook (about every 150 words) and asked a simple why question about each of these statements. Significant differences were found favoring elaborative interrogation theory and its question strategy treatment over the placebo-control in terms of science comprehension even after significant estimated predictors of prior knowledge and verbal ability were statistically controlled or accounted for by removing the statistical contributions of these predictors to the main effects. ß

A composite theory of college science student note‐taking strategies was derived from a periodic series of five interviews with 23 students and with other variables, including original and final versions of notes analyzed during a semester‐long genetics course. This evolving composite theory was later compared with Van Meter, Yokoi, and Pressley's (Journal of Educational Psychology, 86, 323–338, 1994) corresponding composite “college students' theory of note‐taking.” Students' notes in this long‐term study were also compared with a standard of “adequate” note‐taking established by experts. Analyses detected many similarities between the two composite theories. Analyses also provided evidence of inadequate note‐taking strategies, inconsistencies between what students claimed and evidently did with their notes, and weak self‐regulating learning strategies. Recommendations included prompting students during class on how to take notes. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 43: 786–818, 2006

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