This paper discusses the design of content-area textbooks and reading comprehension in two aspects. On the one hand, textbook designers should determine if the readers have appropriate schemata, including textual schema and content schema. If they do, the authors should help them instantiate appropriate schema, If not, the authors must help them construct it. On the other hand, textbook designers should note the coherence of textbooks. The more coherent the text, the more likely the reader will be able to construct a coherent cognitive model of the information in the text. Texts cohere both globally and locally. Global coherence is achieved by text characteristics that facilitate the integration of highlevel,important ideas across an entire section, chapter, or book. Local coherence is achieved by several kinds of simple links or ties that connect ideas together within and between sentences. Moreover, the authors may use a concept map for the design of textbook. If a concept map is an integral part of the text, the students become keyed into and involved in discovering new relationships among concepts.
| Keywords: | Textbooks; Reading Comprehension; Classroom Learning |
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