Reports on a series of semi-structured interviews conducted with the parents of 15 "precocious" readers during their child's time in Key Stage 1. Notes the parents were interviewed three times: once each academic year. Concludes there are important lessons to be learned from these parents; however, as the parents of children with a precocious…

Educators and policy makers in many countries have been expressing concern about how to improve students' achievement in reading and math. This article explores and proposes a solution: introduce or increase foreign language study in the elementary schools. Research has shown that foreign language study in the early elementary years improves…

Whatever has happened to using teacher observation as an approach to assess student achievement? Presently, the emphasis is upon state mandated testing to ascertain student progress. Much is written in educational journals about having students achieve No Child Left Behind (NCLB) federal and state standards, signed into law in 2002. Much drill is…

Broad literacy trends among elementary, high school, and college students can be determined from various reports from the National Assessment of Education Progress, standardized achievement scores, and the verbal scores on the SAT. When these scores are analyzed for the decade of the 1970s, one finds different trends for different age groups, with…

Because the mass marketing of educational support services through franchised reading clinics is growing on a daily basis, both reading specialists and reading supervisors need to become aware of the growth of this industry and of its implications for the educational system. Primary forces in the franchising movement, Sylvan Learning Corporation,…

The research on literacy is ready for a better balancing of the theoretical with the problem oriented, particularly for those children, young people, and adults who are having difficulty with literacy: the poor, minorities, dyslexics, bilinguals, and high school and college students who are poorly prepared by their earlier experience. (CMG)

Mentors need to be carefully selected to assist new teachers in making a successful transition from student teaching to being fully licensed and certified to teach in the regular classroom. During the school year, the mentor may help the new teacher in a variety of ways--one is to build confidence in the new teacher for teaching and another is to…

Pupils need to experience a quality literature and reading program. By following tenets concerning the principles of learning developed by educational psychology, teachers can provide more adequately for students' individual differences such as the fast, average, and slower readers in the classroom setting. Teachers need to study each pupil and…

This list of year-by-year statements has been drawn together from England's National Literacy Strategy Framework for Teaching, with a particular focus on reading. The statements also take into account the stages set out in "Progression in Phonics" and the criteria for assessing reading in National Curriculum assessment at Years 2 and 6.…

Presently, reading is much discussed by senators, representatives, and state legislatures--the debate is on the following issues in reading instruction: (1) having all students in public school achieve at grade level as a reading minimum; (2) accountability of teachers for student achievement; (3) teachers having high achievement expectations from…

This paper discusses and recommends diagnosis and remediation procedures in teaching pupils in the area of reading. The first section of the paper addresses diagnostic emphasis in reading and discusses individualized reading, experience charts, and 5 recommendations for teaching phonics. The next section discusses basal readers, argues that good…

Examines the extent and direction of curriculum bias in standardized reading achievement tests by comparing the relative overlap in the contents of five separate reading achievement tests with the content of seven commercial reading series. (HOD)

The article reviews research on the academic status of behaviorally disordered adolescents and identifies research needs in the areas of sampling techniques, selection of dependent measures including curriculum-based assessment, assessment of the learning strategy, abilities of students with behavioral disorders, and instructional variables…

Discusses the six goals and some of the ramifications of the "Standards for the Assessment of Reading and Writing," developed by the National Council of Teachers of English and the International Reading Association Joint Task Force on Assessment. (RS)

In response to a critique by Lori Bell Mick (EC 600 580), the original author counters objections to ideas concerning the nature of Ritalin, Ritalin's side effects, drug dependency, and teachers as classroom pushers. The response concludes that evidence for Ritalin's positive effect on reading achievement in children with attention deficit…