This small study reveals the value of story writing as a pedagogical technique in environmental education. The qualitative research conducted in 2020 examines 14 Indian children's place-ecological meaning as expressed in the story books they authored. Thematic analysis of the story books, interviews, journals, creative writing assignments &…

The authors compared the discourse of 100 Israeli preschool teachers with a group of children during three book-sharing contexts: reading, reconstruction, and telling. During telling and reconstruction, the teachers used more utterances and questions and referred more to concept of book and to the illustrations. During reading, they referred more…

This study aims to investigate narrative competence of bilingual children from low socio-economic status (SES) before and after they were involved in fourteen weeks of Turkish storytelling activities. Fifteen bilingual children from low-SES backgrounds participated in this research. Bilingual children first produced narratives using Mercer Mayer's…

To fully consider the potential of informational texts to serve as mentor texts in the elementary classroom, the authors propose an inquiry about the intersections among the author's intentions, instructional contexts, a teacher's approaches, and students' responses to informational texts when contemplating the roles these texts might serve. In…

Forty middle-class American mothers and their preschool children were observed in a narrative activity which involved telling a story using the Berenstain Bears Play Set as a stimulus. The goal of the study was to examine the presence of story grammar elements in both maternal and preschool narratives. In addition, the study sought to explore the…

Two studies investigated five- and six-year-old preschool children's narrative production in an attempt to show how LI may impinge on narrative production in measurable ways. Study 1 analyzed renderings of familiar stories for group (typical language development vs. language impairment), story content (Jungle Book/Goldilocks) and language…

Storytelling is an imperative and innovative pathway to enhance learning due to the fact that such activity prompts learners to reflect to construct meaning based on their observations and knowledge. Therefore, to develop and enhance students' storytelling ability has become an important issue for both educators and researchers. Since storytelling…

This study tested the hypothesis that children's books accurately reflect the gender-based division of labor in the culture and historical period in which they were published. A content analysis was performed on illustrations in books that won the Caldecott Medal or Honor between 1990 and 2009. The final sample included 490 illustrations in 68 of…

The study evaluated the effects of the Integrated Reading Comprehension Strategy on two levels. The Integrated Reading Comprehension Strategy integrated story grammar instruction and story maps, prior knowledge and prediction method, and word webs through a culturally responsive teaching framework; the Integrated Reading Comprehension Strategy…

The importance of emergent literacy skills as a foundation for proficient reading has led to the development of interventions to teach these skills. These interventions are particularly important for children from disadvantaged homes because they often lack the home literacy experiences necessary for building foundational literacy skills prior to…

The aim of this research brief was to explore the efficacy of story mapping, with the integration of Kidspiration[C] software, to enhance the reading comprehension skills of story grammar components for elementary-age students. Three students served as the participants, two in third grade and one in fourth, with specific learning disabilities…

Argues against the idea that story is the primary way that children come to literacy. Presents a case study that shows that, given the chance to interact with information books, young children are not only capable of reading them but eager to do so. (MG)

Argues that one way to investigate the relationship of text to story taker (reader or listener) is to compare how the writer has made the story to how the story taker has recreated the story. Indicates a resonance between the story taker's retelling and the original text. (RAE)

Looks at the features of teacher-guided discussions of literature that led elementary students toward constructing a theme for a story. Shows how students can profitably explore theme in the literature they are reading and provides an alternative to the directed reading activity format that has become typical of small group reading instruction.…

Investigates fifth-grade children's expectations for stories in relation to knowledge of literature/reading ability. Shows "high readers" included more high-level story propositions and structurally important story information than did low readers; students who included structurally important story information scored higher on knowledge…