A study examined 58 home economics education textbooks in terms of reading difficulty, writing style, and interest level for special population learners. The objective was to identify texts, using six different readability formulas that were significantly more difficult and provided educational obstacles to special populations in their preparation…

One hundred undergraduate business students completed a questionnaire designed to determine their reactions to a traditional and a "flashier" textbook format. Before completing the questionnaire, subjects spent several minutes examining two business textbooks--one an older textbook with black ink on white paper, narrow margins, and few…

A study was conducted to evaluate the level of difficulty of textbooks (French and Sciences) written in French for use with sixth grade students. A cloze test was administered to a sample of sixth grade students in two francophone districts in the province of New Brunswick, Canada, and the Henry readability formula was applied to the same texts.…

A study examined text-based scientific concepts and described how those concepts were elaborated in three high school biology textbooks. The three textbooks were aimed at different student audiences: non-college bound students, special education students, and high school students at all levels. A concept analysis was established for each text, and…

An extensive basal evaluation form--written in a series of 73 questions, each requiring a short narrative response and many with specific references to notes in the appendices--is presented in this paper. The evaluation form is divided into two sections: general questions on teacher's guides and general questions on student books. The questions on…

A comparison of four college-level elementary German textbooks reveals significant differences in the numbers of vocabulary entries in each textbook. Further comparison of three of the textbooks with the basic German vocabulary lists provided in "Kontaktschwelle Deutsch als Fremdsprache" and in "Das Zertificat Deutsch als Fremdsprache" reveal in…

The purposes of this study were to assess the usefulness of a variety of readability formulas in predicting the relative difficulty of passages, and to explore the contribution of pupils' background to text difficulty. Subjects were 285 special education students in grades 1-9, 117 of whom were based in rural and suburban Minnesota (MN) and 168 of…

A study followed three textbook adoption committees as they evaluated basal reading programs. The committees used "A Guide to Selecting Basal Reading Programs" (developed at the Center for the Study of Reading) to help them evaluate the quality of instruction in existing programs. Case studies of the three committees sought to address the…

Thirty-one secondary level social studies textbooks, published between 1974 and 1984 were examined to determine the characteristics of those identified as heroes and heroines, the extent to which they were presented, and ways in which they were presented. Five institutional settings (family, religious, political, economics, and sports) and five…

Using the "Checklist for Evaluating Sexism in Reading," an analysis was undertaken of the Ginn 360 series and the Ginn 720 series of basal readers for sex stereotypes and related language usage. The main characters and illustrations in approximately ten stories at each reading level were analyzed. Of the 116 stories examined, 49 featured…

On the assumption that word frequency in written language as well as children's knowledge of words can provide the basis for a systematic contextual approach to reading vocabulary development, six current reading series and their workbooks (grades two through six) were analyzed for their presentation of prefixed words in context. Results of the…

This dissertation analyzed how political foundations, economic matters, and social problems of the United States are portrayed in selected English-language textbooks of East and West German publishers. For West Germany the research was based on nine Ieading stage-adopted textbooks at the upper level. The East Germans allow only one series of…

Basic values of moral education in Finnish schools come from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Moral tenets are taught in religion and civics. The textbooks deal with moral questions mainly on the individual level and provide limited opportunities for practice necessary for the internalization of values. (Author/SJL)

Presents a study which examined elementary science textbooks (grades four and six), noting (1) text organization and structure; and (2) the degree of problem solving required in chapter activities (according to Bloom's taxonomy). Reports a need for a more varied use of text structures and the inclusion of activities that utilize higher-level…

Presents an evaluation of the Houghton Mifflin and Scott Foresman Reading Programs which reveals that stories in both of these series satisfy the requirements of a conventional story grammar. Suggests that such stories help children comprehend and remember the stories they process and serve as excellent models of narrative. (ARH)