Supports the position that because of improved conditions and communication in society children are ready to learn earlier than they were in the past. (RB)

This study hypothesizes that while the mental age most effectively predicts reading readiness, deficits in information processing at the automatic level decrease the efficiency of the prediction. Conclusions support this hypothesis. (Author/HMV)

AN OVERVIEW OF THE RESEARCH ON VISUAL DISCRIMINATION SHOWS A TREND FROM THE WHOLE-WORD VIEW TO A COMBINATION OF LETTER-DISCRIMINATION AND THE WHOLE-WORD METHOD. TEN STUDIES CITED IN THIS ARTICLE ATTEMPTED TO ANSWER THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS--(1) WOULD NONVERBAL STIMULI FACILITATE READING PERFORMANCE, (2) DO CHILDREN FOCUS ON THE SHAPE OF THE WORD OR…

THE COMPARATIVE VALIDITY OF THE LEE-CLARK READING READINESS TEST AND THE CALIFORNIA TEST OF MENTAL MATURITY (CTMM) FOR PREDICTING GRADE 1 READING SUCCESS WAS STUDIED. ALL ENTERING FIRST-GRADE PUPILS IN TWO ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS IN A LOW-MIDDLE-CLASS COMMUNITY WERE ADMINISTERED BOTH TESTS DURING THE FIRST 3 WEEKS OF SCHOOL. PERFORMANCES ON THESE TESTS…

Expresses a joint statement of concerns about present practices in pre-first grade reading instruction and makes recommendations for improvement. Guidelines and recommendations are the result of a collaboration among six national organizations. (KS)

This report, the sixth in a series developed by the Education Commission of the States (ECS) examining the impact of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act 2001, discusses Reading First, which replaces the Reading Excellence Act. The report states that Reading First, a voluntary program, aims at having all children achieve reading proficiency by the…

Forty-seven children (ages 4-6) with language handicaps were assigned to receive training in 1 of 3 categories of phonological tasks (rhyming, blending, and segmenting) or a control group. Subjects made significant progress in each experimental category but demonstrated little or no generalization within a category or between categories.…

"Waterford Early Reading Level One"[TM] is an emergent literacy curriculum that uses computer-based technology to prepare children for reading. It begins with a tutorial to familiarize the child with the computer and mouse and a reading placement evaluation to assess and determine whether a child should work on "Level One"…

A Russian method of teaching beginning reading using auditory discrimination of phonemes training was shown to be superior to two American methods. (JH)

This study surveyed all-day and half-day Ohio kindergarten teachers regarding their reading or reading readiness instructional practices. First grade teachers in the same schools assessed the preparation and experiences of their incoming students. A Chi Square analysis comparing all-day and half-day programs revealed more areas of similarity than…

To investigate the relationship between a kindergartner's prior experience with print and the child's scores on Marie Clay's Concepts About Print Test, a study examined 23 kindergarten students from an upper middle class neighborhood. A 27-item questionnaire was given to parents at the beginning of the school year, asking what their children knew…

DATA RELEVANT TO THE FOLLOWING THREE QUESTIONS WERE DRAWN FROM 27 INDIVIDUAL STUDIES COMPRISING THE COOPERATIVE RESEARCH PROGRAM IN FIRST-GRADE READING INSTRUCTION--(1) TO WHAT EXTENT ARE VARIOUS PUPIL, TEACHER, CLASS, SCHOOL, AND COMMUNITY CHARACTERISTICS RELATED TO ACHIEVEMENT IN FIRST-GRADE READING AND SPELLING, (2) WHICH APPROACH TO INITIAL…

The Pre-reading Skills Program (PRS) was developed at the Wisconsin Research and Development Center for Cognitive Learning. Research on prereading skills was conducted from 1966 to 1969. The developmental period, 1970 to 1974, included piloting and field testing instructional materials, teachers' manuals, assessment instruments, and a management…

A study using four groups, each of 25 first graders, indicated that letter-naming ability does not facilitate learning to read words composed of the same letters. One group was taught to discriminate between four artificial graphemes by identifying them with different geometric forms. The second group was taught to give the graphemes the letter…