University English-as-a-Foreign-Language students in Hong Kong who participated in popular literature class that emphasized reading for content and enjoyment made superior gains on measures of vocabulary and reading rate compared to students enrolled in a traditional academic skills class. Eighty-eight percent of the literature students felt that…

Argues that the method of "collaborative modelling" developed to teach reading skills may be utilized in generating and assessing pupil talk within the classroom. Pupil pairs were given different texts from science, English, and geography and asked to re-present them in another form. Results indicate the value of the talk emerging from…

Introduction: The main purpose of this study is to investigate whether children who have reading disabilities in an alphabetically transparent orthography show a syntactic processing deficit. This research focuses on exploring syntactic processing and the use of morphological markers by subjects with reading disabilities. We analyze these groups'…

Reading comprehension is a very complex task that requires different cognitive processes and reading abilities over the life span. There are fewer studies of reading comprehension relative to investigations of word reading abilities. Reading comprehension difficulties, however, have been identified in two common and frequently overlapping…

Based on the results of Phase I of a reading skills project in 2000 ("SAJHE" 16(3) 2002), Phase II was undertaken to set up a reading intervention programme on a voluntary basis for students enrolled in a mathematics access module, to determine whether explicit attention given to reading would improve their reading skills and academic…

This document describes the rationale and the strategy of the new United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Initiative for literacy: LIFE. The Literacy Initiative for Empowerment (LIFE) is designed as a global strategic framework through which national governments, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), civil…

This paper discusses the use of computers to modify the learning processes of preschool children. Focusing on children from non-francophone, lower-class, immigrant families in a suburb of Paris, France, the paper discusses the development of specialized computer software to allow children to type the names of animals, objects, and people on the…

Using the tools of systematic grammar, this case study examined 3- and 4-year-old children's experiences with storytelling and the potential effects of those experiences on the children's future success in learning to read. Subjects were students attending one of two nursery school classes held at a large primary school on the south coast of…

A survey of Local 343-United Brotherhood of Carpenters & Joiners of America and the Manitoba Construction Labour Relations Association, Manitoba, determined the critical, essential, and important workplace skills of carpenters. A survey instrument was developed and mailed to 438 active members of Local 343; 110 surveys were completed and…

A study of reading problems among Hong Kong university students of English as a Second Language has two parts. The first examines a teacher's comparison of a source text with a student's written response. The student subject was a highly-motivated, proficient learner. Discussion of her reading problems focuses on the incidence of misinterpretation…

This paper examines the prevailing theoretical orientation of the "free play" curriculum in New Zealand child care centers. It also introduces an alternative way of understanding how children learn and discusses a literacy-centered curriculum that uses aspects of the free play and alternative curricula. Child care centers in New Zealand…

This English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) assessment kit was designed for use by teachers and program managers who are involved in the initial interview, assessment, and referral of students and who are responsible for placement of learners in programs and classes. Its aims are to help the interviewer to: (1) identify the relative priority of…

This report on an internal evaluation, which was conducted for developmental purposes, describes services provided at the Learning Skills Centres (LSC) on three separate campuses of Grant MacEwan Community College, in Edmonton, Alberta (Canada). The key questions of the evaluation addressed student and staff awareness of the existence of the LSC;…

This book provides a range of practical ideas for teachers of English as a first or second language for working with newspapers in the classroom. It seeks not only to provide teachers with resources and techniques for using newspapers, but also to give students practice in the skills needed to enable them to read English-language newspapers for…

An Indonesian study on prereading strategies for reading in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) is reported. Three areas were examined: (1) differences in the reading achievement of groups receiving AO ("advance organizer" or meaningful verbal learning, based on the learning theory of David Ausubel) techniques or "Daftar Kata-Kata…