Using first- and second-grade students, this study examined the use of sentence contexts for word identification by beginning readers. (HOD)

This study with 32 primary school children (ages 6 and 8) confirms that children read words better in context but concludes that the use of context as a routine way of compensating for poor decoding skills may lead to future reading difficulties. (DB)

Finds that orthographic information dominated word recognition of both good and poor readers and that both semantic contexts and text difficulty influenced the reading of target words. Shows that good readers used orthographic information more than did poor readers, whereas poor readers used semantic context more than good readers. Finds support…

A study examined whether children increased their vocabularies as a result of hearing unfamiliar words within the oral context of a story and observed the oral strategies the children employed as they attempted to define a new word. Subjects, 64 males and 64 females, were from self-contained third-grade classrooms in public schools in a small town…

The efficacy of two methods of early reading instruction were examined: introduction of words in isolation and introduction of words in context. (HOD)

Investigates the use of graphic and contextual information in word recognition and the extent to which good and poor readers are flexible in their ability to trade off one type of information for another when the situation warrants. (HOD)

First- and third-grade students were assigned to a list/list, list/story, or story/list condition and their ability to recognize easy and hard target words was noted. (FL)

Uses a naturalistic setting to explore the effects of word-recognition instruction by a context method and a word-alone method to find out if mode of assessment plays a part in determining efficiency of methods. (HOD)

The use of words in isolation, words with pictures, and words in sentence context in teaching word recognition to beginning readers was studied in a sample of 54 boys and 54 girls. These 108 pupils were randomly assigned to the three treatment groups; each child was individually taught the target words. Learning was assessed on five dependent…

The effectiveness and efficiency of two commonly used teaching strategies in reading (contextualized practice alone, and decontextualized coupled with contextualized) were compared with six learning disabled first-grade boys. Journal availability: see EC 112 927. (Author/DLS)

Goodman critiques a previous article in this journal (see EJ 217 652) that discussed a 1965 research study he conducted; he argues that the other article reflects confused thinking, and he suggests why the findings and implications of his research study have gained wide acceptance. (GT)

Six learning disabled boys served as subjects in a study designed to examine the effects of two instructional conditions on word recognition. In one instructional condition, students practiced reading exclusively in connected text (contextualized practice). In a second condition, reading in connected text was supplemented with drill on isolated…

Reports on three experiments designed to investigate K. Goodman's finding that children read words better in context than in isolation. Concludes that Goodman was wrong about the effects of context on word recognition, and that what seems to separate good from poor readers is the ability to decode words independently of context. (FL)