Beginning with the spring 1974 semester, all incoming students at Borough of Manhattan Community College (New York) were tested using the Reading subtest of the Stanford Test of Academic Skills, Level II. Students achieving scores lower than the fifth stanine on beginning grade 12 norms were required to take a remedial reading course. The…

The purpose of this study was to determine the compatibility of the reading level of students with the required power-mechanics textbooks used by senior industrial arts majors in the California State University and Colleges System. The data for this study were obtained from responses to the Schrammel-Gray High School and College Reading Test…

This paper reviews the literature concerning preschool experiences which affect reading development. An attempt is made to isolate and describe experiences which, according to research, enhance reading achievement. Since 1960, many different early childhood education programs have been developed for educationally disadvantaged children. An…

Demonstrates that the application of reading and study skills during subject-area teaching does transfer to higher achievement scores on standardized tests. Suggests a realistic strategy for including reading instruction within subject areas at the junior high school level. (Author/RL)

Television has had a major impact on the reading habits and achievement of children. Preschool and primary students benefit the most from viewing but after age 12, students' total knowledge declines as they increase viewing. (Author/IRT)

Four learning-disabled students, aged 12-15, were given relaxation training exercises, after which their performance in oral reading was measured. Results indicated that, for three of the four students, the use of audiotaped relaxation exercises improved their oral reading performances. (Author/JDD)

Explores how well measures of verbal short-term memory and naming speed tasks predict children's reading achievement under various IQ control conditions. Both were effective, but when controlling for verbal IQ, memory measures are less reliable, whereas digit-naming speed remains a significant predictor of reading achievement. (MM)

Indicates a reasonable range of individual differences in the dark interval threshold (DIT). Reveals a significant interaction between DIT and illumination level in their effect on reading accuracy. Finds that children with a short DIT read more accurately in high rather than low illumination and that this performance was reversed for long DIT…

Outlines the importance of principals' focusing their school's curriculum on the development of reading skills through ideas such as (a) faculty inservice and orientation programs, (b) organization of faculty reading planning teams, (c) allocation of resources, (d) supportive classroom visits, and (e) informal evaluation systems to ascertain…

Presents conceptual framework for classification of poor readers based on a sample of over 5,214 children between 9 and 10.7 years. The framework is based on the notion of low achievers (those whose reading attainment is low but who attain the expected level) and underachievers (those whose reading is poor but who ought to read at a higher level).…

Two experiments designed to examine the effects on poor readers' comprehension of increasing their decoding speed indicated that the decoding training on single words and phrases increased the speed of word recognition but did not improve comprehension performance. (MKM)

This study, involving 41 hearing foreign students, sought to determine the suitability of using the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) to determine the English reading skills of deaf international college applicants. Results indicated that a TOEFL score between 400 and 500 correlated with a reading grade level of less than 8.0.…

Examines the relationship between level of schooling and literacy attainment in four rural communities in Guatemala. The authors first identify the grade at which most children become literate and then estimate the net contribution of schooling to literacy. They found that most children became literate with between three and four years of…

Comparison of maltreated (N=195) and non-maltreated (N=179) children found the maltreated children had significantly lower academic achievement scores but did not differ on perceived academic competence. Maltreated children were more likely to overestimate their level of competence, particularly for reading and arithmetic. Also, children with low…

The National Assessment of Educational Progress' (NAEP) 1992 reading assessment was administered to nationally representative samples of fourth-, eighth-, and twelfth-grade students attending public and private schools, and to state representative public-school samples of fourth graders in 43 jurisdictions. Nearly 140,000 students were assessed in…