Presented in this guide are the philosophy, evolution, structure, and implementation of a nongraded reading program which is organized on 23 sequential learning levels. The program concentrates on requirements in word analysis skills, comprehension skills, and study skills; and provides listings of suggested texts, supplementary materials, and…

Intended for beginning students concerned with reading instruction as well as for graduate students, reading teachers, or remedial specialists, the text deals with the overall classroom program, methods for evaluating and diagnosing group and individual needs, and developmental and remedial teaching of specific skills. Chapters explore the…

To determine the factors accounting for children's growth in decoding skill, a study examined school entering characteristics--age, sex, ethnicity, and developmental abilities--and school-influenced skills and characteristics--phonemic awareness, letter-name knowledge, basal text, and place in series--of approximately 100 grade one students.…

A group of elementary teachers enrolled in a graduate class in language arts at the University of North Dakota explored how children construct their own meanings as they interact with texts. One teacher regularly read to her 20-month-old grandson, and excerpts from the journal she kept reveal that his understanding of a specific text evolved to…

The concept of scaffolding can be used as a framework to argue that a "rich interpretation" in child language is needed in the area of early literacy learning. Child language is the reading-like text language of "prereading" kindergarten children. Two threads (internal and external) of the scaffolding process have been identified. The external…

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 6 titles discuss the following topics: (1) the effects of comparison/contrast writing instruction on the reading comprehension of tenth-grade students; (2) an exploration of the role of language awareness in high school students'…

Reports findings of a survey, asking 1000 secondary social studies teachers to rate 36 specialist-designed reading practices. Shows teachers value and employ these techniques: (1) provide suitable materials; (2) offer instruction and guidance; (3) develop readiness through prereading; (4) encourage recitation, discussion, and comparative reading.…

Studies low-achieving fifth-grade readers to evaluate the feasibility of a cross-age reading program and to clarify implementation details for a large-scale project. Finds that quantitative results and qualitative data suggest that cross-age reading programs are a promising way to help poor readers to improve their reading. (MG)

Six weeks were spent working with a five-year-old kindergarten child who had an excellent understanding of sound/symbol relationships but did not know how to read for meaning. A variety of techniques was used to help the child develop reading strategies and increase confidence: directed reading-thinking activity in week one; student retelling of a…

Based on the hypothesis that teachers' naturally occurring presentations of storyreading have an effect on children's literacy learning, a study examined whether teachers can be trained to provide a structure for listening to stories and whether this type of presentation would result in significant gains in children's story understanding. Five…

This booklet contains nine 1-hour training sessions related to the components of family literacy programs. Each session may stand alone or be used in combination with any other. This provides trainers with the flexibility to base workshops on participants' needs and interests. Titles for the sessions include: (1) the process of literacy learning;…

Intended for use by curriculum specialists, administrators, resource teachers, classroom teachers, and teachers of special reading programs, this language arts guide for kindergarten through grade eight offers objectives and activities for integrating the language arts. The guide follows a general format, making it adaptable to any situation, and…

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 18 titles deal with a variety of topics, including the following: (1) the effects of phonemic segmentation and blending training on the word recognition performance of learning disabled readers; (2) a comparison of two remedial…

The reading activities collected in this handbook were used in parent workshops organized to increase the involvement of parents of Italian descent in teaching their children reading skills. The goal of the lessons was to increase parents' activities directed toward reading skills and to familiarize parents with what their children were learning…

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 28 titles deal with a variety of topics, including the following: (1) cognitive style and the reading of children in second grade; (2) the effect of increased review in teaching sight words to average and poor readers; (3)…