This research review concludes that precocious reading ability is a complex skill, and levels of specific subskills vary widely among individuals. Precocious reading ability is moderately associated with general intelligence and with academic achievement. Parents may encourage the early development of reading through natural and mutually enjoyable…

This study compared 56 early and nonearly readers (matched individually on sex, age, and preschool and kindergarten attended) in terms of their language concepts and skills, as well as their reading achievement, in kindergarten through second grade. The early readers were found superior to nonearly readers on preschool measures of general language…

Examines the responses of preschoolers to a number of print design features in various genres of alphabet picture books. Discusses the authors' personal stance on the language learning and language teaching that occurs during these encounters with alphabet books. Ponders the published criteria presented by children's literature experts for…

Discusses research on home literacy environments, the values of reading aloud, independent reading, literature and writing, and literature in the language arts curriculum. (RS)

The authors of this article report on a preliminary study of 18, 4- and 5-year-old children, followed by a longitudinal study of 44 children, who were tested in the first, second, and third grades. The children's ability to detect the ambiguity of lexically ambiguous sentences (e. g., "The children saw the bat lying by the fence") and…

For children whose everyday speech differs greatly from the School English (SE) they encounter in academic materials and settings, it was hypothesized that greater familiarity with SE would be associated with more successful early reading acquisition. Sentence imitation and reading skills of 217 urban African American students in kindergarten…

This study examines how measures of articulation rate, verbal short-term memory (STM), naming speed, and phonological awareness tasks administered in kindergarten and again in Grade 1 jointly and uniquely predict word reading and passage comprehension variance in Grades 1, 2, and 3. Results from regression and commonality analyses indicated that…

This paper reports a study that followed the development of reading skills in 72 children from the age of 8.5 to 13 years. Each child was administered tests of reading, oral language, phonological skills and nonverbal ability at time 1 and their performance on tests of reading comprehension, word recognition, nonword decoding and exception word…

The present 9-month longitudinal study investigated relations between Chinese native language phonological processing skills and early Chinese and English reading abilities among 227 kindergarteners in Hong Kong. Phonological awareness, rapid automatized naming, and short-term verbal memory differed in their relations to concurrent and subsequent…

Many research questions require the assessment of reading in large samples of children. We compared two nonconventional procedures for early reading assessment: test administration by telephone, and teacher assessment. Five thousand five hundred and forty four children participating in a longitudinal twin study were assessed by telephone using the…

This paper explores reading for pleasure, its importance, and its impact on literacy attainment and other outcomes and reviews much of the research on the importance of reading for pleasure. A debate has been rife in the UK over the past few years as to how best to teach children to read, which culminated in an "Independent Review of the…

This study evaluated the validity, reliability, and utility of five of the six subtests of Clay's (2002) Observation Survey of Early Literacy Achievement (OS), including Letter Identification, Word Reading, Writing Vocabulary, Hearing and Recording Sounds in Words, and Text Reading. In addition to a review of studies providing assessment of the…

It is argued that attention to effective evidence-based early reading interventions are a co-requisite to genuinely inclusive education, with implications not only for reading acquisition, but also for a range of other social and academic domains. This paper briefly describes some of the recent developments in reading research that have the…

Special education legislation has placed an increased emphasis on early intervention programs for children at risk for early literacy delays and behavioral disorders. Given this trend, it is important to understand the characteristics of students identified and served in at-risk programs. This study presents the findings from a cluster analysis on…

This issue features seven studies that address affective as well as academic educational outcomes. The first article incorporates teachers' perceptions of the role of technology in supporting English language learners' writing. The second article highlights results for two cohorts of young children served by an Early Reading First program at…