A "Reading Club" approach at Liberty University (Virginia) has been implemented to avoid the stigma that may be associated with elementary and junior high school students receiving remedial reading instruction. Students in grades K-8 from the local schools come to the university campus to be tutored in reading. Elementary education…

Many gifted children enter kindergarten already reading and in need of reading instruction that is different from the regular program. A reading program for gifted youngsters that is literature-based will help develop comprehension skills at the highest cognitive levels and will also foster the desire to read. Beginning with the interpretation of…

Drawn from the experiences of actual families as well as from research findings, this book is intended to show parents how storybook reading promotes language and literacy development and instills in children a love of books and reading. Each section of the book contains parent-child vignettes and photographs of families reading books together.…

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 effect of illustrations on third grade students' attitudes toward the elderly; (2) visual and phonological coding in word processing by fourth, sixth, and…

This paper, number eight in an ongoing series, is part of an interdisciplinary project on the context of reading and reading research that explores similarities and dissimilarities in the response to literature in readers from different cultures. Presented are the written responses from 129 readers in Denmark, Greenland, Great Britain, India, and…

This paper, number nine in an ongoing series, is part of an interdisciplinary project on the context of reading and reading research that explores similarities and dissimilarities in the response to literature in readers from different cultures. Presented are the written responses from 137 readers in Denmark, Greenland, Great Britain, India, and…

This paper, number 10 in an ongoing series, is part of an interdisciplinary project on the context of reading and reading research that explores similarities and dissimilarities in the response to literature in readers from different cultures. Presented are the written responses from 140 readers in Denmark, Greenland, Great Britain, India, and…

Approximately 1200 Danish school children aged 8, 11, and 14 participated in a questionnaire study under the caption, "Why I like to read." Data from Denmark formed part of an international study, in which 12 other countries used the same questionnaire to explore various functions of reading and to compare them over different countries.…

A study examined the influence of classroom organization, student age, and student ability on 122 students' perceptions of who were the "better readers" in their classrooms. The students were members of one second grade and one fifth grade receiving reading instruction in a whole-class format; a second-third grade combination classroom taught with…

Focusing on the social nature of reading instruction provides another direction to research and study that both differs from and adds to cognitive research. H. Mehan's theory of social constructivism emphasizes that the development of cognitive processes occurs within the individual through the internalization of interactions between learners and…

One hundred forty-seven students enrolled in a developmental reading program responded to a questionnaire designed to ascertain the reading attitudes and interests of middle school students. It was hypothesized that by overemphasizing basic skills instruction, schools may not be taking the necessary steps to help students develop the ability and…

Noting recent research showing the considerable benefit in having carefully structured systems for parental involvement in reading, this book presents a review of past and current successful practices in this field. The chapters in the first part of the book discuss the context of international trends in parents' involvement in their children's…

If reading is to become a lifelong passion, teachers must strive to encourage in students a lifelong interest in reading, and to improve their literature appreciation and critical reading abilities. Research indicates that teachers must enrich the reading curriculum beyond the basic skills program if children are to learn to love to read. Such an…

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 35 titles deal with a variety of topics, including the following: (1) characterization of native Americans in children's and young adult's fiction written by native American and nonnative American authors; (2) fantasy fiction;…

The skills-based method of remedial reading instruction is based on a medical model, in that it focuses instructional efforts solely on "curing" what is "wrong" with a reader. Such attention to students' shortcomings and the labeling of their lack of instant success as a problem causes healthy learners to begin to doubt their own abilities, often…