Discusses advantages--and a few disadvantages--of using social sight words (such as "sale,""stop," and "exit") in introducing young children to reading; suggests learning activities involving such words. (GT)

Gives advanced and novice readers in grade one and older disabled readers nonword reading and spelling tasks. Finds that disabled readers read as many nonwords and spelled as many words as beginning readers, indicating equivalent alphabetic knowledge. Finds that disabled readers took significantly more trials to read 16 target words, indicating…

Describes two models of childrens' literacy acquisition developed by research psychologists. Argues that these models make practical sense by embodying within them the notion that children use a combination of top-down and bottom-up processes to solve the problems of how to read. (RS)

Three students (ages 12-16) with moderate mental retardation and severe behavior disorders were taught to read sight words related to the daily newspaper weather report by a method that interspersed known words with new words. Students mastered the 10 sight words and showed some improvement in reading the weather report. (DB)

The instructional level, a measure of optimal instructional challenge, addresses the amount of review material interspersed with new. The current study further attempted to identify the instructional level for drill tasks by teaching sight-words to five fourth grade students with reading disabilities and documented attention difficulties. Four…

Phonics has been taught from the time of the ancient Greeks to make the written language more accessible. The first task of learning to read is learning to recognize in print the language used in speech. As a result of many studies conducted during the 1960s which demonstrated the effectiveness of phonics, its use as an instructional method…

This 34-item annotated bibliography examines the literature concerning language experience in the following areas: (1) the rationale for incorporating language arts in the primary classroom; (2) whether using language experience aids the child in developing reading strategies; (3) the achievement scores of children using language experience; (4)…

Results suggested that auditory-visual integration ability in this sample was developmental; however, the subjects functioned at a lower level than would be expected of middle-class students. The effects of grade level, sex differences, Intelligence Quotient, and single-modality auditory and visual functioning were examined as possible moderating…

To determine whether increasing decoding speed affects the comprehension of poor readers, two experiments were designed to test two groups consisting of seven good readers and eleven poor readers chosen from fourth and fifth grade. In the first experiment, poor readers were trained to read a list of words as rapidly as the good readers and were…

Explains the use of the Dolch List in the lower elementary grades. (FL)

Suggestions from eight contributors include the following: how to use pattern books with beginning readers, how to develop a locally relevant basic sight word list, how to use learning styles in individualizing instruction, and how to personalize handouts. (FL)

Compares the reading performance of first grade readers of low, middle, and high abilities trained in listen-read, listen-alone, or read-alone procedures. Concludes that the listen-read procedure is an effective technique for low and middle ability readers in facilitating word recognition and reading comprehension. (RS)

Investigates the use of closed captioned television to improve the sight vocabulary of adults receiving literacy instruction. Finds that students' sight vocabulary increased significantly and that student attitudes to closed captioned television were extremely positive. (RS)

Community-referenced sight words and phrases were taught to six adolescents with mild or moderate mental retardation, using three instructional methods in two locations. Results showed rapid acquisition of the sight words in all three training conditions and showed generalization from the flash card and videotape conditions to the community sites.…

This final report describes activities of a federally funded project which developed an educational computer-assisted instructional program for persons with severe disabilities. A preliminary review of the literature identified specific inadequacies of most software for this population, such as: too few examples of a task or concept thus limiting…