Learning disabled students can perform tasks to understand seven "metagrammars," organizational structures in writing: (1) narration, (2) chronology, (3) location, (4) analogy, (5) origin, (6) taxonomy, and (7) description. Charts can sensitize students to the various types of organizations. (CL)

Describes a technique that draws upon popular children's literature to help children learn more complex sentence structures through a sentence modeling cycle. Lists books that are appropriate for use with the technique. (FL)

The Read/Write for Personal and Economic Growth program starts with the writing of three-sentence paragraphs that contain a topic sentence and two major detail sentences. The program begins with short passages so that adult learners can experience immediate success. As learners progress, they receive help on such problems as sentence fragments,…

Written for the third- and fourth-grade levels, this workbook gives students practice in using context clues and reading comprehension to apply punctuation rules, as well as in carefully reading and following directions. Noting that the activities are based on the idea that punctuation is necessary to make written communication clear, the…

Proposes that rather than "water down" children's reading materials, educators should help students deal with the complexities of connected discourse so that they can learn to appreciate the richness of the language. Offers a number of teaching ideas for achieving this goal. (FL)

Provides several typical negative sentence structures, discusses why children find them difficult, and suggests how to begin teaching them to handle negatives. (FL)

This workbook is designed as an introduction to the "Editor in Chief" series, which reinforces the rules of written English. In this workbook, student first review the rules of grammar and mechanics using multiple-choice questions; then the students learn to apply these rules in context by editing stories in a variety of formats. This "Beginning"…

Written for the fifth- and sixth-grade levels, this workbook gives students practice in using context clues and reading comprehension to apply punctuation rules, as well as in carefully reading and following directions. Noting that the activities are based on the idea that punctuation is necessary to make written communication clear, the…

Written for the seventh- and eighth-grade levels, this workbook gives students practice in using context clues and reading comprehension to apply punctuation rules, as well as in carefully reading and following directions. Noting that the activities are based on the idea that punctuation is necessary to make written communication clear, the…

This lesson plan can help teach primary students about sentence structure, rhyming words, sight words, vocabulary, and print concepts using a weekly poem. These important skills for reading and writing are demonstrated in a whole-to-parts approach using engaging poems, shared reading, and independent activities. During five 15-minute class…

Discusses background information about the deaf that may be useful to reading teachers working with older deaf students; suggests additional sources of information on sign language and reading instruction for the deaf. (MKM)

Methods for teaching students to recognize and manipulate structures of cohesion in reading materials are discussed. Teaching students to connect text involves a strategy that combines reading and writing in student- and teacher-directed activities. An example illustrates how the strategy can be applied with specific course content, a ninth-grade…

A contract deliverable on the NIE Communication Skills Project, this report consists of three separate documents describing the instructional implications of the analytic and empirical work carried out for the "Classroom Instruction in Reading Comprehension" part of the project: (1) Guidelines for Phrasal Segmentation; (2) Parsing Tasks…

Argues that there is sufficient reason on both theoretical grounds and the results of research and demonstration to encourage and include writing as one aspect of a reading improvement program. Describes several writing activities for use in such a program. (FL)

Designed to provide specific instructional suggestions for integrating basic reading and writing instruction in the elementary school, the lesson ideas presented in this booklet are applicable across grade levels and can be used with any basic reading and language arts textbook series. The 30 ideas cover a variety of areas, including the…