Sandra Smidt takes the reader on a journey through the key concepts of Jerome Bruner, a significant figure in the field of early education whose work has spanned almost a century. His wide-ranging and innovative principles of early learning and teaching are unpicked here using everyday language and the links between his ideas and those of other…

This article examines the role of capacity limitations in working memory for children with specific language impairment (SLI). Preliminary findings support the contention that capacity constraints play a role in language disorders and that variations in the presentation rate of linguistic models affect the ability of children with SLI to learn new…

This review considers aspects of normal mental storage and retrieval, storage and retrieval in disordered word finding, possible causes of word finding disorders, and clinical implications in both storage and retrieval components. Implications call for attention to increasing word knowledge, storage strength, naming accuracy and speed, retrieval…

This article examines the construct of working memory and its relationship to sentence comprehension difficulties of children with specific language impairment. Some sentence comprehension problems of these children may be related to inefficient management of working memory resources. Techniques for assessing working memory and enhancing the…

Discusses how laughter and joke-telling can be channeled in such a way as to enhance second language teaching. In addition, it is suggested that jokes can act as a dynamic in overcoming problems (such as lassitude) that arise in situations involving group work. (SL)

This article presents a functional understanding of the executive system, its development in childhood, its relation to communication effectiveness, and an everyday approach to intervention for adolescents with executive function impairments associated with traumatic brain injury (TBI) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. The role of…

This paper discusses five language roots of reading: phonology, syntax, semantics, short-term and long-term memory, and auditory segmenting. Teachers are urged to focus early school experiences toward development of these five skills to reduce the incidence of reading difficulties. Specific teaching suggestions are offered. (Author/DB)

This book offers the latest available information on central auditory processing disorders (CAPDs) drawn from a State University of New York at Buffalo conference on CAPDs in September of 1996. It is divided into three parts: introduction, management approaches, and specific methods and populations. Chapters include: (1) "Overview and Update…

Evidence is offered that children with specific language impairment often have serial memory difficulties. Research on the difficulties such children have in rote counting and in learning nursery rhymes is reviewed. Implications of current research for assessment and intervention in mathematics and rhymes are discussed. (DB)

This book contains articles from two issues of "Topics in Language Disorders" that focus on recent developments in the understanding of short-term memory, working memory, and long-term memory systems and their relationship to language comprehension, lexical development, early academic development, later academic development, and communication…

The memory deficits associated with the dementia syndromes of Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and Lewy body disease are outlined and related to the language impairments that have been observed in patients with these disorders. Assessment techniques are described, including commonly used individual tests and test batteries that assess memory and…

This book is intended to help professionals differentiate among processing disorders in children in kindergarten through high school so that intervention efforts can become focused and more effective. It explains how to differentiate among processing disorders, discusses the major processing models, explains assessment procedures, and outlines…

The first section of this manual provides background on storytelling and the importance of storytelling for children, describes the essential elements of the storytelling process, and discusses the place of storytelling in the schools. Language arts and creative skills developed by storytelling are also identified. Guidelines for choosing a story,…

Informal practitioner designed materials and activities, such as audiovisuals and word games, for training auditory attention and memory span in young language impaired children are described. (PHR)

Results of five experiments in which adults and children were exposed to two study strategies for vocabulary learning: (1) repetition of words with meanings and (2) associative elaboration (the keyword method). Subjects were asked to choose one of the two study methods for learning a 24-item list of new vocabulary words. (SL)