The cumulative body of eye movement research provides significant insight into how readers process text. The heart of this work spans roughly 40 years reflecting the maturity of both the topics under study and experimental approaches used to investigate reading. Recent technological advancements offer increased flexibility to the field, providing…

"Individual Learner Differences in SLA" addresses the apparently insoluble conflict between the unquestionably individual character of the process of second language acquisition/foreign language learning and the institutionalised, often inflexible character of formal instruction in which it takes place. How, then, is success in SLA so prevalent?

In this article, I describe studies conducted over 25 years with secondary and post-secondary L2 learners in the United States. The evidence from these studies shows that there are important connections between students' early L1 skills and their L2 aptitude and L2 proficiency and that individual differences in students' L1 skills in elementary…

Functional neuroimaging may provide insights into the achievement gap in reading skill commonly observed across socioeconomic status (SES). Brain activation during reading tasks is known to be associated with individual differences in children's phonological language skills. By selecting children of equivalent phonological skill, yet diverse…

An account of one first grader's growth in writing and how his steady progress toward competence changed the way his teacher evaluated all children's writing growth. Chronicles the teacher's developing professional growth as she learned to look for the things mastered instead of the things still not understood. (ET)

A study was conducted to examine cognitive levels in adults (using Peel's tasks of logical judgment) and to assess their relationship to reading comprehension and various demographic variables. Subsequent to testing their reading comprehension with the California Achievement Test (CAT), forty-one adult education students ranging in age from…

Even Start is a family literacy and support program for families with young children. This paper identifies several characteristics of adult learners in order to suggest effective approaches for working with adults to improve literacy skills. The first section presents five case studies illustrating adults with different histories, circumstances,…

A project provided family literacy services in Lewistown, Pennsylvania. The "Together We Learn" project had four objectives: (1) promoting family literacy by using the Project PACT (Parents and Children Together) model in two 10-week sessions; (2) improving parents' basic skills so they can work better with their children; (3) assisting…

Presents a model of empirically supported instructional strategies for optimizing the mainstreaming of mildly handicapped students. Argues that such a model must account for the actual characteristics of mainstreamed students rather than the categorical designation applied to such students. The model is described within an overall model of…