Historically, there has been concern about students losing reading ability over extended breaks from school, commonly in the summer, but studies of this phenomenon have produced inconsistent results. We applied exploratory visual analysis of multiple datasets to examine whether students in Grades K-5 appear to lose or improve in various reading…

Background: Prior research has indicated that high levels of motivation and subjective well-being can predict engagement in challenging academic situations and achievement. Yet studies in the field have yielded inconsistent results in young elementary school students indicating a need to further examine this topic. This is particularly urgent for…

Background: Parents play a crucial role in supporting children's literacy, especially in the first years of school. However, parents can find this challenging if they struggle with reading themselves. We explore whether family learning phonics courses boost parents' reading-related skills and ability to support their children's reading, in a…

Vacations may have detrimental effects on maths and spelling performance, but the findings for reading are less conclusive. The purpose of this study was to analyse the effects of summer vacation on early literacy skills of young children. Participants included rising first and second-graders, most of whom were at-risk, struggling readers. No…

Discusses two frequently recommended tests for the evaluation of visual perception in relation to reading ability: the Frostig Development Test of Visual Perception and the Bender Visual Motor Gestalt Test. Questions the content validity of the former and suggests that the latter is a reasonable predictor of reading achievement. (FL)

This study explores the long-term effectiveness of two differing models of early intervention for children with reading difficulties: Reading Recovery and a specific phonological training. Approximately 400 children were pre-tested, 95 were assigned to Reading Recovery, 97 to Phonological Training and the remainder acted as controls. In the short…

Investigates whether alternating the use of the eyes has a negative effect on reading ability and on timed visual-motor tasks. Finds that the reading achievement of eye alternators is no different than for visually normal children and that alternators are no more likely to have difficulty with visual motor tasks. (PRA)

Compares picture span performance of developmental dyslexic teenagers to the picture span performance of both reading and chronological age match controls. Finds all three groups showed a significant phonological similarity effect but only the dyslexic group showed a significant visual similarity effect. Discusses results in terms of developmental…

Examines and rejects the theory that the deaf have access to a "phonological" code. Recommends that if deaf children are to be introduced to a manual system of communication, it should be the syntactically adequate Paget-Gorman system. (Author/FL)

Compares the development of reading and spelling in a group of dyslexics and nondyslexics over a 5-year period (from ages 8 to 13 years). Notes that three distinct groups emerged: stable (identified at both ages), transient (identified at the younger age), and late emerging dyslexics (classified at age 13). Finds that dyslexic students do not…

This study evaluated a model of reading skills among early adolescents (N=174). Measures of family history, achievement, cognitive processes and self-perceptions of abilities were obtained. Significant relationships were found between family history and children's single-word reading skills, spelling, reading comprehension, orthographic processing…

Indicates a reasonable range of individual differences in the dark interval threshold (DIT). Reveals a significant interaction between DIT and illumination level in their effect on reading accuracy. Finds that children with a short DIT read more accurately in high rather than low illumination and that this performance was reversed for long DIT…

Suggests that, in the majority of the aspects of the reading process examined, there was a statistically significant interaction between illustration and difficulty levels. Finds that reading performance in the illustrated conditions was superior to that in the unillustrated conditions at the lower level of difficulty. (JD)

Compares the reading comprehension and accuracy and listening comprehension of West Indian and English children living in England and having equivalent intellectual abilities. Finds no significant differences between the cultural groups. (FL)