Many digital reading applications have built-in features to control the presentation flow of texts by segmenting those texts into smaller linguistic units. Whether and how these segmentation techniques affect the readability of texts is largely unknown. With this background, the current study examined a recent proposal that a sentence-by-sentence…

This study investigated the relative extent to which developing readers (6- and 9-year-olds) of English (deep) or Greek (transparent) orthography exhibit serial and exterior letter effects in letter position encoding. Participants were given a visual search task that required detection of a pre-specified target letter within a random five-letter…

The theoretical and practical implications of examining young children's acquisitions of phonological awareness skills with specific and differentiated processing tasks are explored in this study. The study presents data from 269 kindergarten children completing a phonological awareness protocol that provided information on 14 discrete…

Discusses the insights into learning to read derived from studying a foreign language later in life. Compares some phenomena of foreign language learning to similar reading phenomena observed in primary grade classrooms. (HTH)

A comparison of two models of the reading process--the psycholinguistic model, in which learning to read is seen as a top-down, holistic procedure, and the traditional theory model, in which learning to read is seen as a bottom-up, atomistic procedure--is provided in this paper. The first part of the paper provides brief overviews of the following…

COMPARISONS WERE MADE AMONG THREE APPROACHES TO DEVELOPING ENGLISH ARTS SKILLS, PARTICULARLY IN READING, WITH FIRST-GRADE CHILDREN FROM SPANISH-SPEAKING HOMES. PARTICIPATING CHILDREN WERE RANDOMLY GIVEN ONE OF THREE INSTRUCTIONAL TREATMENTS FOR ENGLISH-READING--(1) BASAL READING, (2) SECOND LANGUAGE READING, AND (3) LANGUAGE-EXPERIENCE READING. IT…

Using kindergarten subjects, a study examined whether prereaders learned better with visual cues while novice readers learned better with phonetic cues. (HOD)

A study examined whether illustrations that must be attended to in order to make sense of a text hinder decoding by encouraging dependence on such illustrations for interpretation of text, both for decoding and for answering questions. Subjects--167 first graders--were asked to read four stories, two of which were taken from basal readers and two…

THE RELATIVE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE SKILLS-CENTERED APPROACH AND THE LANGUAGE-EXPERIENCE APPROACH TO TEACHING READING TO DISADVANTAGED URBAN CHILDREN IN THE FIRST GRADE WAS EXAMINED, AND METHODS COMPARED. APPROXIMATELY 50 TEACHERS AND 1,150 STUDENTS MADE UP THE PROJECT SAMPLE. TYPES OF DATA GATHERED INCLUDED PRETEST AND POST-TEST SCORES OF THE…

The readings in this collection were prepared to accompany a report of a series of experiments conducted to determine what information readers, both skilled adults and children beginning to read, use when they read to understand a story. Titles of the readings are are (1) "Oral Reading: Does It Reflect Decoding or Comprehension?" (2)…

THE VIEW THAT READING IS A ROTE, AUTOMATIC, CONDITIONED, NONMEANINGFUL PROCESS WHICH PRECEDES (THUS IS SEPARABLE FROM) COMPREHENSION IS CORROBORATED IN A TWO-PART INVESTIGATION. IN PART I, EVIDENCE IS PRESENTED TO SUPPORT THE POSITION THAT READING IS A NONMEANINGFUL PROCESS. IN PART II, A STUDY OF THE EFFICACY OF AN AUDITORY APPROACH TO…

A series of experiments were conducted to determine what information readers use when they read to understand a story. The experiments examined both skilled adult readers and children beginning to read. Oral reading was used both because elementary school teachers frequently ask children to read aloud and because oral reading provides an…

A comparative analysis evaluated three studies that dealt with the differences among five-year-olds that should be considered before reading instruction is initiated in kindergarten. The premise of the comparison was that children from different countries (especially Israel, where these studies were conducted), have different abilities, react…

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 68 first graders to identify what ideas young readers hold about the reading process. Specifically, the study questioned whether good and poor readers held the same views about how they learned to read, what they and others did as they read, their reading ability, and why people read. The responses of…

Studies the development of word-retrieval speed and its relationship to reading in 72 average and 11 severely impaired readers in kindergarten through the second grade. (HOD)