This nontechnical guide for parents and teachers examines learning to read from infants' babbling to the fluent reading of children reading independently for pleasure. Chapter 1, "Baby Speaks," describes language development in infancy. Chapter 2, "Our Alphabet: Language by Ear and by Eye," presents the alphabetic system and…

The purpose of this study was to determine whether children learning to read in the initial teaching alphabet (i.t.a.) and traditional orthography (TO) differ in general attitudes toward reading, in fluency in written expression, and in reading vocabulary and comprehension at the end of their second-grade school experience. Further, this study…

This longitudinal study compared the longterm effects of beginning reading instruction in traditional orthography (TO) and the initial teaching alphabet (i.t.a.) on two pupil populations comparable in intelligence, socioeconomic status, and preschool experience. Teacher and school factors were rigorously controlled. A continuous comparison of…

Data from four of the Cooperative First Grade Studies (1964-1965) were reanalyzed for four first grade projects, (Fry, Hayes, Mazurkiewicz, and Tanyzer). These projects were selected because they compared the Initial Teaching Alphabet approach with traditional orthography-basal reader approaches. The focal point of this reanalysis was to study the…

Article discusses the remedial learning of reading for the teaching of the English language to those who come to school with deficient verbal skills, and for others who simply want to enjoy a satisfactory life. (Author/RK)

A study was conducted to determine the influence of a holistic versus a phonic approach in beginning reading on children's comprehension scores at the end of grade two. Two groups, each of approximately 350 students, were studied. Group one began reading instruction in first grade using the "Early-to-Read i.t.a. Program" (initial teaching…

The Oakland County, Michigan, first-grade study of the effectiveness of three approaches to beginning reading was extended to the second and third grades to investigate differences in their effects on reading and related language development. Each of 11 research teams chose three classrooms which used either the Initial Teaching Alphabet approach…

As part of a two-year project that examined the processes by which children initially approach the reading task, a study was devised to test the project's materials and procedures. Selected by a pretest, four kindergarten children, with no prior reading instruction, were taught the same reading content using the initial teaching alphabet for a…

During the first year of the program, 27 individual projects enrolling approximately 20,000 first-grade pupils were involved. Fifteen of these projects participated in a second-grade followup study. Some conclusions based on an analysis of data are (1) that prereading knowledge of letter names is the best single predictor of reading achievement in…

In this document, points of view are presented by a group of educators and academicians whose common purpose was to explore the area of beginning reading. Articles deal with (1) definitions of reading and problems with the use of associated terminology, (2) various theoretical considerations of the processes of learning which apply to beginning…

The manuscripts resulting from the seventeen different current issues in reading that were discussed at the thirteenth Annual International Reading Association Convention in Boston in 1968 are published in this volume. The topics include reading research, content area reading, speed reading, comprehension, reading skill sequence, reading…