The complexity of gear concepts, often misunderstood by young children, highlights the need for educational frameworks beyond simple play. To examine the effects of using the prediction, observation, and explanation (POE) model in building block activities, a true experimental design was implemented. A total of 49 preschoolers were randomly…

Parity is one source of automatic reinforcement that increases the probability of verbal behavior that conforms to models provided by the verbal community. Parity as a conditioned reinforcer could explain the acquisition of grammar in the absence of direct, explicit reinforcement. This possibility has been explored in previous research on…

Empirical and theoretical literature on cooperative problem solving in preschool children suggests that integrating features of play into structured, experimental settings should increase the benefits of joint peer interactions and task performance. Four- and five-year-old peer dyads completed a playful, flexible, and child-driven building task or…

This study sought to further investigate the effects of an observational intervention for two participants on the reinforcing property of pieces of string. Pre-observational intervention data showed that the neutral stimuli (strings) did not function to reinforce two participants' responding to a performance task or learning three new skills that…

Nursery school children were shown films to vicariously condition either fear or positive emotional responses in them. The children showed a higher rate of responding to the positive stimulus. (Author/KM)

Preschool children who did not group a set of geometric stimuli according to complete similarity on a pretest were taught classification wither in a modeling or in a reinforcement condition. Modeling was found to be an effective means of teaching classification behavior. (ST)

Tests the hypothesis that there is a relationship between children's comprehension of a syntactic form and the effectiveness of modeling in promoting imitation of that form. Subjects were 71 four- and five-year-old children. (Author/MP)

This study examined the effects of observational learning on preschoolers' attention to print, use of a questioning technique, and knowledge of the alphabet. Participating were 13 boys and 13 girls from a day care center at a community college, with a mean age of 4.3 years. Children were randomly assigned to one of three training conditions, each…

Investigated effects of observational learning on preschoolers' attention to print, use of a questioning technique, and knowledge of the alphabet. Found that young children are able to extract a concept or rule through a brief exposure to observational learning. (SD)

The reflections and theses on preschool children's literacy development presented in this book are the result of an experimental project carried out in Buenos Aires from 1974 to 1976. Chapter 1 discusses the educational situation in Latin America, traditional methods of reading instruction, contemporary psycholinguistics, the pertinence of…