This study reports the effects of instruction of elementary students in a complex package of social and academic skills designed for use in cooperative groups while studying important information in inclusive general education classes. Twenty-five teachers and 519 fourth and fifth graders, including 45 students with learning disabilities (LD),…

There is growing interest in disciplinary literacy instruction as a primary means of improving adolescent literacy outcomes. At times, this disciplinary framework has been represented as a replacement for the more broadly known general strategy instruction. However, disciplinary literacy, a potentially powerful idea, cannot replace general…

An analysis of the rationale and theoretical foundations of the Genius Discipline-specific Literacy Model and its use of SMARTvisuals to cue information-processing skills and strategies and focus attention on essential informational elements in high-frequency topics in history and the English language arts are presented. Quantitative data…

This comprehensive resource arms classroom teachers and administrators with information to meet today's adolescent literacy challenges. In Part I, the authors highlight research on what works with adolescent learners and discuss how to implement instructional programs to fit the unique needs of specific schools or districts. Part II presents a…

The effects of using the Embedded Story-Structure (ESS) Routine in a literature course were investigated. A heterogeneous group of 79 ninth graders, including 14 students with LD, were randomly assigned to one of two conditions, with instruction occurring in groups of 12 to 14 students in general education literature classes over a nine-day…

Demands of mainstream secondary and postsecondary settings on learning disabled (LD) students are reviewed, including demands to work independently with minimal teacher help and feedback, complete assignments, and gain information from large volumes of materials written at relatively high readability levels. Attempts to teach learning strategies…

The University of Kansas Institute for Research in Learning Disabilities has designed and validated a set of task-specific learning strategies to teach mildly disabled students "how to learn" so they can more effectively cope with increased curriculum expectations. (Author/CL)

Using a learning strategies approach, the article outlines specific procedures to promote acquisition and generalization of learning strategies in LD adolescents. First, students are taught a specific strategy in isolation before being asked to apply it to controlled materials and later, to transfer the strategy to regular class content. (Author)

While most efforts in programing for learning disabled adolescents have been directed to the content of instructional offering, the authors identify procedures to promote acquisition and generalization of skills. Exemplified within a learning strategies model, the procedures outlined here stress acquisition of specific strategies through learning…

Three aspects of the learning strategies model are discussed: its philosophy (that intervention should be based on principles of cognitive psychology and learning); its major components (including identification, decision making, and cooperative planning); and its application to a 15-year-old LD student. (CL)

Historically, most of the professional literature in the field as well as federal funding initiatives in research and program development have been directed at younger students with learning disabilities (LD). The prevailing assumption (or hope) has been that if intervention took place at a young age, many of the manifestations of the learning…

The paper argues that the strategies instructional approach should be infused into preservice teacher training programs. Reconfiguration of course structures and preparation experiences should include not only "what" is taught about learning and teaching, but also "how" teacher trainers incorporate the principles of strategies…

The strategies instructional approach developed at the University of Kansas Institute for Research in Learning Disabilities is described. The approach teaches students strategies in the academic, social, motivational, and executive functioning areas that will enable students to meet content learning demands and modifies instructional environments…

Despite numerous successes achieved by American schools in recent years, one of the remaining challenges is the large number of adolescents who lack basic literacy skills. Nearly 25 percent of 8th and 12th graders score below the basic level in reading on the National Assessment of Educational Progress and only 70 percent of all high school…

Reviews research on learning strategies instruction that has been conducted on students with learning disabilities. Outlines instructional principles on how to teach learning strategies to at-risk students, according to which teachers should teach prerequisite skills before strategy instruction begins; teach regularly and intensively; emphasize…