This paper argues that it may be much more damaging, psychologically, to try to correct the written usage of persons whose nonstandard written forms correlate with their spoken dialect than to try to correct the nonstandard written forms of persons who do not use nonstandard forms in their speech. It is possible that nonstandard speakers will view…

Forty-eight Black children, ages 4 to 9 years, who utilized features of Black English in their oral language, participated in a study which investigated selected linguistic features believed to be a function of age among children. (Author/MH)

IT IS IMPORTANT TO RECOGNIZE THAT APPALACHIAN CHILDREN ARE NOT ILLITERATES. THEY HAVE A VERY SOPHISTICATED LANGUAGE WITH WHICH THEY COMMUNICATE EFFECTIVELY WITHIN THEIR OWN COMMUNITY. THEIR LANGUAGE SYSTEM, HOWEVER, IS NOT LIKE THE STANDARD AMERICAN ENGLISH, BUT IS LEARNED ALMOST EXCLUSIVELY FROM ORAL TRADITION AND HAS CHANGED VERY LITTLE FOR…

A curriculum guide was prepared for the teaching of standard oral English in the Los Angeles junior high schools. This guide focuses particularly on the teaching of standard English to Negro students using a nonstandard dialect. The lessons were designed for use with accompanying tapes and filmstrips. (See also UD 007703 for parallel program to…

The language proficiency of four groups of children, Negro and white, in one southern community, Lafayette Parish, Louisiana, is examined. The goals of this study were threefold: (1) to study the development of language patterns in first grade children from these socioeconomic groups; (2) to determine the effectiveness of the Gloria and David…

The experiment described in this report investigates two basic questions concerning beginning reading instruction to speakers of nonstandard dialects. 1--Will learning to read be facilitated if the primary reading material is phrased in the actual word patterns and grammatical structure used by the children in their oral speech? 2--Will learning…

The problem of teaching standard English reading and language skills to children who speak nonstandard dialects can be facilitated through a language program that distinguishes between "everyday talk" and "school talk," while recognizing the position of both types of speech. The instructional materials must be meaningful with respect to the…