A considerable amount of learning, especially in the early years, is incidental learning. What is incidental learning? It is learning that occurs simply through exposure to the environment--what people hear, see, and experience. It takes place in the natural course of events, without intentionally directed instruction about how or what to learn.…

The difficulties hearing impaired students experience in acquiring the conceptual information underlying narratives is discussed in terms of schemata development and the role of incidental learning. Principles for teaching concepts and labels, elaborating the schema, using questions to fill in conceptual gaps, and using imaginary play and…

The development of children's language skills was studied in an experimental research project involving programmed versus incidental instruction in a prekindergarten program. It was hypothesized that children who attended a prekindergarten with programed instruction would score significantly higher on language skills tests than would a comparable…