Notes that information presented in dialog form in a foreign language lends itself more easily to conversation than does intricate narrative prose. Using background information on Halloween, the article adapts the text to present information about the target culture as well as to humorously present facts about the North American festivity.…

Describes how narratives can stimulate children's play and how it is possible to create playworlds. Shows how cultural context has a positive influence on children's quest for meaningful action. Asserts that a child's imagination is captured by the narrative, which gives objects and actions their meaning. Maintains that when adults play roles and…

Investigated the effects of both pre-task and on-line planning on second language (L2) oral production. Results show that pre-task planning enhances grammatical complexity while on-line planning positively influences accuracy and grammatical complexity. Pre-task planners also produced more fluent and lexically varied language than the on-line…

Undergraduate creative writing students (n=41) and 40 student journalists (n=40) wrote sentences in response to photographs. Responses were then scored according to Burner's theory of Narrative and Paradigmatic Thought. Creative writers scored significantly higher than journalists on narrative thought. Male journalists outscored male creative…

Compares the effects of drama and discussion as planning activities for narrative writing in the second and third grades. Finds that writing quality of the group that used drama activities (developing individual ideas for stories through paired improvisations and role plays) was significantly higher than that of the control group. (SR)

Describes a discussion between Cleanth Brooks and Eudora Welty about the state of the story in today's fiction. Characterizes the narrative form as the spine of literature. Points out that, too often, contemporary writers neglect this form of writing and instead emphasize a type of prose poetry. Notes that authors today overemphasize the present…

Narratives from three studies were analyzed using seven variables hypothesized to measure a variety of language abilities used in narrative production. Results indicated that the variables represented global organization of content, and within- and across-sentence structure. Variables representing sentence structure were most effective as…

The relationship between specific narrative skills and social class was studied in a culturally and racially homogeneous sample (51 4-year olds), focusing on narratives of economically disadvantaged children. Children from disorganized, chaotic and disadvantaged households were most likely to produce minimal narratives that were poorly planned.…

Explores how agoraphobia is realized through the activity of storytelling. Analyzes one agoraphobic woman's narrative to articulate the narrative structuring of a panic episode, the grammatical resources systematically recruited to portray panic as unaccountable and the protagonist as irrational and helpless, and a recurrent communicative dilemma…

This article addresses issues in determining normal development of narrative skills in school-age children and adolescents. It considers the purpose and use of norms in this area and research on currently available norms. It focuses on difficulties in compiling norms, including children's wide ability range and effects of situational variables,…

Historical accounts by fourth graders at the beginning stage of learning history show that these young students lack an experience-based framework for grounding and connecting historical teaching. Implications for teaching history to elementary school students and aspects of children's reliance on imagination in constructing historical narratives…

Children slow in expressive language development (SELD) at age two and matched normal toddlers were reevaluated at age four. Fifty-seven percent of SELD children showed chronic deficits in expressive syntax and morphology at reevaluation. Children with chronic language delay performed more poorly on narrative skill than their normal language…

Conducted a read-and-recall procedure with 40 individuals in Japanese courses, 20 native readers of Japanese, and 16 native readers of English. First language readers recalled high coherence texts (HCTs) better than low coherence texts. Advanced L2 readers showed a similar advantage for HCTs in their second reading. Texts used in the study are…

Explores whether children acquire semantic structures from early book reading experiences by examining similarities between discourse structures of stories read to and written by two small children. The generative relationship of prototypic and derived stories is demonstrated by the high correspondence between both constituent structure and…

Ten learning-disabled adolescents (LDs) performed a reading comprehension task below the level of same-age nondisabled students (NLDs) but at the same level as younger NLDs (YNDs). On a measure of incipient awareness of theme, LDs scored below YNDs. Why LDs have difficulty getting the point is discussed. (SLD)