The 1983-84 Chapter 1 Reading Program of the Des Moines (Iowa) Independent Community School District is evaluated in this report. The first section of the report describes the project's operation, and specifically discusses the criteria used for selecting students' instructional methods and activities, how instruction was organized, parent contact…

One in a series on the status and progress of studies on the nature of speech, instrumentation for its investigation, and practical research applications, this document contains 17 research reports. Topics discussed in the reports are as follows: (1) dynamic modeling of phonetic structure; (2) coarticulation as a component in articulatory…

The manual supplements "English as a Second Language Program: A Support System for the Basal Readers," an oral language guide that is a compilation of objectives and activities that use a sequential and systematic approach to develop language skills and concepts. Designed to help teachers and other instructional personnel in the implementation of…

Four major categories are included in this annotated bibliography of materials for adult English as a Second Language (ESL) courses. The categories are: (1) general purpose ESL; (2) special purpose ESL; (3) teacher resources; and (4) ESL administrator resources. The criteria used in selecting the materials are that the materials are frequently…

Addressing the question of why some children manage to continue successfully through the later stages of literacy acquisition while others are unable to meet the challenges presented by fourth and fifth grade reading tasks, an 18-month, in-depth study was conducted of the home environment factors influencing the reading comprehension of second,…

One area explored in the second (in-depth) phase of the Learning in Science Project was "children's science," defined as views of the world and the meanings for words that children have and bring with them to science lessons. The investigation reported focuses on the concept of "electric current" held by 43 elementary school…

A review of several classroom observation and survey studies of comprehension instruction, content area reading for homework, and aspects of reading assignments raises the question of whether enough is being done in Irish schools to develop critical reading competency. It appears from these studies that many students are being left to their own…

A study of students' self-expressed test-taking strategies for reading comprehension tests in English as a second language (ESL) had as subjects 86 Hebrew-speaking university students in Israel. The students were given a reading comprehension test, half with open-ended questions and half with multiple choice. Half the responses were anonymous and…

Intended for students taking the English 30 Grade 12 Diploma Examinations in Alberta, Canada, this test (to be administered along with a questions booklet) contains the reading selections portion of Part B, the reading component of the June 1988 tests. Representing the genres of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and drama, the 10 selections consist of:…

Intended for students taking the English 30 Grade 12 Diploma Examinations in Alberta, Canada, this booklet contains 80 multiple choice test items related to the 10 selections in the reading booklet of Part B, the reading component of the June 1988 tests. The questions examine students' skills in: (1) understanding meanings; (2) recalling materials…

Intended for students taking the English 33 Grade 12 Diploma Examinations in Alberta, Canada, this test (to be administered along with a questions booklet) contains the reading selections portion of Part B, the reading component of the June 1988 tests. The following short selections taken from fiction, nonfiction, poetry, drama, and day-to-day…

Summaries of several papers are presented to develop a working theoretical analysis of reading comprehension and an understanding of development in language comprehension based upon empirical studies. Contributions from the areas of assessment, artificial intelligence, cognition (including schema theory), instruction, linguistics, learning…

The present study, using a sample of 1,491 grade 10 students from a mid-western province in Canada, examined the validity evidence on the Canadian Tests of Basic Skills. Factor analysis of the 34 micro-skills (content by skill/process classification of items) of the four tests indicated that the Reading Comprehension, Written Expression, and Using…

Parallel studies at universities in Israel, Finland, Canada, and the United States used a "selected deletion gap-filling test," a variation on the cloze procedure designed to measure reading comprehension by testing the reader's familiarity with cohesive links and grasp of text coherence. The test design responded to the growing demand for a more…

The study describes ten discussion activities designed to improve the communicative abilities of Japanese learners of English based on cultural instruction goals. The activities target intermediate and advanced students, but teachers can modify the lessons for false beginners. All exercises stress speaking and listening. They focus on topics…