This study examined whether the effects of context variables (i.e., perceptions of environmental factors) on student motivation are mediated by personal variables. It was hypothesized that effects from context variables are weak and would be totally mediated by personal variables in the beginning of the first high school year. It was also…

Investigates complex usages of language at home and school in spontaneous conversation of 30 girls four years of age, their mothers, and their teachers. While significant social class differences were found, in their own milieu working-class children displayed all essential verbal cognitive skills. Findings discussed in relationship to the…

Unclear professional norms create problems of role conflict for program evaluators. Four circumstances that produce role conflict and suggestions for dealing with each one are examined. The influence of organizational context on role conflicts is also considered. (Author)

One hundred high school students completed semantic differential ratings of themselves in general and in four roles: student, athlete, son/daughter, and best friend. Results suggest that self-concept is better conceptualized as multiple and differentiated rather than as unitary and global. (Author/RH)

Whether explicit-strategy instruction combined with whole-language instruction would improve third graders' spelling more than using either approach alone was studied with 37 students. Findings suggest that young children learn to spell best when they are taught a repertoire of effective strategies in a meaningful context. (SLD)

Examined effects among kindergartners of friend/nonfriend groupings on early literacy. Predicted that friend, compared to nonfriend, conditions elicit more conflicts/resolutions, emotional terms, and literate language; that friendship condition is particularly supportive for girls' exhibition of literate language and emotion terms; and that…

"Forbidden Signs" explores the debate between manualists and oralists in deaf education into political, pedagogical, scientific, philosophical, historical, racial, sexual, economic, and linguistic contexts. The biggest weakness of the book is that it is a history only of the attitudes of hearing people toward oralism and manualism. (SLD)

Understanding situated learning requires bridging sociocultural and cognitive theories. The reconciliation of cognitive and sociocultural theories provides a basis for accounting for ways situations influence the coconstruction of knowledge. The proposed framework accounts for the complementarily of the two perspectives and shows how arrangements…

Argues that social language should be delayed in a second language course until a core of factual language has been built up. The article presents an account of verb-form clustering and of some of the problems caused by discrete treatment of verb forms. It also suggests how to implement verb clustering within the context of syllabus design. (11…

Shows that variation in the composition of the lexicon at token-level between more and less formal oral styles is identical to the variation between written and oral discourse. The article argues that speakers deictically anchor their utterances in a non-linguistic spatio-temporal context and that the degree of context-dependence is reflected in…

Replies to Billig's (1995) critique of his paper on the relations between language and ideology. The article argues that the paper critiqued is tentative and maintains that social cognition should not be reduced to structures of interaction or rhetoric. The article also emphasizes that ideologies are crucial in the cognitive and social management…

Collected longitudinal data from rural, African American, single mother-headed families with young adolescents to examine longitudinal links between contextual risks, parenting, and youth outcome. Accumulated risks related to lower levels of the competence-promoting parenting practices that were linked directly with youth outcomes via youth…

Presents a response to Gifford-Smith and Brownell's "Childhood Peer Relationships: Social Acceptance, Friendships, and Peer Networks" (this issue). Focuses on the interaction of context, children's social skillfulness, and the type of peer relationship targeted as central elements in conceptualizing effective interventions. (Contains 12…

Mother and child dyads were videotaped four times over 16 days as they repeatedly read an initially unfamiliar storybook. Results are discussed in terms of maternal scaffolding approaches, child participation, importance of context and the nature of the task, and implications for intervention. (Author/VWL)

The role of contextual factors in intelligibility was examined using sentences produced under varying conditions by a speaker with severe flaccid dysarthria. Results indicated that gestures, predictiveness, and context influenced intelligibility. It is argued that when signal fidelity is poor, different combinations of signal-independent…