Investigates why some middle school students appear to be good decoders but have problems with reading comprehension. Shows that their listening comprehension was no better than their reading comprehension, and thus rather than needing further instruction in decoding, they require assistance in developing their general language and listening…

Listening and reading comprehension tests were administered to 180 children in grades 3-8. A regression equation was derived and applied to listening comprehension scores of seven children with reading difficulties. The procedure was determined to be useful in predicting reading comprehension and attributing it to poor decoding, poor…

Parent-teacher conferences are an opportunity to communicate a belief in the value of a successful partnership between home and school. Productive parent-teacher conferences require effective communication techniques. Teachers can facilitate the process with active listening, positive use of attending skills, good questioning technique, and…

A study of 78 women in Tilzapotla, a small Mexican town with an unusually strong commitment to education, examined decontextualized language and literacy skills related to oral and reading comprehension of health information and to speaking skills during a health interview. Length of schooling was related to most skills, but all measured skills…

Examined the validity of aural and oral self-report scales for determining the Fiji Hindi proficiency of new adolescent immigrants in New Zealand. Participants completed self-reports and performance tests (oral interviews, listening-comprehension tests, and vocabulary tests). Performance tests correlated strongly with self-reports. Respondents…

Discusses an effective model for improving the English listening comprehension of Korean college students. To achieve this, the focus of the experimental model is on three kinds of listening experience: pre-listening, while-listening, and post-listening. (Author/VWL)

The Voice of America English broadcasts have become a very convenient and accessible resource for Chinese students to learn English in China. Discusses one third-year listening course for English majors where VOA news items have been used and have proved very effective in developing students' listening skills. (Author/VWL)

Investigated the effects of three aural-advance organizers on student comprehension of second-language (L2) videotaped materials. Subjects were 160 low-intermediate Chinese students of English in Taiwan. Suggests that in preparing advance organizers for English-as-a-Foreign-Language students, teachers should focus on new words rather than on video…

Conducted a pilot study with learners of Spanish who had completed a 25-week basic language training at the Defense Language Institute's Foreign Language Center. Compared the listening and reading proficiency of 10 officers with 44 enlisted personnel, using t-tests and analysis of variance (with the Defense Language Proficiency Test as a…

Discusses multimedia software and describes the production and the learning rationale of a series of six multimedia CD-ROMs that develop the listening skills of learners of Business English. Describes problems of cost, time, and quality in producing multiple courseware and explains the programming solution which gives control to subject experts.…

Studied the impact of exposure to authentic video--a Spanish-language telenovela--on the second-language acquisition process of students studying Spanish at the university level. Measured the increase in listening comprehension that exposure to the soap opera would afford and tested the validity of the hypothesis that an increase in the quality…

This article explains dyslexia and characteristics of students with dyslexia and discusses types of instruction that are most appropriate for students with dyslexia, including multisensory instruction, explicit instruction, and phonemic awareness. It provides techniques for enabling students with dyslexia to succeed in reading, writing, listening,…

Analyzes the production and perception of illocutionary forms. Using a semantic neutralization procedure, the performance of children (5, 7, and 9 years old) and adults was compared in two experiments focusing on prosodic representations in production and perception tasks. (Author/JL)

A study involving three children who are deaf (grades 7-8) investigated the ways in which American Sign Language (ASL) and English-based sign allow for comprehension of text content. Retelling, proposition, and feature analysis scores indicate students understood the fable texts whether they were presented in ASL or English-based sign. (Contains…

Describes the design and implementation of a CD-ROM-based German exercise package for commercial distribution and a listening and culture package using interactive multimedia based on authentic German television programs. The project demonstrates how a set of specialized authoring tools can be brought to bear upon the real-world needs and…