This paper describes one college's individualized-instruction approach to its freshman composition courses and offers suggestions for the implementation of individualized instruction in other freshman composition programs. The paper stresses that the courses should be competency based and self-paced. Other considerations that are important include…

This paper lists the language arts skills that are developed in elementary school children, including sentence writing, punctuation, capitalization, reference, poetry, listening, conversation, spelling, and handwriting. The degree to which children are introduced to these language arts skills depends on their grade level and capabilities, as well…

This paper proposes a study of the writing performance of superior twelfth graders and college English majors in three types of discourse: expressive, explanatory, and persuasive. The primary purpose of the study is descriptive, though the results of the descriptive analysis will permit a comparison of twelfth graders' writing with college…

This document is volume 4 of a four-volume report which describes the components of the Health Services Mobility Study (HSMS) method of task analysis, job ladder design, and curriculum development. Divided into three chapters, volume 4 is a manual for using HSMS task data and analysis results to develop curriculum objectives, guidelines, and…

Subjects in the study were 29 black and 73 white introductory psychology students, 90% of whom identified themselves as prospective teachers. As part of their classroom work, these students were randomly assigned to read an essay on urban life. Attached to the essay was one of two cover letters describing the theme's writer. These cover letters…

The components that one midwest community college uses in its remedial English composition program reflect applications of behavioral theory and include an explicit course goal; twelve small, sequential, cumulative instructional steps; explicitly stated behavioral objectives (based on Bloom's taxonomy in the cognitive domain); three forms of…

After considering various estimates of the extent to which there is a "literacy problem" in the United States, this paper develops an econometric model of the literacy program. Defining the volume of literacy as the total amount of information that people exchange through the materials they want or need to use, the volume of literacy is seen to be…

The acceptability of a sentence is dependent on context: some sentences look awkward in isolation but improve in an appropriate context, whereas other sentences look all right in isolation but fail to fit certain types of context. Of particular interest is the degree and specificity of textual fit of different thematic (theme-rheme, topic-comment)…

The demands of education reform in many states are constraining the time teachers have to prepare and teach new activities. Therefore, it would behoove environmental educators developing supplemental curricular materials to use their concepts to augment state reform goals. This study suggests that a biodiversity curriculum guide, using the…

A study investigated the effect of Frank O'Hare's "Sentencecraft" sentence combining program on the written syntactic skills, reading comprehension level, and speed of average ability ninth-grade students. The sample consisted of 75 experimental group students and 68 control group students. Following a pretest, the experimental group…

Applicable to kindergarten through grade 12, the individualized Language Arts composition program is based upon actual student experiences. Once student writing samples have been plotted on a diagnostic grid, the program's manual provides teachers with specific methods for meeting students' needs. Uniting cognitive, affective, and creative…

A study was undertaken to determine (1) the relationship between listening and reading (the receptive language mode) and (2) the relationship of listening and reading to speaking and writing (the generative mode), intellectual ability, self-concept, impulsivity/reflectivity, and socioeconomic status (SES). Sixty grade six students were…

In most colleges and universities, the task of assigning students to basic or remedial writing courses is handled the same way--students are tested during a summer orientation program by a combination objective and essay examination or during the first few days of the term by a composition instructor. Whereas the intentions of the testing are…

A random sample of 175 compositions on the same topic (a lost suitcase) was used in a study examining the correlations between holistic (single impression) and quantitative methods of evaluating student writing. The sample contained 25 papers from each of the following grade levels: four/five, and seven through twelve. A panel of three readers…

A study was undertaken to explore how five-year-old children approach becoming literate. Interviews consisting of eight core questions were conducted with each of 20 kindergarten children. The questions dealt with children's concepts about reading and writing, and about the purposes children establish for writing. Accompanying each set of…