This discussion of the Basic Skills Improvement Program (BSIP) formulated by the United States Congress strongly urges educators to develop programs that demonstrate the effectiveness of teaching basic skills in a comprehensive curriculum integrating reading, writing, speaking, and mathematics. The major functions of BSIP are explained as…

PHONICS INSTRUCTION IS A BASIC SUBJECT IN THE PRIMARY SCHOOL CURRICULUM. THE HARVARD-BOSTON SUMMER PROGRAM BEGINS WITH A DIAGNOSTIC TEST TO DETERMINE JUST WHAT SKILLS SHOULD BE TAUGHT. THE PROGRAM IS BASED ON THE CONCEPT THAT PHONICS IS THE SPOKEN WORD, THUS IT IS SUGGESTED THAT A LITERARY APPROACH BE USED IN WHICH THERE ARE A VARIETY OF WRITING…

AT THE UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA, TEACHERS USE INSTRUCTION IN LANGUAGE AS THE BASIS FOR INSTRUCTION IN COMPOSITION AND LITERATURE. FOLLOWING THE PRINCIPLES OF FRANCIS CHRISTENSEN, THE TEACHERS CONCENTRATE FIRST ON THE WRITING OF SENTENCES, THEN ON WRITING PARAGRAPHS. THE FINAL WRITING AND STUDY OF WHOLE THEMES ILLUSTRATE THAT THE DEVICES WHICH CONTROL…

THIS SOURCEBOOK WAS PREPARED AS A TEACHING SUPPLEMENT FOR USE IN THE LANGUAGE ARTS PROGRAMS OF RURAL ALASKAN SCHOOLS IN THE INTERMEDIATE GRADES. A WIDE RANGE OF MATERIAL IS INCORPORATED, INCLUDING THE AREAS OF LANGUAGE SKILLS, AVAILABLE TEXTBOOKS AND FILMS, TYPES OF COMPOSITION, AND EXTENSIVE SUGGESTIONS FOR CORRELATED ACTIVITIES IN THE AREAS OF…

Describing the early reader as one who has learned to read informally at home before formal schooling has begun, this paper reviews the literature on two aspects of early reading. The first aspect considered is the home environment of the early reader and the interactions with his or her parents. The second aspect considered is the process by…

As one of five modules focusing on writing skills, this module on spelling and vocabulary is intended for use in a one-semester course on written communication or as a supplement to other courses where written communication skills are included. Designed for both teacher-directed and individualized learning situations, this module contains learning…

The Regents Competency Testing Program has been designed to assure that all students develop adequate skills in reading comprehension, writing, and mathematics before graduation from high school in New York. This bulletin provides information on two of the program's three basic elements that contribute to the accomplishment of this goal. First,…

Elementary school teachers acknowledge the need for better writing instruction, but seldom have time for it within their already crowded curricula. Writing instruction suffers from placing skills development before writing activities, from emphasis on reading, and because many teachers are not well prepared to teach writing. A low priority is…

Noting that the idea of reading as a natural language communication process has been well established by research, this paper identifies learning strategies and suggests teaching methods for developing the young child's awareness of the communication nature of reading. The paper concludes that learning strategies based on imitation, drawing, and…

This book is designed to teach parents the skills necessary to enable them to help their teenage children who are having study problems. The book covers a wide range of possible difficulties from basic reading problems to researching and writing a full-scale report. The book includes discussions of alibis students use to disguise poor study…

A study of the writing of 11 minority group students in a college biology class explored two questions: (1) how the difference between well-shaped and poorly shaped writing could be described, and (2) how the various pieces of writing of an individual student could be compared. The study concentrated on a contrastive analysis of two pairs of…

A cooperative writing assessment program between a college and seven public school districts was designed to demonstrate that the writing skills necessary for adequate composing were not those that could be measured by an objective test. The goals of the program were to (1) analyze the rhetorical skills of sixth and eighth grade students, (2)…

The College Outcome Measures Project (COMP) was established to develop, validate, and implement measures of the knowledge and skills that undergraduate students are expected to acquire and that are important to effective adult functioning. The COMP Measurement Battery yields a "communicating" score based in part on a speaking assessment…

Combining concepts of cognitive theory with those of rhetoric and linguistics can help writing teachers understand the kinds of activities that will enable basic writers to produce syntactic constructions appropriate for the content they have generated. A review of research studies of sentence combining, syntactic constructions, grammatical…

The bulk of this guide is devoted to the detailed description of 18 tests of English as a second language (ESL). Most of the tests were produced in Great Britain, the remainder in the United States. Each description provides information on the source, aims, and administration of the test; outlines the content of the test; and, where pertinent,…