This historical account of the development of the manual alphabet in American Sign Language traces fingerspelling back to the monks of the seventh century, who devised a system for representing speech without needing to speak. (Author/VWL)

Children (n = 122) and adults (n = 200) with dyslexia completed rapid automatic naming (RAN) letters, rapid automatic switching (RAS) letters and numbers, executive function (inhibition, verbal fluency), and phonological working memory tasks. Typically developing 3rd (n = 117) and 5th (n = 103) graders completed the RAS task. Instead of analyzing…

Acquisition of orthographic knowledge and phonemic sensitivity are processes that are central to early reading development in several languages. The language-specific characteristics of the alphasyllabaries ( Bright, 1996), however, challenge the constructs of orthographic knowledge and phonemic sensitivity as discussed in the context of…

VOLUME TWO, UNITS 16 THROUGH 25, CONTINUE THIS INTRODUCTORY COURSE IN URDU. THE GENERAL FORMAT IN THE FIRST FIVE UNITS IS CONSISTENT WITH VOLUME ONE (IN WHICH THE SOUNDS, BASIC STRUCTURES, AND WRITING SYSTEM WERE INTRODUCED). THE LAST FIVE UNITS BEGIN WITH AN ESSAY WRITTEN IN URDU SCRIPT FOLLOWED BY A VOCABULARY SECTION, WHICH TOGETHER REPLACE THE…

Examines the notion that words are sometimes perceived with greater ease than letters and that word shape sometimes plays a role in the perception of words. The data collected from 40 Israeli kindergarteners revealed that beginning readers found it easier to identify single letters than whole words, thus refuting the above notion. (Author/AS)

"Children's Choices," a project of a joint committee supported by the International Reading Association (IRA) and the Children's Book Council, is published annually in "The Reading Teacher." Books recommended by children are grouped by levels: Beginning Reader (ages 5-7); Young Readers (ages 8-10); and Advanced Readers (ages…

The purpose of this study was to describe literacy instruction in child care centers, examine aspects of child care center quality that may predict such instruction, and provide a limited analysis of whether literacy instruction impacts children's concurrent pre-academic functioning. Staff and children in 103 classrooms serving preschool-age…

This study assessed the effects of multi-sensory training on the understanding of the alphabetic principle in kindergarten children from low socio-economic status families. Two interventions were compared, called HVAM (visual and haptic exploration of letters) and VAM (visual exploration of letters). The interventions were conducted by either…

This Spanish language workbook is intended to help elementary school children learn the Spanish alphabet. Each page presents a letter of the alphabet, a number of Spanish words beginning with that letter, and pen and ink drawings illustrating some of the words. The drawings are suitable for coloring. (AMH)

Third year results (Grade 2) are reported for the Initial Teaching Alphabet (i.t.a.) study, selected as an experimental reading medium because its symbol-sound consistency makes learning to read a simpler task. Instruction was begun at the kindergarten level. The study investigated whether the i.t.a. program helps improve the reading skills of the…

The origins of written language and the study of the alphabet's evolution from pictographic icon or glyph to phonetic, syllabic code are fundamental to the study of writing. Electronically-generated typographies have reawakened interest in letterforms, alphabets, typefaces, and the physical arrangement of words on the page. Fonts, a word that…