This book focuses on how individuals learn to read, how motivations for reading or avoiding reading are built, how the cognitive characteristics of the learner can be used to select the most promising beginning approach, and how self-directed reading extends the cognitive and the affective world of the reader. The book covers the interaction of…

The final report of a project designed to review that status of reading achievement, instruction, and teacher education represents the results of a wide literature search covering the years 1960-70. A search of the ERIC system was supplemented by use of general and specialized references. Documents dealing with the subjects of literacy,…

Suggests that Whole Language is not the whole word approach, nor merely teaching skills in context, nor the Language Experience approach, nor a new term for the Open Classroom, but rather a point of view about language, literacy, and content learning. (JC)

Identifies three problem areas in teaching students with limited English proficiency to read: (1) the readers' input (what they bring to the reading process), (2) the author's input, and (3) the reading process itself. Recommends that teachers acquaint themselves with students' prior knowledge and language competence level and strive for a balance…

Describes a study of content area textbook use, in which three teachers' explanations of their use of textbooks differed from those derived from observations, and that this ambiguity may serve to confuse students. (HTH)

Examines the experience of reading student writing by holding it against current views of reading from literary theory and composition studies. Describes this experience as a concentrated effort at once to read and not to "read" the student writing. (MS)

Examines the strategies first grade students use when reading two types of materials--basal and student-authored. Finds that children used more efficient strategies and had better comprehension when reading student-authored stories. (MM)

Offers an approach to text analysis that discusses what makes good writing good. Argues that good writing involves the presentation of propositions that are not too dense, in a schema that is familiar or explained carefully, requiring not much inference on the part of the reader, and in a pattern that is coherent from beginning to end. (MS)

Describes the lack of substantial knowledge base about the nature of adult reading schemata and adult skill acquisition processes, posits reasons for the lack, and points out areas in adult reading that need to be addressed by researchers, such as materials, programs, and instructional methods. (SKC)

Explores opposing theoretical views on the effects of text underlining and reports on a study of 67 college freshmen. Finds that the subjects who generated their own underlining did not perform significantly better than those who were given experimenter-generated marking. (SKC)

Examines the present crisis embodied in the illiteracy impasse and advocates making instruction in the critical reading of literature the foundation of an integrated literature and writing curriculum that would help develop a working model of the imagination's real relation to language as a guide to the cultivation of literacy. (NKA)

Investigates the relationship between auditory and visual processing modality and strategy instruction in first- and second-grade children. Determines sentence strategy to be effective for both auditory and visual processing. (HOD)

Supports the hypotheses that (1) students of teachers trained to use explicit explanation are more aware of what they had been taught than students of teachers who are not similarly trained and (2) there is a significant positive relationship between teacher explanation and student metacognitive awareness. (PD)

For use by K-12 teachers or specialists, this book presents an informal classroom tool for assessing reading processes which is rooted in contemporary research and practice. The book features separate assessments for narrative and expository retelling, portfolio checklists to help analyze results, modeled "think-alouds," and an annotated…

Reflecting a constructivist approach to teaching and learning, this book presents the content of the language arts curriculum and the most effective strategies for teaching this content. The processes of reading and writing provide the foundation for the three instructional approaches presented in the book: literature focus units, reading and…