Noting that children's perceptions of literacy and of themselves as learners differ from those of adults, this book documents how Sarah, from the ages of 2 to 5 years, understood literacy and invented reading and writing for herself. Numerous reading and writing samples in the book, organized around broad research questions, present Sarah as an…

Adding new chapters on emergent literacy, special needs children, and technology in the reading/writing classroom, the second edition of this book emphasizes that teaching children how to read and write is not enough--teachers must create an environment that invites children to want to read and write for real, communicative purposes. Chapters in…

Preservice teachers must see appropriate instruction in action; they must see content in conjunction with process. Content, process, and active student involvement are necessary for the creation of new cognitive structures that are congruent with the view that reading is an interactive-constructive process. Three types of literacy course…

Based on the premise that elementary students must be engaged in frequent reading, writing, and speaking throughout all areas of an integrated curriculum, this book is intended for a first course in language arts for preservice teachers. The book can also be used for courses in which reading and language arts theory and methods are combined. The…

A study analyzed think-aloud protocols to investigate and describe what readers who are developing proficiency do as they read. Subjects, three sixth-grade middle-school boys (with grade point averages of 3.0-3.5 on a 4-point scale) from a small West Virginia suburb, read aloud 16 text sections (from one to four sentences in length), thought aloud…

Designed to help parents in their important role as their children's most powerful guide to reading and learning, this book contains directions, guidelines, and activities to build a positive environment and a relationship that promotes learning. Chapter titles are: (1) Helping Children with Reading and Learning; (2) Creating Interest and Positive…

This booklet (one of a series of 10 booklets in a reading project to benefit Kosair Children's Hospital in Louisville, Kentucky) contains five stories especially written for kindergarten children by educators. The stories are about: the importance of using a seatbelt; a child's first experience of a hospital; a visit to an emergency room; a…

This booklet (one of a series of 10 booklets in a reading project to benefit Kosair Children's Hospital in Louisville, Kentucky) contains nine stories especially written for first graders by educators. The stories are about: illness and accidents; accident prevention; children's reactions to hospital stays; the first day of school; a death in the…

This booklet (one of a series of 10 booklets in a reading project to benefit Kosair Children's Hospital in Louisville, Kentucky) contains 10 stories especially written for second graders by educators. The stories are about: illness and accidents; accident prevention; children's reactions to hospital stays; the death of a pet; a child's view of…

This booklet (one of a series of 10 booklets in a reading project to benefit Kosair Children's Hospital in Louisville, Kentucky) contains 10 stories especially written for third graders by educators. The stories are about: various kinds of disabilities; accidents and accident prevention; childhood illnesses; children's reactions to hospital stays;…

Educators are now stressing that teaching students to be independent learners who learn to plan, structure and regulate their own learning activities, should be central to instruction. Studying word parts and origins has the potential for metacognitive instruction. Learning about the importance of context clues is also potentially metacognitive,…

Assessors of literature learning have long been concerned with the issue of difficulty and the fundamental contradictions in the term "examination of literary understanding." An alternate view of literature is that although texts are finally indeterminate, a group of them has been set aside by communities as forming a part of the…

A reprint of a classic review of research and research tends on reading that originally appeared in 1941 as the article "Reading" in the "Encyclopedia of Educational Research," this monograph sets forth the views of William S. Gray, an eminent reading educator and theorist. The 11 sections of the review discuss the following topics: (1) the…

Research was conducted to investigate the interactions among component processes of reading and to determine if a hierarchical training model, in which particular reading components are developed sequentially, is an effective way to build reading skills for a target population. Three game-like microcomputer training systems were constructed, each…

This study examines how third and fourth grade children work with a representative sample of test items designed to measure reading comprehension. The developmental and ethnocultural problems that children experience (whether they are rooted in the passage, the tasks, or the entire item) are discussed. From a passage-based perspective, the items…