The article describes a series of 10 games designed to improve the communication skills of pupils with severe learning difficulties. The games encourage attention development, initiating comments, and giving and receiving instructions. (DB)

Compares two instructional programs--the structure of the Intellect-Learning Abilities and the Language Experience in Reading--utilized in a rural midwestern laboratory school. Reports no significant difference between experimental and control groups in four out of five operation areas, although the control group scored significantly higher in…

A study evaluated how well autistic and non-autistic Japanese primary children (N=35) were able to describe the events in a five-frame cartoon. Results are discussed in terms of cognitive ability and linguistic skills. Discussion focuses on how to help autistic individuals improve their language once they have acquired its rudiments. (DJD)

The Parent Infant Program of the Montreal Oral School for the Deaf provides individual guidance sessions, audiological assessment, parent-tot playgroups, home visits, parent education evenings, and a summer program. The benefits of a school-based program include continuity of diagnosis and habilitation as well as easing the transition from parent…

This article presents ideas to encourage speech and language in infants and toddlers with hearing impairments. Ways to embellish interactions in daily life to make speech/language aspects more salient are suggested, with a 2-minute example of such an interaction between a mother and her 13-month-old hearing-impaired daughter. (DB)

Some 76 hearing children in prekindergarten classes, half receiving sign instruction and half not, were tested on English vocabulary acquisition. Children who received the sign instruction scored significantly higher on the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test than children receiving sign instruction. (Contains 15 references.) (Author/LB)

Reviews two prevalent paradigms for language writing education: the social, using formalized methods to bring students of all backgrounds into mainstream academic literacy; and the developmental, emphasizing theories of language acquisition to enable students to approximate literacy through their cultural contexts. Argues against viewing these…

Several ways to extend the notion of second-language (L2) learning motivation are discussed. The motivational materials and techniques considered are well known in the fields of general, industrial, educational, and cognitive developmental psychology but have not been applied to the L2 field. (Contains 98 references.) (LB)

In a study of language anxiety, a video camera was introduced at various points in a vocabulary learning task. Observations of first-year university students of French revealed significant increases in anxiety when the camera was introduced, along with concomitant deficits in vocabulary acquisition. Implications for remedial action are discussed.…

Systematically explored how three different initial training contexts affect children's and adults' interpretation of novel action verbs. Subjects included 54 3-yearolds, 60 10-year olds, and 60 college-age adults. Findings suggest a hierarchy of verb learning strategies, especially among the youngest children. (DR)

Describes an instructional approach that encourages teachers to guide children in narrating stories based on actual or imagined experiences, particularly those that transpire in the classroom. Discusses ways of incorporating events from dramatic play and everyday occurrences into storytelling activities and offers a story sampler that exemplifies…

Sheltered instruction is described as a content-driven teaching approach that provides access to the core curriculum using techniques that make lessons more understandable, such as a slower speech rate, controlled vocabulary, and hands-on activities. The goal is for the student to learn content material in a way that facilitates development of…

Studied the relationship between parents' correcting of childrens' sentences and children's subsequent grammaticality. Found that parent's language corrections are related to children's subsequent grammaticality but that recasts of incorrect sentences serve as negative leading indicators of grammaticality. Also shows that correction and negative…

A time delay procedure was used to teach three children (ages 5-9) with autism to ask the question "What's that?" when novel stimuli were presented, and generalization of the skill was assessed. Results suggest that children with autism can be taught to ask questions that lead to acquisition of new information. (Author/DB)

The conversational interactions of 25 mothers and their 4.5-year-old children, who had been born preterm, were evaluated during a social problem-solving task. The subject mothers tended to approach the task as a vocabulary lesson, whereas comparison mothers tended to focus on the social negotiation aspect of the task. Possible explanations for…