The prerequisites of language acquisition are cognitive and pragmatic. The child's conceptual development and social needs direct his attention to particular linguistic forms. These provide an efficient selection device enabling the child to match his language learning task with his abilities. The second language learner who is cognitively and…

The 12 papers in this collection deal with trends in English education research. The papers discuss the following topics: (1) language awareness and schooling, (2) the language processes underlying literacy, (3) the role of oral language in early writing processes, (4) writing to learn in the humanities, (5) instructional effect on reading…

This report, designed especially for use by researchers, evaluators, and teachers, explores the practical implications of the composing process for writing instruction and assessment. An understanding of the actual process of text composition is presented as insights into how the acquisition of aspects of writing might be facilitated are explored.…

The activities depicted and the information provided in this book reflect the program for cultural awareness at The Learning Tree, a preschool located in Dallas, Texas. The material is presented in the hope that it will serve to increase children's acceptance of diversity and pluralism in American society. Six cultures are represented: Asian,…

This three-volume annotated bibliography cites 986 articles covering a variety of issues related to preschool education in several Eastern and Western countries, including England, France, Italy, Russia, Czechoslovakia, and Germany, as well as the United States. Entries are classified into 13 main categories: social and ideological basis of…

The normal sequence of development of Spanish phonology and Spanish grammatical patterns in the speech of native Spanish-speaking children, two to five years old, was studied to determine the syntactic structures and range of language variability at each chronological age level. Middle-class children, living in the Lower Rio Grande Valley of…

It is proposed that in studying the development of children's speech, the findings in the data are heavily influenced by what is expected to be found on the basis of our theoretical preconceptions. This phenomenon is actually more widespread than has previously been acknowledged, and our expectations about how children learn language may have to…

Intended for parents and teachers of blind, multihandicapped children in special schools; the booklet outlines practical suggestions for teaching children with varying degrees of handicap. Sections cover the following areas (subtopics in parentheses): visual handicap (degrees of blindness); motor development and mobility (suggestions for…

Infant bilingualism can be defined as a child being exposed to two or more languages from birth. Because of the dearth of first-hand research on the effect of a bilingual environment on a child's speaking patterns, parents from multilingual backgrounds raised their daughter in a bilingual environment, German and Spanish, in England. They speak to…

In order to examine the emergence of semantic notions and their interaction with the linguistic codes of bilingual children, this paper focuses on acquisition of a semantic field related to Piagetian tasks of conservation. The hypothesis examined in this study states that the manifestation of a concept will occur first in the bilingual's dominant…

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 20 titles deal with a variety of topics, including the following: children's sociolinguistics skills, ability to sequence verbal expressions, analogical abilities, and learning and application of the principle for nouns; Basil…

Designed for use with infants and children below the developmental level of seven years, the guide contains diagnostic and instructional information on skills in the following 11 areas (sample skills in parentheses): pre-ambulatory motor skills and behaviors, gross motor skills and behaviors (hopping, kicking, rhythm), fine motor skills and…

Intended for instructional personnel working with rural handicapped and nonhandicapped children (birth through 5 years), the documents provide English and Spanish versions of a checklist of behaviors to record an individual child's developmental progress, a card file listing possible methods of teaching these behaviors, and a manual of direction.…

The ten articles in this volume focus on the challenges of reading in the 1980s. Specific topics discussed in the articles include (1) the freely selected books of fourth and sixth grade students, (2) a student author project that served to integrate the language arts, (3) communication apprehension and its implications for communication…

This is the second of two volumes of working papers produced by working groups of the National Congress on Languages in Education. The papers in this volume are concerned with the relationship between the acquisition and teaching of the native language and the learning and teaching of other languages. The papers included are the following: (1)…