Suggesting that a whole language approach can build a foundation that gives all primary students an opportunity to succeed, this book presents nine thematic units (with suggestions for presenting specific skills on a weekly basis) designed to support the skills necessary for creating a strong literacy foundation. Lesson plans in the book are keyed…

This collection of readings is intended to provide teachers of children who are blind or visually impaired with guidelines and strategies for teaching the reading and writing of braille. The eight chapters are: (1) "Braille as the Primary Literacy Medium: General Guidelines and Strategies" (Diane P. Wormsley); (2) "Fostering Emergent Literacy"…

This study examined the utility of electronic mail (e-mail) as an instructional tool for limited-English-proficient (LEP) adult females who have made little progress in learning writing in English as a Second Language (ESL). Six subjects, aged 30-50 years, enrolled in a university ESL program produced 25 e-mail exchanges with the research over a…

Noting the crucial role parents play in their child's academic success, this book offers parents guidance in supporting their child's education in the primary grades. The book's chapters are: (1) "Learning in the Early Grades," including questions parents ask, what 6- to 8-year-old children are like, principles that make learning effective, why…

This handbook was created through participatory research between November 1989 and July 1990. It includes ideas, experiences, and stories contributed by learners, tutors, teachers, and organizers at St. Christopher House, a group home for people with disabilities in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The handbook contains five sections: (1) who are the…

This book is the product of a collaborative partnership between the two authors to develop a year-long literary/literacy program for first grade children based on bridging learning in the library and the classroom. Some of the objectives of the program described in the book are: to provide opportunities for children to experience personal…

These four volumes of a quarterly newsletter offer a collection of articles on teaching English as a Second Language to refugees. The volumes in this document are: Volume 7, Fall 1999 - Special Edition; Volume 8, Spring 2000; Volume 9, Spring 2000; and Volume 12, Fall 2002. Topics covered in these volumes include: "Fort Dix, NJ: Operation…

This action research study examined what writing strategy, process writing approach, free, or informal writing, was the most effective with students with learning disabilities. Five students (ages 13-15) in a self-contained eighth grade language arts class were observed while they learned the three different writing strategies. The process writing…

Students can learn a number of words in any given day from television, parents, through reading, and through classroom activities. The activity in this lesson plan focuses on students expanding their written vocabulary to make writing passages more vivid and pleasurable to read. The lesson provides an opportunity for individual and group work, all…

An instructional module designed to help prepare college-level teaching assistants (TAs) for their duties in second language instruction is presented. The module's focus is on second language writing instruction. It first considers the role that writing plays in the teacher's life and the lives of the students, the teacher's attitudes toward…

In early stages of writing, the writing process encourages "writing the way we talk," but in the end students are expected to write as academicians: a student must control his/her written level of language. For English speaking students, needing to belong to ingroups, and the casual attitude of American society both contribute to students'…

The report describes a grammar program designed to reduce structural errors in written tests on non-native students of English. Subjects were 20 college English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) students of different language backgrounds. The program's objectives were to (1) reduce grammatical errors in the students' writing by 20 percent, (2) improve…

This case study of electronic correspondence and interactions shares some things that seemed to work and some that didn't when a seventh grade remedial reading class chatted online with a university-based professor of curriculum and instruction. The middle school students and teacher became quite interested in this activity. These students were…

This paper investigates the writing revision strategies employed by Taiwanese English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) college sophomores. Nine English majors participated in this study. Participants revised their second drafts based upon teacher feedback--both written and oral. Data were gathered from verbal self-reports, semi-structured oral…

This study examined English-as-a-Foreign-Language (EFL) college students' attitudes toward and use of feedback on their written work in an Academic English (AE) course, highlighting two students who used very different strategies regarding feedback in one-to-one teacher-student tutorials. Participants were students enrolled in the AE course within…