The purpose of this "Reading Aid" is to help teachers and other school personnel responsible for selecting readiness programs to evaluate those programs they are considering for selection. The programs reviewed here represent a cross-section of the many language and perceptual readiness programs available. The assumption underlying each of these…

To determine the effects of two facets of the adult's input in a child's acquisition of syntactic structures and vocabulary, fifteen classrooms of kindergarten, first, and second grade children from four middle socioeconomic class schools were assigned to either a literature group (which provided exposure to reading rich in varied syntactic…

Presented are issues, background information, and a definition pertaining to manual communication, and explored are aspects of language development in aurally handicapped children. Proposed is a functional definition of American Sign Language, with High(H) (a system that accommodates itself to English, such as manual English) and Low (L) (a system…

This cross-cultural study investigated methods of using drawing to develop the cognitive abilities of disadvantaged preschool children. Five teaching methods were compared in parallel programs in Tel-Aviv, Israel and Columbus, Ohio. The Traditional Method, in which materials are supplied but are not used to emphasize cognitive development was used…

This study explores (a) the relative effects of the Learning to Learn Program on the educational competencies of the experimental children (E) who attended the Learning to Learn Program as compared to control children (C) who participated in traditional preschool and primary grade programs; and (b) the developmant and longitudinal educational…

The Bilingual Education Program for 1969-70 was evaluated in this report. The program consisted of 1,220 Mexican American pupils in grades 1-3 in Harlandale Independent School District, San Marcos Independent School District, and St. John's Catholic School in San Marcos. Its primary objective was to provide a learning situation to meet the special…

This paper discusses some of the educational potential of psycholinguistic research. The first area discussed is the educational implications of the human capacity for acquiring language. Studies cited cover topics related to the universality of language acquisition, children's mastery of basic grammatical devices, neurophysiological states of…

This study investigated developmental changes in semantic structure, focusing on whether changes could account for differences in the concepts acquired by children and those acquired by adults. Semantic structure was determined at each of four age levels (6, 9, 12 years and college students). Two indications of developmental change were observed…

This text seeks to sensitize teachers and administrators to the language problems faced by culturally different children, to sharpen and broaden their perspectives regarding the relationship between language and culture, and to help them devise effective strategies for teaching language skills. The text is divided into three major sections. Part…

The purpose of this study was to test the effects of an experimental method of instruction upon the cognitive development of disadvantaged first grade children. The hypotheses formulated were: (1) there is no difference between the medians of the control and experimental groups or between the numbers of subjects in each group placing at the…

This research report examines the pronunciation that children give to synthetic words containing vowel-cluster spellings and analyzes the observed pronunciations in relation to common English words containing the same vowel clusters. The pronunciations associated with vowel-cluster spellings are among the most unpredictable letter-sound…

Three language models (Staats, Lenneberg, and Piaget) are reviewed, and implications for reading are suggested. Staats' behaviorist stance maintains that imitation, mediation, generalization, and discrimination are key concepts in language learning behavior. Critics contest the importance of these concepts and claim that behaviorists cannot fully…

Any theory of language acquisition must take into account the actual speech heard by children during the acquisition period. When 8 well-educated mothers were tape-recorded talking to their daughters, ages 16 to 30 months, it was found that their speech differed significantly from that spoken to another adult. The mothers used a more restricted…

This study of written language development and instruction of elementary school children found that realistic approaches are needed in teaching language usage, dialects, and registers. These approaches should include a nonrepetitive instructional system accounting for different linguistic abilities, a diagnostic evaluation of children's written…

Language as an identifiable cognitive behavior must be studied in relation to identity and memory, all of whose structures undergo progressive changes as the child develops. The organization of the development of the organism depends upon relatively ordered structures of growth, following foreseeable pathways or creodes. The processes occurring…