A picture can be interpreted in different ways by various persons. There is often a difference between a picture's denotation (literal meaning), connotation (associative meaning), and private associations. Two studies were conducted in order to observe the private associations that pictures awaken in people. One study deals with associations made…

Formal and functional similarities in a learner's first and second languages (L1 and L2) facilitate the perception of cross-linguistic equivalence between individual items (phonemes, morphemes, words, and phrases). The beginning foreign language learner makes frequent use of these perceived equivalences when he learns to understand L2 items. This…

A study examined the efficacy of the keyword method of vocabulary instruction by comparing it with five methods designed to increase semantic processing of the definitions of the vocabulary words. Subjects in all five experiments were college students. In the first three experiments, recall of the definitions from the vocabulary words was the…

The research literature suggests that the processes involved in language and cognitive development are similar in nature, especially during the early years. Both require some method for assimilation and accommodation of incoming stimuli, both appear to be continuous and hierarchical in nature, and both require the development and refinement of a…

Although traditional learning theories are based on a demonstrative view of cognition, human beings tend to reason both demonstratively and dialectically. To examine the dialectical theory five studies were conducted. In the first study subjects rated words that could be used as personality descriptors for likability and subsequently learned them…

The role of visual imagery in the learning of letter-sound combinations was investigated using such mediating images as two scoops of ice cream for the letter "m." In a preliminary study, high-, medium-, and low-strength mediating images were determined for each letter-sound combination. The 216 kindergarten subjects in the main study were…

THE RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN PREREADING MEASURES OF VISUAL-MOTOR-PERCEPTUAL SKILLS AND READING ACHIEVEMENT WERE STUDIED. SUBJECTS WERE 172 FIRST GRADERS. PRETESTS AND POST-TESTS FOR WORD RECOGNITION, MOTOR COORDINATION, AND VISUAL PERCEPTION WERE ADMINISTERED. FOURTEEN VARIABLES WERE TESTED. RESULTS INDICATED THAT FORM-COPYING WAS MORE EFFECTIVE THAN…

A REINFORCEMENT TECHNIQUE IN COUNSELING WAS USED TO MODIFY A FIRST GRADER'S ATTENDING BEHAVIOR. PRE AND POST MEASUREMENTS WERE MADE AND CUMULATIVE RECORDS WERE KEPT OF THE ATTENDING TIME IN COUNSELING SESSIONS AND IN ARITHMETIC LESSONS, AND A RECORD WAS KEPT OF COMPLETION VERSUS NON-COMPLETION OF ARITHMETIC ASSIGNMENTS. THE ASSESSMENTS MADE IN…

A study was designed to determine if the results of a previous investigation could be duplicated, and if so, whether the observed effect was independent of content. The results of the earlier study had indicated that shifting from one form or "code" of expression to another inhibits a student's ability to express a concept explaining a physical…

This study reveals that children from the age of four to six years are unable to segment meaningful sentences into component words. The experiment investigated three hypotheses of performance on a word-learning task for beginning readers and prereaders. Readers and prereaders were taught five words as oral responses, each word paired with a…

This study evaluates the effectiveness of a mnemonic procedure, called the keyword method, for teaching a large Russian language vocabulary to college students. The method divides the study of a vocabulary item into two stages. The first stage requires the student to associate the spoken Russian word to an English word (the keyword) that sounds…

The role of visual imagery in the learning of letter-sound combinations was investigated using such mediating images as two scoops of ice cream for the letter "m." In a preliminary study, high-, medium-, and low-strength mediating images were determined for each letter-sound combination. The 216 kindergarten subjects in the main study were…

A brief glimpse of the on-going process of loanword borrowing in a bilingual culture is accompanied by frequent examples. The phenomenon described as "reverse borrowings of English corruptions" refers to linguistic occurrences in which the native speaker adapts a loanword which is, in fact, a corrupted version of his native language which he does…

A study was made to determine how the rate of spelling and the retention of spelling words was influenced by the number and spacing of practice presentations on unlearned words. Sixth-grade students (42) in East Palo Alto were drilled by a computer for 6 weeks on six lists of 12 different spelling words each. They drilled on one list until (1)…

This curriculum is designed primarily for individualized classrooms where the teacher is working with an assistant, but has also been proven effective in traditional classrooms and in remedial situations. It is designed to test and teach children the basic abilities (readiness skills) assumed by the present primary-grade reading, writing,…