Abstract: Thirty physical education students and 30 music education students read a passage that could be given either a prison break or a wrestling interpretation, and another passage that could be understood in terms of an evening of card playing or a rehearsal session of a woodwind ensemble. Scores on disambiguating multiple choice tests and theme-revealing disambiguations and intrusions in free recall showed striking relationships to the subject’s background. These results indicate that high-level schemata provide the interpretative framework for comprehending discourse. The fact that most subjects gave each passage one distinct interpretation or another and reported being unaware of other perspectives while reading suggest that schemata can cause a person to see a message in a certain way, without even considering alternative interpretations.

Abstract: In late 1967, Project Follow Through was reorganized to select, test, and evaluate promising but different educational programs for disadvantaged youngsters in the first three grades. Now, nearly ten years later, the completed evaluations of Follow Through suggest that one of these programs, the University of Oregon's Direct Instruction Model, has produced significant gains in measures of positive affect, basic skills, and conceptual reasoning. In this article, Wesley Becker discusses the distinctive features of this model—its underlying assumptions and basic teaching components. He then explores the implications of teaching reading and language skills to economically disadvantaged children and advocates that immediate steps be taken to teach vocabulary systematically throughout the school years. Viewing this goal as essential for compensatory education, he concludes with an analysis of how vocabulary instruction might best be implemented.

Abstract: The problem of sharing data among asynchronous processes is considered. It is assumed that only one process at a time can modify the data, but concurrent reading and writing is permitted. Two general theorems are proved, and some algorithms are presented to illustrate their use. These include a solution to the general problem in which a read is repeated if it might have obtained an incorrect result, and two techniques for transmitting messages between processes. These solutions do not assume any synchronizing mechanism other than data which can be written by one process and read by other processes.

Abstract: A possible account of the reading difficulty of certain aphasic-dyslexic patients includes the notion that they are impaired in translating the written word into a phonological code via grapheme-ph...

Abstract: The history of our knowledge about specific reading disability—dyslexia—is checkered with different hypotheses and theories. In this overview of the literature Frank Vellutino critically examines the foci of four prevalent explanations for reading failure in children: visual perception, intersensory integration, temporal– order perception, and verbal functioning. Applying findings from his own laboratory investigations and other selected research to each of the four hypotheses, Vellutino argues that the verbal-deficit hypothesis offers the most convincing explanation. Through the use of direct and indirect evidence Vellutino demonstrates the relationship between reading problems and dysfunction in the semantic, syntactic, or phonological aspects of language. Finally, Vellutino pursues the implications of his position and asserts that the linguistic problems of some poor readers necessitate an emphasis on the internal structure of words in learning to read.

Abstract: AUTHOR Smiley, Sandra S.; And Others TITLE Recall of Thematically Relevant Material by Adolescent Good and Foor Readers as a Function of Written Versus Oral Presentation. Technical Report No. 23. NSIUION Bolt, Beranek and Newman, Inc., Cambridge, Mass.; Illinois Univ., Urbana. Center for the Study of Reading. SPONS AGENCY National Inst. of Child Health and Human Development (NTH), Bethesda, Md.; National Inst. of Education (DHEW), Washington, D.C. PUB DATE Mar 77 GRANT EL-05951; HD-06864 NOTE 23p.

Abstract: The present study investigated the hypothesis that frequently found short-term memory deficits in poor readers may reflect a lack of ability or inclination to use efficient task strategies on some memory tasks. The performance of second-grade good and poor readers was compared on a task which allowed direct observation of the use of verbal rehearsal as a mnemonic strategy. Children in the 2 reading groups differed significantly in both total recall score and amount of verbalization (rehearsal) observed, with the poor readers obtaining lower scores on both measures. On a variation of the task which had been previously demonstrated to facilitate the use of rehearsal, the poor readers improved significantly in both amount of verbalization and total recall scores. On this latter task, the memory and verbalization scores of good and poor readers were not significantly different from one another.

Abstract: Kenneth and Yetta Goodman argue that reading, like speaking and writing, is an active language process in which readers display their sophistication as functional psycholinguists. The authors note, however, that it is difficult to gain access to and understand these active, underlying processes. To make such processes accessible, the authors advocate the use of oral reading as a data base. The Goodmans maintain that when oral readers depart from the written text—when miscues occur— the underlying processes of reading begin to be revealed. Using examples from children and adults, the authors present a typology of miscues and demonstrate how miscues provide a window on reading and other language processes. Throughout the article the Goodmans note the implications of miscue analysis for research and teaching.

Abstract: While a considerable amount of research has been conducted on learning disabled populations to determine their ability to decode and learn words in isolation, limited research has addressed the reading comprehension of LD populations. Pany and Jenkins compared the effects of three instructional strategies on reading comprehension. Specifically, the study measured recall of word meanings and recall of facts from a story. The authors discuss the implications of their findings for remedial reading instruction.

Abstract: In a task designed to separate perceptual processes from memory, 12-year-old children with reading disabilities showed no perceptual deficits as compared to their peers. However, they exhibited major deficiencies in memory skills for both labelable and nonlabelable visual information. Reading-disabled children in this age group appear to suffer from a basic information-processing deficiency.

Abstract: EXAMINES FUNCTIONAL LITERACY literature as it relates to the concept and its measurement. The concept is shown to be used in connection with measures which are assumed to yield information relating to functional reading skills, general cognitive competencies, and affective characteristics. Reviews measures of educational attainment, grade equivalency scores, and specifically designed tests of functional reading and competency; and specific shortcomings of such measures are presented. The lack of agreement as to what functional literacy is-and therefore the lack of agreement as to what should be measured-is shown to result in estimates of "illiteracy" ranging from I to 20 per cent. The authors propose that new measures be developed, that they exclude general literacy and functional competency, and that they be classified according to the practical information to be obtained and the decisions which are to be made from them. These might include determining listening, reading, writing, and calculating requirements of high school graduates; cognitive and affective information for use by potential employers; or abilities needed to obtain necessary information from various functional documents.

Abstract: AN EXTENSIVE body of normative literature suggests that reading to young children enhances their language develop ment (Templin, 1957; MacKinnon, 1959; Durkin, 1972; Department of Education and Science?Bullock, 1975) and is related to reading success (Almy, 1958; Durkin, 1972, 1974). Educators have urged frequent oral reading to young children in the belief that "language is as much caught as it is taught" (Durkin, 1972). Several methodological texts on the teaching of reading urge parents to read to young children because books and stories provide children with "models of book language"-an extremely important concept for young children (Durkin, 1972). Few educators will disagree with the need for reading to young children, but even fewer educational researchers have investigated the most efficacious ways in which this reading should be done. Sir Allan Bullock's report, A Language for Life (1975) addresses the how of reading to young children by stressing the importance of the emotional implications of the child's first contacts with books. The report advised: "The best way to prepare the very young child for reading is to hold him on your lap and read aloud to him stories he likes?over and over again." One of the few empirical studies on the effects of style of reading to young children upon the child's cognitive growth was reported by Swift (1970). His parent training program, a component of the Get Set Program in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, enabled mothers of preschool age children to lengthen thoughts, elaborate upon ideas, and

Abstract: The results of a recent study (Liberman, Shankweiler, Liberman, Fowler, & Fischer, 1977) suggest that good beginning readers are more affected than poor readers by the phonetic characteristics of visually presented items in a recall task. The good readers made significantly more recall errors on strings of letters with rhyming letter names than on nonrhyming sequences; in contrast, the poor readers made roughly equal numbers of errors on the rhyming and nonrhyming letter strings. The purpose of the present study was to determine whether the interaction between reading ability and phonetic similarity is solely determined by different rehearsal strategies of the two groups. Accordingly, good and poor readers were tested on rhyming and nonrhyming words using a recognition memory paradigm that minimized the opportunity for rehearsal. Performance of the good readers was more affected by phonetic similarity than that of the poor readers, in agreement with the earlier study. The present findings support the hypothesis that good and poor readers do differ in their ability to access a phonetic representation.

Abstract: Summary Almost every child aged 15–16 1/2 years being educated in schools for the deaf and partially hearing in England and Wales, was given Brimer's Wide-Span Reading Test which assesses prose comprehension After excluding certain categories of children, results were available for 355 children With degree of hearing loss as the main independent variable, results are presented in terms of mean and median reading age, and in reading age percentile form Reading is significantly affected by degree of deafness and by non-verbal intelligence Though the presented reading ages are with reference to hearing norms, other criteria for assessing the reading performance of deaf children are discussed

Abstract: The purpose of this study was to determine the relative predictive accuracy of a number of measures employed in a 4-year longitudinal study of the neuropsychological abilities of normal and retarded readers. The results indicated that there were some very accurate predictive measures of reading and spelling achievement levels over the 4-year age span studied, and that the relative accuracy of these measures differed markedly for normal and retarded readers. Especially in the case of retarded readers, performance on the Underlining Test was a much more accurate predictor of eventual achievement levels in reading and spelling than were tests of reading, spelling, or psychometric intelligence.

Abstract: AUTHOR Lamy, Darlene; Jenkins, Joseph R. TITLE Learning Word Meanings: A Comparison of Instructional Procedures and Effects on Eeasures of Reading Comprehension with Learning Disabled Students. Technical Report No. 25. INSTITUTION Bolt, Beranek and Newman, Inc., Cambridge, Eass.; Illinois Univ., Urbana. Center for the Study of Reading. SPONS AGENCY National Inst. of Education (DREW), Washington, D.C. PUB LATE Mar 77 CONTEACT 400-76-0116 NOTE 34p.

Abstract: A presentation is given of a strategic-process perspective on the development of reading skills. The approach integrates reading research with developmental findings in cognitive psychology (Brown,...

Abstract: For many years researchers and educators have sought to specify the prerequisites for learning to read Physical, intellectual, and perceptual factors are often cited as the necessary precursors Frank Smith has often argued that reading is not a matter of decoding but consists of bringing meaning to print In this essay Smith claims that the essential antecedents of reading consist of two cognitive insights: that written language is meaningful and that written language is different from spoken language Smith discusses the importance of each of these insights and explains how children typically learn them He argues that current instructional practices may thwart the learning of these insights and suggests ways in which parents and teachers may help children to understand that reading makes sense