Contained in this yearbook are the proceedings of the fourth annual Arizona State University Reading Conference. This edition reflects an emphasis on bilingual/bicultural aspects of reading, as well as on content area instruction. Following a foreword, the articles discuss the following: (1) matching materials and strategies for comprehension, (2)…

The materials in this volume are intended to supplement existing tape materials in the lessons of the basic course in French. The exercises begin with lesson 13 of the Basic Course and continue through lesson 63. Each unit in this manual concentrates on a grammatical point and contains the following elements: (1) learning objectives, (2)…

Dictations are not sufficient as exercises for developing listening comprehension skills. Other techniques and exercises which have been used in English for Special Purposes classes include practice in note taking, cloze-testing on lectures, mock formal interviews and informal conversations, and discourse analyses of sample lectures. Such analyses…

The 73 readings in this volume average one page each in length and are intended as a supplement to "Albanian: Basic Course." (JB)

Participants in this conference represented France, Canada, the United States, Denmark, Japan, the United Kingdom, Austria, Norway, Germany, Sweden, Australia, Egypt, India, Israel, Ireland, and Brazil. Each of the 33 articles is printed in the language in which it was delivered (English except for two articles), and each is preceded by short…

Radio commercials, used as supplementary materials in the English as a second language class, have the following advantages: (1) they correspond closely to everyday spoken English; (2) they are clear; (3) they are short enough to sustain student interest; (4) the many redundancies in the message enable even the slower student to understand; (5)…

Claiming that the actual learning of basic language skills takes place in the language laboratory, the author states four requisites for effective use of the laboratory: (1) a clear statement of specific objectives, (2) instructions for the student, (3) realistic objectives, and (4) student rewards. Testing, learning theory, applied linguistics,…

This article outlines a plan for developing listening comprehension materials for advanced students of English as a second language, based on formal and informal speech samples of natural discourse. (CFM)

Since foreign language methodology has, in the past fifteen years, included aural-oral skills as well as reading and writing skills, achievement tests for foreign language courses should also include these skills. (Text is in French.) (MLA)

Summarizes current trends in second language acquisition research and suggests their implications for teaching. Five second language acquisition principles are presented, followed by a discussion of the relevant literature and a description of language teaching practices consistent with each principle. (SED)

Investigation of the simultaneous effects of and interaction between both culture-specific content schemata and formal schemata on English as a second language reading comprehension revealed that familiar content and rhetorical form yielded good reading comprehension. Results for "mixed" conditions indicated that content schemata affected reading…

Much research in second language reading uses a free written recall task to measure comprehension. The significance of differences in research design is analyzed. Sixteen groups of college Spanish students (N=20 each group) were given a recall task (in appendix). Research variables, including level of study, language of recall, and pre-reading…

More than 1,500 high school foreign language students were tested for comprehension of authentic texts. First- through fifth-year French, German, and Spanish students read texts of the types mentioned in the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines at the intermediate and intermediate high levels. All students captured some meaning from each of the texts.…

Analysis of responses to two cloze tests administered to native and non-native speakers of English revealed that non-natives were far less capable of coping with the loss of redundant cohesive data than were natives. Nonnatives were more reliant on text in comprehension process than were native speakers. (Author/CB)

Observation of native Hebrew speakers who read Hebrew and English texts suggested that there is a powerful affective factor which completely blocks the reading in English of some students and severely limits the comprehension of a considerable number of others when they meet difficulties in the foreign language texts. (Author/CB)