The development of a strategy for increasing pupil performance in the Southwest Regional Laboratory (SWRL) Beginning Reading Program (BRP) is described in the introductory section of this document. This strategy, or support system, is embodied in "The Instructional Improvement Kit," presented as an appendix to the document. The kit is designed for…

This study investigated the difference in effectiveness in increasing first-grade reading achievement of a traditional reading program in which no words were taught and a program that began with formal reading instruction in preprimers and no reading readiness. The subjects were 137 pupils in six first-grade classes in a middle-class suburban…

This experiment included the construction and evaluation of a test of critical reading and thinking capable of identifying critical and noncritical readers among second and third grade children. Fact, fancy and opinion, assumption, relevancy, inference, and generalization were selected as subskill foci, based upon a survey of professional…

This paper describes various approaches to beginning reading instruction and discusses the major factors which determine success or failure in beginning reading regardless of the approach used. The teacher, the child, and the social and physical environment while being infinitely variable can be controlled to great extent by the teacher of…

The purpose of this study was to determine what differences in expressed attitudes toward reading existed after one school year's instruction in each of four different beginning reading programs. Four schools with similar populations using four different emphases in beginning reading were selected for sampling. The different emphases were Language…

The purpose of this study was to develop a test of listening comprehension for kindergarten and beginning first grade and to establish the reliability and validity of the instrument. Parallel forms of the test were developed, each form consisting of six graded passages ranging in difficulty from grade 1 through grade 4, and 14 questions measuring…

Reviews the literature in the Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC) on whole word lists. (RB)

Investigates the relative difficulty of learning Japanese word kanji and syllable kana. (AA)

Analyzes four basal reading series to ascertain current usage of the words on the Dolch List. Reports that the listed words continue to be widely used and that the list remains a potent force in elementary school reading programs. (TJ)

Considers solutions to beginning readers' problems with decoding, syntax, semantics, text organization, and differences between spoken and written language. (DD)

Reviews recent innovations in language arts instruction and provides lists of materials children read and books children might make. (DD)

Reviews some of the research on the effectiveness of direct versus incidental instruction of beginning reading. (MKM)

Explores the characteristics and implications of the "new sentence method" of learning to read. (JM)

Investigated was the development of the process whereby 63 deaf children (9-14 years old) attended to the orthographic structure of tachistoscopically presented verbal materials. (Author/DB)

Briefly discusses research on consonant substitution and presents a five-step teaching strategy to help beginning readers use the words they know to figure out the words they don't know. (JM)