Drawn from the experience of various ministries and departments in governments across Canada, this guide is meant to be a practical guide in implementing plain language for managers in the Ontario (Canada) government. The guide describes how to use plain language in planning, writing, designing, and editing forms and documents, and how to set up…

Surveys 44 high school students regarding their textbooks: including how often they use textbooks; which is their least favorite text and why; which is their most favorite text and why; and what they would do to make textbooks more enjoyable and readable (discussing graphics\illustrations, teen interest topics, organizational patterns, vocabulary,…

Examines persuasive text, first describing it and discussing it with reference to relevant philosophy and rhetoric, and then asking whether it is successful: do written texts change the minds of their readers? Notes that research on designing text to disabuse students of scientific misconceptions points to text features that authors could use to…

Investigates how the writing of some Year 6 children was influenced by exposure to the work of a contemporary author of children's literature and through reading a variety of fairy stories, tales and nursery rhymes. Concludes the children's awareness of story structure resulted in thought-provoking short stories with intertextual references. (PM)

Examines diaries kept by 8 adults (born between 1856 and 1876) over a 70-year period of their lives. Analyzes the complexity of the narrative structure and the cohesion of the text. Finds that the diarists' narratives became structurally more complex across the life span, although they became less cohesive as ambiguous anaphors increased. (KEH)

Suggests modeling of thought processes with expository text structure as one method of promoting strategic reading with students. Explains that modeling involves explaining the kinds of strategies used and the reasoning involved in the process of making sense of text. (MG)

Offers a review of research conducted on reading comprehension, focusing on studies of the cognitive processes involved in the comprehension of the meaning of the microstructures and macrostructures of a text. (DMM)

Describes a method of generating a flow chart which indicates the multiple cause and effect relationships in literature and content area texts. Argues that this teaching strategy aids in the comprehension of difficult text. (RS)

Describes the results of a study in which 32 English teachers were requested to identify passages of verse disguised as prose. Analyzes which features enabled the readers to recognize the poetry passages. (KEH)

Deals with the text patterns commonly found in social studies books. Explores the expository text pattern and offers a teaching pattern to help guide students through the transition from narrative to content area texts in the upper elementary grades. (MG)

Describes a method of assessing students' actual reading processes, allowing teachers to suggest and model strategies for overcoming reading problems. Reports that the model works well with remedial readers in an individual setting and could be applied, with modifications, to a group of students. (RS)

Tests the hypothesis that different assigned purposes for reading led to changes in the "interestingness" and recall of text material. Concludes that reading for a particular purpose enhances the interestingness of text information even when that information is not intrinsically interesting. Discusses educational implications. (BS)

This paper examines the role of hypotheses in several introductory science texts, including the various elements normally associated with hypotheses, such as: assumptions, generalization, and prediction; observation and experiment; and induction and probability. It discusses the major types of hypotheses: theoretical, statistical, and heuristic.…

Examines the relationship among sources of interest, perceived interest, and text recall. Reveals (through factor analysis) six different sources of interest. Suggests sources of interest affect perceived interest, which in turn affects recall. Suggests that text structure appears to play an important role in perceived situational interest and,…

Discusses issues surrounding virtual reality and "virtual books." Suggests that those who are exploring the territory of virtual realities are already helping to expand and enrich expectations and visions for integrating technology into reading and writing. (RS)