Describes some of the research being done by the Center for the Study of Reading, a federally sponsored center established to pursue research into the processes underlying the development of reading comprehension by children in grades three through eight. (MKM)

Phonological development in children is described in terms of four stages; (1) preverbal vocalization and perception (birth to 1;0); (2) phonology of the first 50 words (1;0 to 1;6); (3) phonology of simple morphemes (1;6 to 4;0); and (4) completion of the phonetic inventory (4;0 to 7;0). (CTM)

The development and normal variability of children's speech is described, particularly in the periods of 18 to 24 months and 24 to 36 months. Vocabulary growth, speech articulation, and sentence construction (complexity and grammar) are major topics. Causes of speech problems are listed and a bibliography is included. (CTM)

Basal readers are supposed to be easy for children to read, but sometimes their language is so unnatural that it's more confusing than helpful. (MKM)

Examines the nature of thematization and thematic progression in children's narrative styles, in order to draw some conclusions regarding the acquisition of textual skills. (AM)

The translation process is discussed from these aspects: (1) Natural translation by bilinguals, explained by a discussion of research in translation skills among bilingual children, (2) the requirements for good professional translation, and (3) a description of the curriculum at the University of Ottawa's translation school. (AMH)

The importance of contextual influences to conversational competence development is emphasized. Included are one or more significant adults whose systematic patterns of feedback teach children rules of conversation while providing guided practice in the use of these rules. The role of expansion is examined as one of the common patterns of feedback…

Results confirm the value of play activities for language development, and illustrate the nature of linguistic interaction among groups of five-year-olds. (RL)

Selected phonological, morphological, and syntactic evidence from two hours of tape recordings of conversations of a four-year-old Native American New Mexican was examined to determine its value in assessing the child's bidialectalism. (Author/SW)

Developmental aspects of several temporal parameters in the speech of 2- to 4-year-old English-speaking children were investigated; adults served as a control group. Children seemed to possess timing control systems which are more sophisticated than has previously been suggested. (Author/SW)

Face-to-face communication makes up only a small proportion of an infant's diurnal transactions with his environment, but it is viewed as crucial to his total development. Research was conducted in which adult and infant behaviors were videotaped, and their interactions were analyzed. (Author/HP)

How a child answers questions provides information about how he or she processes input. A child's early responses to questions at age one year, three months, were compared to her responses at one year, seven months, when she was in the two-word stage. (SW)

In order to examine the extent to which adult judgments of first words depend on visual and auditory cues, spontaneous utterances were collected for boys and girls ages one year, five months to one year, ten months. Adults named the same toys. The older the speaker, the less perception was affected by visual context. (Author/SW)

Twelve one-word-stage children were given minimally contrasting two-word instructions. Since non-linguistic cues were eliminated, comprehension involved making non-syntactic inferences from the word combinations. The children could respond correctly to some of the instructions, and even carried out some unfamiliar activities. (Author/SW)

Describes the characteristics associated with children who have receptive language disability or aphasia, the difficulties these children have in everyday living, the problems they can expect in school, and the responsibility of the teacher and parent in helping the aphasic child overcome his problem. (RK)