Volume 1 of the final report of Project FAST consists of reports on 13 experiments concerning: (1) the application of associative learning strategies to the development of a basic sight vocabulary among mentally retarded children and adults, and (2) the development of text reduction techniques designed to facilitate comprehension and recall of written materials among visually handicapped and hearing impaired subjects. Six experiments with educable and trainable mentally retarded children cover topics such as the application of associative strategies to word recognition, the effect of reinforcement on word knowledge, the effect of pictorial stimuli on word recognition, and the effects of animation on word memory. Seven studies investigate such topics as the effect of a subjective deletion scheme on reading performance of Braille and regular print readers, the application of a subjective deletion scheme to film captioning for the deaf, and a comparison of two deletion schemes on three types of prose among blind and deaf students. Major conclusions reported are that learning and retention in word recognition tasks can be facilitated by the use of associative learning strategies; and that telegraphic prose is a viable alternative to traditional educational materials for the blind, but results were not as favorable with the deaf. (LS)