The purpose of this study was to describe the home literacy environments and literacy experiences of a select group of Asian American children, and to recommend an intervention program based on the findings. The target population was the families which sent their children to a Saturday Asian language and culture school while sending them to public schools during the week, because of their expressed interest in literacy and the probability of their being the group to most likely benefit from intervention. The Home Literacy Environment and Literacy Experiences survey was initially sent out and results tallied and quantified. Upon placing the returned surveys into groups of "high," "middle," and "low" home literacy environment and literacy experiences, a sample of five "high" and five "low" families was selected for further study. Home visits, interviews, field notes, collection of artifacts and other methods of data collection provided a clearer picture of the state of the home literacy environment and literacy experiences of the families studied. Families rated as having "high" home literacy environment and experiences were found to have a larger number of literacy-related materials and higher frequency of literacy-related activities. Bilingualism and education were perceived as being important. The families also …

In this study, 78 kindergarten and first-grade children were interviewed about their writing to identify indicators of self-assessment. Writing samples for each participant were saved over a three month period, then compared and discussed by the child. Results indicated that these young children did engage in self:-assessment behaviors. The classroom teachers were asked to place the participants in their classes along a writing continuum known as a Writing Band. Graphs were presented to show the writing levels of the children by classroom. In addition, each classroom was surveyed to document events which promote literacy development within the framework of an integrated curriculum. Writing samples for each child were collected and kept in a portfolio. Participants were interviewed regarding the contents of the portfolio. Children in two of the kindergarten classes were interviewed using 5 samples collected over a 2 1/2 month time period, and all other participants were interviewed using 6 writing samples collected over a 3 month period. Findings indicated that not only did these young children recognize growth in their writing, but they also assessed that growth based on outward, physical features of their writing. The writing ability of each child at the beginning of the study did …

This study has five chapters, organized in the following manner: (1) Chapter I contains the introduction, statement of the problem, purpose of the study, questions, significance of the study, and definition of terms; (2) Chapter II is a review of the literature; (3) Chapter III is a description of subjects and tests and procedures for treating the data; (4) Chapter IV contains the statistical technique of the analysis and the findings related to the questions, and (5) Chapter V consists of the summary, findings, conclusions, and recommendations. The problem of the study was to explore the relationship between curiosity and print awareness among four-year-old children. Subjects participating in the study were 71 four-year-old children from six licensed child care and preschool settings located in different geographical sections of a north central Texas city. The study included thirty-four girls and thirty-seven boys. Instruments used to collect the data were Kreitler, Zigler, and Kreitler's battery of curiosity tasks and Goodman's Signs of the Environment and Book Handling Knowledge tasks. Canonical I correlation analyses do not yield a significant relationship between variables of curiosity and print awareness. An alternate Pearson Product Moment correlation yielded some specific pairwise correlations between certain curiosity variables and …

This qualitative research study examined the usage of whole-language instruction in the classrooms of four self-professed whole-language teachers. Data were collected from the following sources: classroom observations; interviews with the teachers and their principals; and a study of lesson plans, student work, textbooks, and curriculum guides. The following conclusions were drawn from the study. The teachers' pre-existing philosophical views regarding language instruction influenced the effectiveness with which they implemented whole-language instruction more than any other single factor. These philosophical bases also determined, to a large extent, the kinds of whole-language practices and strategies the teachers used in their instruction. The skills-oriented teachers most often stated that they used whole-language instruction in order to review or reinforce skills. The more holistic teachers most often stressed language development, language appreciation, and self expression. The data collected in this study led to the conclusion that teachers must become knowledgeable of whole-language principles and make a personal commitment to the whole-language philosophy in order to develop integrated, coherent whole-language instructional programs. The data also led the researcher to conclude that assessment of whole-language instruction was an area of ambiguity and uncertainty for the teachers involved in the study. The following recommendations were made from …

The study investigated the relationship among three cognitive styles and summarization abilities. Both summarization products and processes were examined. Summarizing products were scored and a canonical correlation analysis was performed to determine their relationship with three cognitive styles. Summarizing processes were examined by videotaping students as they provided think aloud protocols. Their processes were recorded on composing style sheets and analyzed qualitatively. Subjects were sixth-grade students in self-contained classes in a suburban school district. Summarizing products were collected over a two week period in the fall. Summarizing processes were collected over an eight week period in the spring of the same school year. The results of the summarizing products analysis suggest that cognitive styles are related to summarization abilities. Two canonical correlations among the two variable sets were statistically significant at the .05 level of significance (.33 and .29). The results further suggest that students who are field independent, reflective, and flexible in their attentional style may be more adept at organizing their ideas and using written mechanics while summarizing. Students who are impulsive and constricted in attentional style may exhibit strength in expressing their ideas while summarizing. Results of the summarizing processes analysis suggest that students of one cognitive …

This descriptive study utilized semi-structured interviews and observations to examine the experiences of hospitalized school-age children, and explore the potential of a live, closed-circuit television program as a psychosocial intervention. Among findings, Phase I data from 16 subjects indicates a) concern with painful medical procedures, particularly intraveneous (IV) injections, b) a desire for more information, especially concerning medical equipment, c) a variety of responses to social issues among subjects, d) the importance of activities, and e) the central role of the hospital playroom. Phase II data indicates that live, closed-circuit television can provide ambulatory and room-bound children opportunities for making choices, social interaction, participation, and information on their environment. Conclusions and implications are included.

In this study, the researcher investigated how computer use functions as an aspect of literacy development within a second-grade classroom. The researcher sought to gather data to help define the role that computer use plays in the literacy development of elementary school students by concentrating on how computers are actually used in the classroom being studied, and by looking for relationships revealed by students' and teacher's beliefs about computer use in the classroom.

This study describes the language behaviors and social strategies of English as Second Language (ESL) and English as Primary Language (EPL) pre-kindergarten students during cooperative Computer Assisted Instruction (CAI) experiences. Thirty-three pre-kindergarten subjects ages four to five years, were videotaped at two personal computers during self-selected center time. The sources of data for this descriptive study were a parent computer survey, videotapes, a subject interview derived from the Young Children's Computer Inventory, and written records.

This qualitative case study examined the extent to which learning styles were used by teachers in four seventh and eighth grade social studies classrooms in a large suburban north Texas junior high school. The conclusions were as follows: 1) The environment on the junior high level did not afford the flexibility found in the elementary classroom. The changing of students, teachers, and the multi-purpose use of rooms did not afford flexibility of light, temperature, sound, and design preference. 2) The physical and the psychological categories had elements within each category that overlapped. A right brain activity closely aligned to a tactile/kinesthetic activity. A parallel between physical-mobility and psychological-global was noted, as well as a pattern between the global and the tactile/kinesthetic projects. 3) The split lunch period created problems for the global, kinesthetic, impulsive students. The academic environment was interrupted for a thirty minute period; students had to re-acclimate to a more analytic environment after lunch. 4) Each teacher alternated between primary style and secondary and tertiary styles. This mediation ability enabled each teacher to use all styles in lessons the researcher observed. 5) Abstract random and concrete random teachers did more group and team teaching than concrete sequential and …

This study examined differences in literacy development between five students attending whole language pre-first-grade classes and five students eligible for pre-first-grade classes but attending modified traditional first-grade classes. Differences between whole language pre-first-grade classes and modified traditional first-grade classes in use of literacy materials, teaching procedures, and amount of time spent on literacy were also examined. The procedures involved testing the subjects on reading and writing skills, observations of the pre-first-grade and first-grade classes, and analysis of subjects' writing samples.