Through observation of young children much has been learned regarding elementary word acquisition and ordering, sentence formulation, and expansion of verbal experience; but little research regarding what precedes "the word" has been done. The present study was concerned with that period in infancy prior to communicative speech production. The purpose of the present study was to answer the question: Can one selectively reinforce a particular babble?

This thesis evaluates the Skyline drama program. The first chapter presents an overview of the program; Chapters II and III describe the core and the advanced curriculum, respectively; and Chapter IV examines the first year of operation and evaluates the entire project.

The purpose of this investigation was (1) to perform hearing screening tests on 100 youths who are classified as delinquent; (2) to evaluate more completely the hearing of those who fail the hearing screening tests in order to determine the nature and severity of the losses; and (3) to determine whether or not any significant number of the youths tested demonstrate nonorganic components in their reported audiometric thresholds.

The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of a previous attitude toward an, issue (i.e., liquor-by- the drink in the state of Texas) on the perception of messages concerning that issue.

This study had a twofold purpose. The first was to determine the extent to which the drama curricula in Texas public high schools have changed since the Texas Education Agency certification change of 1966; and the second was to reveal the position of administrators regarding a preference of teaching fields as background for a prospective teacher of drama.

The purpose of this study is to examine some aspects the Parent Teacher Association through designing a questionnaire, administering it to individuals involved to some degree in the organization, evaluating the data received, and then making knowledgeable observations about it. The specific aspects to be examined are its role and its communication of goals and programs as seen by several groups. Although the scope is limited to the Texas PTA, attitudes toward PTA in general are reflected in the responses.

Two hundred questionnaires were sent to high school speech teachers in Texas to determine their attitudes toward peer evaluation, a method of critiquing speech class activities. Results indicated that these teachers are familiar with and use peer evaluation and that they do favor it as an evaluation technique. Women used peer evaluation more than men, and teachers with more experience used peer evaluation more than those less experienced. Peer evaluation was used most for speeches and oral interpretation and least for parliamentary procedure. Peer evaluation helps students learn the criteria upon which an oral presentation is evaluated, keeps the students busy, and helps the students become better listeners. Its values outweigh its drawbacks.

"The purpose of this study is to record an accurate account of this development at North Texas State University and to correlate it to general trends in speech education in the United States. The hypothesis for such a study is that historical comparisons may be beneficial to scholars as indicative of those methods that have met with the greatest success."--2.

The purposes of this survey were (1) to determine the nature of the case load of speech clinicians in Texas public school speech and hearing therapy programs, (2) to determine the type and condition of facilities in which the therapy described in item one above is being conducted, (3) to ascertain what the speech and hearing clinicians of the state believed to be essential for the effective practice of therapy, and (4) to find out what the clinicians believed to be special problems in their present facilities.

"It is the purpose of this thesis to employ some of the basic methods currently in practice in the teaching of creative dramatics, in a second grade class of the North Texas State University Laboratory School in Denton, Texas, and to record the results."--2.