Recent cognitive research concerned with training of word recognition skills and vocabulary skills in English monolinguals has implications for second language learning theory and the teaching of English reading skills to native Spanish speakers. Researchers in reading development, cognitive psychology, and second language proficiency assessment have found that good readers master the fluent recognition of all the codes making up a written text. Second language training for word analysis skills might focus on improving recognition of letter units forming words, the syntactic functions of words, and the meanings referred to by words, in both a top-down and bottom-up fashion. The situation is made more complex by the likely transfer of skills from the native to second language. Specific techniques for training automatic word recognition in English that can be adapted for use with native Spanish speakers include Frederiksen's "Speed" and "Ski-Jump" games, which use both the top-down and bottom-up approaches. Activities to strengthen vocabulary skills can be developed based on the considerable cognitive research currently under way, especially Sternberg, Powell, and Kaye's three-phase instructional system focusing in turn on morphological cues for meaning, inference of unfamiliar words through morphological cues, and integration of skills for analyzing morphological structure and meaning. (MSE)