Many Canadians are concerned about the quality of reading instruction in Canadian schools. Recent newspaper articles, research reviews, and newsletter articles reflect the nature of these concerns. The official instructional policy in a number of provinces as well as in a number of local school districts is based on a whole-language philosophy.…

In response to a position paper that called upon the ministry of education in each Canadian province to provide a balanced selection to offerings on the province's authorized list of language arts textbooks, several ministries claimed that a balanced approach to teaching reading was being followed. A letter received from Alberta Education even…

This study evaluated the predictive validity of the Caregiver's School Readiness Inventory (CSRI), a new screening measure developed for use in situations in which it may not be appropriate to employ traditional screening measures to identify preschool children at risk for school failure. The three items of the CSRI concern: (1) children's books…

An evaluation was made of the effectiveness of an empirically derived five-item questionnaire, the Teacher's School Readiness Inventory (TSRI), in identifying at-risk or failure-prone preschool children. Screened with the TSRI in the spring of either the prekindergarten or kindergarten year, four samples totalling 453 children were followed…

A 3-year longitudinal investigation indicated that form errors in printing that children make can aid in the identification of at-risk or failure-prone pupils as early as the start of prekindergarten. Two samples were selected, one consisting of 104 and the other of 63 prekindergarten children. Mean age of the samples was 52 months. Item analysis…

An item analysis of Harris' scoring system for the Goodenough-Harris Draw-A-Man Test was conducted by comparing sets of protocols obtained in the early fall of kindergarten from children whose overall in-class academic performance placed them either in an at-risk category (N=21) or at the top of their class (N=38) by the end of the school year.…

The Printing Performance School Readiness Test is an empirically derived instrument designed to aid in the early identification of preschool children who are at risk for school failure. The test is based on the outcome of a research program dealing with various aspects of children's printing that involved over 400 normal, non-repeating, native…

Involving 619 preschool children, a longitudinal investigation evaluated a new test for identifying preschool children who produce an excessive number of form errors in printing. All children participating were fluent in English and were in the appropriate grades for their ages, either pre-kindergarten or kindergarten, when they were given the…

The claim that the incidence of school failure can be greatly reduced by increasing kindergarten entrance age from 57 to 60 months was investigated in three related studies. In the first study, subjects ranging in school entrance age from 57 to 68 months were drawn from five elementary schools in an urban lower socioeconomic area. A total of 114…

Form errors, but not reversal errors, generated when kindergarten children printed reversible letters and numbers, were associated with teachers' judgments of children's academic performance at the end of kindergarten and throughout Grade 1. Three samples totaling 166 non-repeating kindergarten children (79 male, 87 female) were drawn from eight…

The reversal errors in the printing of 51 first grade students were examined. These children were asked to print a series of reversible target figures (letters and numbers, such as 2-s, p-q, p-9, and b-d) that were presented alone and with their mirror-image counterparts. To control for the possibility that the mere presence of another figure…

One hundred and seventy right-handed children from kindergarten through grade 2 were asked to copy 26 upper and 26 lower case letters and the numbers 1-9 shown at one time on slide projections. The resulting stroke patterns which were observed, supported predictions derived from the starting, progression, and horizontal rules expressed in the…

Children from kindergarten through grade 2 were asked to copy, then print from memory, each of the 41 reversible letters and numbers administered individually on slides presented in random order. The main findings of an experiment with 179 children drawn from two elementary schools show that mirror-image reversals and other errors (1) take place…

A series of investigations were conducted to determine whether reflexive crying occurs in newborns and to define the parameters that control his behavior. (NH)

Presents reactions of provinces to position paper issued by the Canadian Psychological Association advocating a balanced approach to teaching reading. Reiterates position that whole-language programs be supplemented with phonological awareness exercises beyond those using initial word sounds to recognize words. Describes a booklet produced with…