71-7449
FECHEK, Theresa Anne, 1933- THE USE OF INFORMATIVE THEMES IN THE READING ANTHOLOGIES FOR THE TEACHING OF COMPOSITION IN GRADES FOUR THROUGH TWELVE.
The Ohio State University, Ph.D., 1970 Education, general
University Microfilms, A XEROX Company, Ann Arbor, Michigan
(£) Copyright by
Theresa Anne Fechek
1971 THE USE OF INFORMATIVE THEMES III THE READING ANTHOLOGIES
FOR THE TEACHING OF COMPOSITION
IN GRADES FOUR THROUGH TWELVE
DISSERTATION
Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University
By
Theresa Anne Fechek, B.S., H.A.
•* # * * # *•
The Ohio State University 1910
Approved by
Tdvisar College of Education ACKN0WLEDCS-1ENXS
This writer would like to extend her appreciation to all persons who have provided encouragement and assistance during the past years at The Ohio State University.
Regarding ray specific doctoral program which includes the major and minor areas of "English Education, Curriculum and Found ations, and Twentieth Century literature, I have considered this program to be a most satisfying one. I express heartfelt gratitude to Professors Wilfred Eberhart, Alexander Frazier, Frank Zidonis,
Paul Klohr, and George Lewis. They represent to me the humanistic values so necessary for the process of education.
Very special thanks go to my parents, my brother and sister, friends, and colleagues for their kindness always.
ii VITA.
Hay Ik, 1933 .... Born - Bobtown, Pennsylvania
1956 ...... B.S., Clarion State College, Clarion, Pennsylvania
1957-1958 ...... Teacher, Washington Elementary School, South Norwalk, Connecticut
1958-196 2...... Teacher, William Poster Elementary School, Cleveland, Ohio
1 9 6 3 ...... M.A., Case-Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio
1962-1967...... English Teacher, Garfield Heights High School, Cleveland,' Ohio
1968-1970...... Teaching Associate, College of Education, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio
FIELDS OF STtror
Major Field: English Education, Professor Wilfred Eberhart
Studies in Curriculum and Foundations, Professor Alexander Frazier
Studies in Twentieth Century American and British Literature, Professor John M. Huste
iii TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS...... ii
VITA ...... ill
IIST OF TABLES...... vi
INTRODUCTION...... 1
Chapter
I. PROBLEM OF THIS STUDI...... 6
Background of the Problem Statement of the Problem Procedures of the Study Need for the Study Definition of Terms limitation of the Problem Assumptions Organization of this Study
H . REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE...... 22
Curriculum Research Relationship of Macro-curriculum Problems Content Analysis and Reading Textbooks Methodology
H I . INFORMATIVE ARTICLES IN READING TEXTBOOKS GRADES FOUR, FIVE, AND S E C ...... U3
Description, Findings, and Organization Summary of the Results
iv IV. INF0H4ATIVE ARTICLES IN READING TEXTBOOKS GRADES SEVEN, EIGHT,AND NINE...... 53
Description, Findings, and Organization Summary of the Results
V, INFORMATIVE ARTICLES IN READING TEXTBOOKS (HADES TEN, ELEVEN,AND TWELVE...... 62
Description, Findings, and Organization Summary of the Results Summary of the Findings
VI. CURRICULUM DEVELOHfflNT AND USES FOR INFORMATIVE THEHSS ...... 7k
VII. SUMMARI, FUNDINGS AND CONCLUSIONS, RE£GI-MSNDATIONS FUTURE RESEARCH...... 90
APE3NDIX...... 96
BIBLIOGRAEHI...... 10]*
V LIST OF IABISS
TABIS PAGE
I. Number of Informative Articles and Pages and Percentage of Pages of Informative Articles in Reading Textbooks in the Intermediate Grades ...... b$
II. Number of Informative Articles and Pages and Percentage of Pages of Informative Articles in Reading Textbooks in Grades Seven, Eight, and Nine ...... $$
III. Number of Informative Articles and Pages and Percentage of Pages of Informative Articles in Reading Textbooks in Grades Ten, Eleven, and Twelve ...... 6U
IV. Average Length of the Articles Included in the Percentage Tables in the S t u d y ...... 70
vi INTRODUCTION
Living in an age consisting of complex communications in which knowledge has increased to enormous proportions, educators have important responsibilities for developing techniques and materials to teach their students improved ways of communicating information accurately and in an organized manner. Palmer defines information a3 "experience which lias been boiled down and crystal lized into a set of concepts and regularities, usually expressed in words but sometimes in the form of maps, charts, numbers, or other symbols.From his point of view, information embodies the ordered experience of the human race. Also, ho considers a well-balanced education to be one in which experience and information are partners.
On the other hand, Rapoport states that "reliable knowledge is knowledge which corresponds to experience.Often, inaccuracies in the contents and the manner in which information is learned can con fuse the children and adults whose response to these verbal represent ations of reality can become distorted. Inaccurate, metaphorical,
^Richard Palmer, "Experience, and the Mass Media," Communication Media and the School. The Yearbook of Education, I960, eds. George Z, F. Be red ay and Joseph A. Lauv:ery3( New York c World Book Conpany, I960), p. 60.
^Anatol Rapoport, "Integrating Knowledge and Action,11 ETC a A Review of General Semantics,XXVIl(Harch, 1970), lit. 2 archaic, connotative, emotive, obsolete, and symbolic language are means for misrepresentation in one* s own verbal awareness.
When fiction and nonfiction prose are classified separately* with the former representing experience and the latter conveying accurate, precise information, there seem to be few opportunities for distorting verbal reality; however, one might question verbal realities when nonfiction prose today includes book reviews, news paper editorials, essays, research reports, term papers, news stories, magazine articles, diaries, autobiographies, biographies, travelogues, political speeches, and narrative factual prose. It is necessary then to question these general classifications in order to decide what typas of nonfiction prose can be categorised as precise, explicit informative prose and what types combine information with judgment, inferences, and opinions.
Unless these distinctions between information and experience, between concrete and abstract words, and between fact and fiction are taught frequently and thoroughly, the programs for the teaching of communication skills trill weaken considerably. 3
In 191*6, Johnson expressed his concern that problems in the language development of children often continue during their adult years. He wrote*
In order to insure that a child will become a maladjusted adult* he should be trained to con fuse the levols of abstraction. So trained, he will indulge persistently in unconscious projection; he will overgeneralize as a matter of course; he will be relatively tense, resentful, and self- defensive in general; he id 11 fail frequently to differentiate sufficiently between past and pre sent, between one situation, person or experience and another . . .He will attempt to solve his prob lems of which he will have a great number, not by trying to state clearly and be taking personal responsibility for obtaining reliable factual answers to his own well-hewn questions— but by trusting in a childish "way the pills, platitudes, and diverse prescriptions of anyone whom he has been trained to regard as an authority.3
Johnsons concern for distinguishing levels of abstraction in a person's language patterns was later discussed by Kelmkemp as a result of her experiments at the University of Cliicago
Laboratory School. In experiments for the teaching of writing to tenth-grade students, she devised the concept of the abstraction ladder in which words are classified into steps ranging from the bottom level at which words are placed at the level of objective reality to the top level of the highest levels of abstraction at which words and meanings become vague and blurred to the writer and reader. As one increases his classes of words
3tfendell Johnson, People in Quandaries(lJew York: Harper and Row, Inc., 19ij6), pp. 379-Sot to the highest level of abstraction, the specifics become less noted also. One of the discoveries by the tenth-grade students
in the experiment in which they v7rote themes using the “language
of report" was that close observation and complete reporting of verifiable facts can result in vivid writing and effective word
pictures.^ Experiments such as this one need to be conducted with
students in the intermediate and junior high schools. These are
important stages of verbal development in the reporting of veri
fiable facts especially.
Church expresses the “need to find out vfiiether logically
defined parts of speech correspond to classes of experience«“£
The concern in his study for a porson*a cognitive development fran
early years reinforces the need for balance in one1s awareness of
both information and experience. In conclusion to his theoretical
discussion on language and reality, Church states that “sound
cognitive development occurs in a context of communication (not
merely of factual information) but of the feeling states that are
characteristically human."^ The importance of verbal expressions
^Eunice Helmkerap, “Training Pupils to Cope with Language Difficulties in Interpreting IJhat Is Read in Grades 7 to 10," Promoting Growth toward Maturity in Interpreting t'Jhat Is Read, edWilliam S. Gray (Chicago, Illinois: The University of“Chicago Press, 1?£L), XIII, 102-103.
^Joseph Church, Language and the Discovery of Reality (Hew York: Random House, Inc., 19&L), p.' 35. " ’
<%b i d 1, p. 210. of reality and. their relationship to experience seetns to be recog nized by scholars studying in many different disciplines.
The necessity for encouraging students from the fourth grade through the college years to communicate information accurately seems to be of the utmost importance; therefore one major objective for this research study is to study this problem as research in the use of factual materials in the curriculum for recommending ways to help students learn to develop their skill in reading these materials and in writing informative themes through "learning the content, study ing the fora or presentation, increasing the knowledge of the verbal tools used, studying the concrete drawing or object, adding new words, and practicing the fora with another similar topic and using another set of vocabulary."^ Other objectives are to know principles of efficient reading and writing, to handle factual terns which require different arrangements for presenting information adequately, to gather information, to classify knowledge, and to synthesize the inforaation into well-designed themes.
7silas H. Rhodes, "The Need for Trained Artists in Communi cation," Communication; The Art of Understanding and Being Under stood, A Report on the Seventh Cornniund.catidns Conference" of theT Art Directors Club of Hew York, ed. Robert 0. Bush(New Yorks Hastings House, 1963), p. 106. CHAPTER I
PROBLEM OF THIS STUDY
Background of the Problem
The success of any program in reading and writing in the eLementary and secondary schools depends not only upon the number of students whose competence is rated high according to test re sults but also upon the quality of their choices, the variety in their choices, and their balance of reading in both factual and in imaginative materials. In many cases, because the major sources of these materials which are used for the purpose of providing balance in factual and imaginative materials are the basal readers and the reading anthologies used 5jn many public schools, the teachers can help their students to recognise and to study the language through their selections of fiction, poetry, drama, and nonfiction prose in these textbooks.
In school districts located in states and counties where funds for materials and equipment are limited, the textbooks that are used generally include the subject matter which represents the curriculum in language arts, literature, and composition. For the teaching of reading, the basal readers for the elementary students are the major textbooks. The Harvard Report on Reading in the
Elementary Schools reports that the "basal readers with their accompanying manuals and workbooks are used more extensively than any other materials. "•*■ In the junior and senior high schools, literature anthologies are the textbooks which are used frequently.
If there are additional funds allotted for improvement of reading skills, materials such as reading laboratories, controlled readers, skills workbooks, periodicals, weekly news magazines, dictionaries, skill builders, companion series, and classroom sets of supplementary books are then purchased.
In many school districts where funds for additional materials and equipment are limited, the teachers often view the textbook con taining the content representing the quality and quantity of the prose and poetry that is studied a3 the learning instrument through which they work with the textbook authors as partners for the benefit of all students; consequently the materials within these books are significant for maintaining a coordinated program from lcindergarten through twelfth grade.
Since these basal readers and the literature anthologies are used by elementary and secondary teachers for teaching students to mature • in their comprehension of reading, vocabulary development,
% a r y C. Austin and Coleman Morrison, The First Rs The Harvard Report on Reading in Elementary Schools (Mew York; tKo Macmillan Company, 19&3), p." 60. 8 ability to utilize powers of observation* and personal reading habits and choices of books* there is a need in the textbooks for a specific form of prose that reports verifiable* explicit, and accurate facts in an organized manner' as distinguished from prose that conveys inferences* judgments, fantasy* opinions* interpret ations* and exaggerations. If employed* these forms might be useful for intensive reading whereby the students could concentrate upon details, a systematic vocabulary suitable to the particular topic* and the design of the presentation arranged in forms which might be chronological* temporal* spatial, or descriptive and presented from the impersonal* objective point of view. These forms also could be examples for students in Grades Four through Twelve to read carefully in order to compose themes containing factual in formation. The students could read about a variety of topics presented in the anthologies. The results of their efforts might aid them in seeing verbal structures clearly and in increasing their own awareness and knowledge of specific systems of related vocabulary.
For discussion purposes in this study, this form of prose will be called the infomative theme. The informative theme is a brief, formal composition consisting of facts limited to one specific topic* organized in a set form suitable to that topic, and written in an objective, impersonal manner as an exercise for communicating precise infomation without inferences* judgments* interpretations, or opinions. One function of a reading textbook
should be related to composition by including some informative themes
as a part of the total content to increase the proportion of . nonfiction materials representative in the series. Often, the
student who has access to reference books, newspapers, and other
sources of knowledge is assisted in increasing his vocabulary growth
systematically. These sources of information provide him with an
increased awareness of meaning through which this student can dis close his observations accurately and realistically. In many schools, these sources are not available.
At the same time the students mature *£iile progressing through
stages of varying reading interests and abilities, they should also mature simultaneously in their stages of ability for writing well- organized factual themes. With limitations in factual information
only, students can write themes in many different forms such as those
depicting a unity of time or place, spatial organization, classifi
cation, and description. Combining specific concrete ideas about
ono topic and arranging these ideas in a particular type of form,
the textbook author would be able to include a variety of worthwhile examples of informative themes presented in an impersonal manner.
This would also increase the proportion of nonfiction prose In the reading textbooks.
If informative thsme3 were available at all grade levels in
the reading program, ihe teachers guidance in assisting the student 10
in intensive study of this farm might play a major part in achieving
the purposes for the use of infomative themes in the textbooks,
"While poetry signifies connotativs responses, the purpose of the
informative theme would be to elicit denotive responses frcm all
who read them. Statement of the Problem
Because reading for specific information and reading for
vicarious experience should be two major purposes of any school
program in reading, there is a need in the curriculum frcm the
elementary years through the secondary years for a balance in the
selection of representative materials to achieve both of these
purposes. This study will seek to find what kinds of informative
materials are available throughout the reading series, to determine
how these articles are presented, and to find what percentage of
informative materials are available in textbooks ranging from Grades
Four through Twelve and the average lengths of these informative
articles. Based upon the results, recommendations and suggestions
vail be offered for future work in the development of informative
themes for reading textbooks.
By suggesting that the materials for the reading and
literature program in the schools might be improved with informative
themes in the reading textbooks in Grades Four through Twelve, the
writer believes that with the uses of these materials as a part of n the curriculum, the students1 communication skills and language development would be improved with their reading and writing competence. Coordination, continuity, and balance of fiction and nonfiction in the reading textbooks are necessary for the improvement of communication. In order to make these recommend ations, one needs to know what quantity and quality of informative materials are available in these books at the present time.
Procedures of the Study
Through analysis of the informative contents in five series amounting to sixty-three basic readers, literature anthologies, and several companion series used consecutively in Grades Four through Twelve, the writer will count the number and types of informative articles, the number of pages, and the percentage of pages of informative articles in each book. An additional table will show the average length of words per article in each textbook in the study. The premise is that there are few examples of informative articles which could be classified as inforniative themes.
Informative articles are any forms of composition for presenting information about general or specific subjects of any length from an impersonal point of view. Informative themes are brief formal compositions consisting of facts limited to one specific topic, organised in a set-forra suitable to that topic, and written in an 12
objective, impersonal mariner as an exercise for complicating
precise information without inferences, judgments, interpretations,
cr opinions.
As a result of the findings from the content analysis of
informative articles, a suggested plan of organization listing
standards for developing types of informative themes to be
recommended for use in the readers and anthologies vail be presented.
This plan will be an application of this thesis stating the need
for informative themes as a part of the available materials in
the reading textbooks to be used as models for factual writing.
Details regarding the exact procedures in this study will be
discussed in the next chapter.
The major objective of this research is to devise a means
for coordinating materials needed for teaching skills in cotmmni-
cating written information accurately.
The primary concern of the writer is that students should
learn to identify in their reading textbooks specific subjects presented with exact, accurate vocabulary in different forms of
a sufficient length suitable to their stages of reading and writing
development. By reading these particular types of themes, students
can learn to collect new information and systems of language which would increase their verbal proficiency and understanding. One might assume that children gain confidence when they see that they 13
can progress in their abilities to write in greater length and with
better organization and structure.
Heed for the Study
Y7ith the success of a reading program being dependent upon
the quality and variety of students* choices of reading materials
and the balance both in factual and in imaginative materials, the
major questions concern the availability of materials and methods used to conduct a research study in order to detennine the situation.
A. lack of knowledge about the appropriateness of the reading materials used predominantly by teachers and students in the elemen
tary through high schools can lead to needless repetition, lack of
coordination, and eventually a weakening of the total curriculum.
If textbook series are used as the predominant part of the program,
the researcher needs to evaluate one or more categories of the
materials in the most recently published books in order to make re
commendations for their improvement if such is needed. To decide upon
the coordination throughout all the grades and the balance of materials
with attention to the total curriculum, both elementary and secondary
books need to be perused. Westbury expresses his concern regarding
the "infrequent appearances of evaluations of actual curricula or
curricular materials in either the research or the subject journals
listed in the 1969 Review of Educational Research. ______;__ :______;______2c*------O Ian Yfostbury, "Curriculum Evaluation," Review of Educational Research, XL, No. 2(April, 1970), 239. ~ Hot only should materials be evaluated for selection purposes but also for the quantity and quality of the materials and the worth of them.
Many research studies of reading as a discipline to be taught to all students have included students1 attitudes to reading, their interests, preferences, tastes, habits, skills in comprehension, and others. Ring questions whether children’s reading interests can be effectively studied with limited reading materials, pointing out that the findings need to be considered according to what reading materials are actually available. Hingoia classified five groups of children ranging from the outstanding to the poor in reading abilities and stated the types of research questions appropriate for study of the effectiveness of the basal readers for these children.
The two major goals rarely evaluated for research purposes were those "of interpreting what is read in terras of personal experiences and of becoming critical of the appropriateness and worth of what is read."^
Having chosen to analyse basic readers and literature antho logies for the study of a specific type of materials classified as informative articles, the writer seeks to find the types of changes that have been made in the materials since i960, a period of ten
^E. M. King, "Critical Appraisal of Research in Interests, Preferences, and Habits," Canadian Educational Research Digest, VII(December, 1967), 322.
^3. M. Kingola, "Classifying Development in Reading for Teaching and Research," Education, L3QCCVIIl(February, 1963), 266. years, in five series of books ranging from Grades Four through
Twelve to find out what types and what amount of informative articles are available and to recommend a specific sat-form for all levels.
In 1963) a questionnaire survey of selected aspects of the content and conduct of reading instruction in all school systems
located in cities and counties throughout the United States where
the population exceeded ten-thousand was completed. Included in this survey were interviews with administrative officers and teachers and observations in elementary school classrooms in a representative sample of school systems. The Harvard Report contained forty-five recommendations for the teaching of reading at the elementary level.
Referring to the controversy regarding the decisions about content, one recommendation concerning research for this type of study urges that
publishers of basal books, in conjunction with a research group such as the national Conference on Research in English, make an extensive examination and re-evaluation of the contents of such books; and if there is evidence supporting a need for change, modifications of their materials and suggested pro cedures should be made in keeping with the study.5
Similar questions for research in reading ware stated in
Hunnicutt and Iverson's list of research questions taken from a bulletin called Areas of Research Interest in the Language Arts.
Types of questions asked about the reading of the essay or article
^Austin, 22U. 16 were: ‘Who reads these types? When and where do they read them?
How many are available and in what books? Concerning writing, some questions were: Are there any trends in the present writing or reading habits? How often do students write? In what styles?
Concerning information and communication, the questions were: At what age and by what means might they develop the ability to dis tinguish between facts and judgments? At what age and by what roans might they develop the ability to organize data into pre- £ scribed patterns or forms of written communication? These are seme of the questions the writer seeks to answer through the use of content analysis techniques used for communications studies.
Definitions of Term3
The following terras used throughout the study are defined specifically as they relate to the context of the investigation.
1) Accuracy. Accuracy means a correspondence of statement with fact or reality which requires that words used in communication have the same meaning.
2) Basal readers. Basal readers are used for instruction in reading and usually are a part of a grade series. In this study, the grade levels range from Grades Four through Eight.
^3, W. Hunnicutt and William J. Iverson, Research in the Three R»s (New Tork: Harper and Brothers, 19$$),' pp. Xv32^2;33. 3) Content Analysis. Content analysis is a research technique for the objective, systematic, and quantitative des- 7 cription of the readily perceived content of communication.
1*) Form. Form is a relatively invariable, set pattern for g the execution of a work of art. .
£) Informative articles. Informative articles are any forms of composition for presenting information about general or specific subjects of any length from an impersonal point of view.
In this analysis of content, informative articles included general and explanatory articles about a variety of topics in categories such as science, biology, zoology, cybernetics, space travel, aero nautics, language, geography, expeditions, sports, and architecture.
Also included were reprints of newspaper reports and explanatory introductions about social history preceding literary and historical periods.
6) Informative themes. An informative theme is a brief formal composition consisting of facts limited to one specific topic, organized in a sot-form suitable to that topic, limited in word length, and written in an objective, impersonal manner as an exercise for communicating precise information without inferences, judgments, interpretations, or opinions.
"^Bernard Berelson, Content Analysis in Communication Research (Glencoe, Illinois; The Free Press, 12£>2y, p. l3. ^Carter V. Good (ed.), Dictionary of Education (1st ed.j Now Yorks McGraw-Hill Book Company, fhcY^i^h!?}, p.' 17$. 18
7) Literature anthologies* Literature anthologies are books of reading selections chosen for their excellence of expression and general interest.
8) Orders of abstracting. Orders of abstracting are steps or levels involved in the process of developing successively broader generalizations. The abstracting proceeds from more detailed and specific levels or orders to higher levels by a process of leaving 9 cut details.
9) Toxtbooks. Textbooks are books dealing with a definite subject of study, systematically arranged, intended for use at a specified level of instruction, and used as a principal source of study material for a given course. In this study, basal readers and literature anthologies are considered reading textbooks*
Limitation of the Problem
Five series of basal readers and literature anthologies,
Grades Four through Twelve, viere used for this study. Several sets of supplementary and companion series were also examined since they are used for students who have difficulties in reading. All textbooks were published from I960 to the present and the most recent revision in most cases was used. The texts of these volumes were analyzed for the percentage of pages of informative articles defined in the previous section. Besides the percentage of pages, the number of
^Ibid., p.3. 1? articles and pages containing informative articles were tallied.
The average number of words in each article was approximated and the average length of articles in each book was determined and placed on one table. Sixty-three books were analyzed.
Assumptions
It is assumed that at each grade level* there is a minimum amount of specific* factual materials which represent forms suitable for the students to use as models for writing informative themes.
It is assumed that the average lengths of the majority of - articles analyzed exceed the usual required minimum lengths ranging from three-hundred to eight-hundred words for the students* require ments in writing themes for school assignments.
Organization of this Study
Justifying a need for basic research in the macro or total design of the curriculum, Eash has identified eight macro-curriculum design problems. From these eight problems which he lists, four significant design problems concern this research. They ares
1. Assessment of internal and external pressures to effect change in parts of the curriculum and the impact on the total curriculum design.
2. Balance: concern for relationships of general education to special education, vicarious and firsthand experiences, product and process learnings. 20
3. Continuity: preserving and expanding threads of experiences frera grade level to grade level and lower school to upper school, observing principles of learning in concept presentation allowing for structural development of fields of inquiry,
k . Coordination: concern for commonalities as well as duplications with emphasis on wholeness in the curricular experiences for the student as he pur sues the various subject areas.10
Recognizing the possibility of a need for including informative
themes in the reading anthologies and a plan for developing these materials in the future according to these four macro-curriculum
design problems, the writer ‘will discuss these problems in Chapter
Tito as they relate to this study. The.review of literature relating
to textbooks in the curriculum and content analysis and methodology
of the investigation will be included.
Chapters Three, Four, and Five will describe the findings from the analysis of the textbooks. Chapter Three will include
ihe findings and a discussion of the study of the basal readers
and companion series usod in the intermediate grades. Chapter Four
will include the findings of the study of the basal readers, companion
series, and literature anthologies at the seventh, eighth, and ninth-
grade levels. Chapter Five will include the findings of the study
of the reading anthologies and companion series at the senior high
level.
10Haurice J. Eash, "Supervision: A Vanishing Breed?," Educational leadership, XZVI, No. l(0ctober, 1968), 79. 21
Chapter Six will include proposed criteria for future develop ments of informative themes and a plan, of organisation for recommend ations for .use in the reading textbooks from Grades Pour through.
Twelve.
Chapter Seven id 11 consist of conclusions and future research needed as a result of this study of informative articles in the textbooks and the recommendation for the use of informative themes. CHAPTER II
REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE
Curriculum Research
Research and studies relating to the curriculum can be represented in many ways, come of which are macro-curriculum 1 problems described by Eash, special programs and projects, curriculum theory, development, or design, curriculum materials, and planning. Because the choices are so diverse, one should set limitations to his own research in order to acquire as much information as possible for making recommendations for improvement.
Although this study is concerned with evaluating a specific type of materials used in reading textbooks in Grades Four through
Twelve, other concerns related to materials include pressures for effecting change in curriculum design, balance in the relationships of the materials to their uses by the students, continuity in the gradual growth of students in stages of reading and writing from their elementary through their high school years, and a better coordination in the relationships of Idle materials containing in formation to the procedures developed for proper use of these types of materials.
^Eash, p. 79. 22 23
Present curricula for the teaching of reading might include a textbook series either used separately or accompanied by supple mentary books and.workbooks, a syllabus written by a teacher of the specific grade or course taught by that teacher, a series of objectives or goals to be achieved with choices of materials left to the teacher, or an elective course represented by a discipline such as a course in teaching composition or teaching the novel.
Some studies relating to research of materials used for the teaching of reading and composition have been significant for their thoroughness and background. In her comprehensive historical study of reading instruction in the United States, Smith doscribes the periods of development in reading materials depicting types of values such as religion, nationalism, and others which were empha sized since the beginning of the public schools in America and ap proaches to the teaching of reading in elementary and secondary schools with the types of reading materials used during the different stages 2 of reading development. Austin and Morrison1 s report of a survey of the practices in teaching reading in the elementary school at the present time offers forty-five recommendations for improvements.^
In their study of one-hundred and fifty-eight high schools, Squire
% i l a Banton Smith, American Reading Instruction; Its Develop ment and Its Significance in"Gaining a Perspective on CurrentT Practices in Reading, (3rd ed.'; Newark', Delaware; International ■ Reading Association, 1965).
^Austin, et al. and Applebee list different categories of reading and literature materials most frequently used and describe the instructional methods for presenting them.^ Evans and Walker describe trends in the teaching of English in secondary schools and comment upon the new materials requiring approaches to teaching language, liter ature, and composition as disciplines to meet the criticisms and demands for excellence in English by critics of the schools such d as Rickover and Conant. Curriculum centers funded by the govern ment have also been conducting research in order to develop materials for different purposes for the teaching of language arts and English.
Shugrue reported the projects and types of curricular developments 6 at the twenty-five study centers and demonstration centers.
Although these studies have explained the usefulness of materials in general, the recent research for the relative effective ness of various kinds of materials or specific.kinds of materials has been sparse. Through study and evaluation of infoimative types of reading materials in reading textbooks from Grades Four through
Twelve, the writer will seek to gain more understanding about the
^James Squire and Roger Applebee, A Study of English Programs in Selected High Schools Which Consistently Educate Outstjuiding ~ StudenfFl-n Eng3SsK"TUrbana, TilinoisY University of’lllinoi’s, 1966).
^William H. Evans and Jerry 1. Walker, Row Trends in the Teaching of English in Secondary Schools (Chicago:' Rand', HcHally and Company, 193577" “
^Michael Shugrue, "Row Materials for the Teaching of English: the English Programs of the USOE," E-HA, LXXXI, No. U(September, 1966), 3-38. 2$ continuity* balance, and coordination needed for further curriculum development and uses of specific types of materials.
Relationship of Macro-Curriculum Problems to this Study
The first design problem, described as internal and external pressures for effecting change in parts of the curriculum should be considered in relationship to how these influences might determine the balance, continuity, and coordination needed for establishing a well-unified curriculum.
Ewer and Latorre present reasons for a need for‘materials useful in providing instruction in the kind of English required by students in the scientific disciplines. This article resulted fran their experiments at the University of Chile for development of an extensive reading program in nonfictional literature (including science). They reported that according to UNESCO, English is now established as the principal international language of science. The major points to be established are the kind of linguistic material to bo provided, the amount of material to be included, and the way 7 this is to be presented. Trying to find ways to create or acquire these materials has been one of the authors1 problems. Although this point of view is an international one, the tendency to associate informative writing with scientific topics can result from this type of pressure.
^J. R, Ewer and G, Latorre, "Froparing an English Course for Students of Science,H English Language Teacher, XXI (May, 19^6), 223. 26
On the other hand, Lynch and Evans, after examination of high school English textbooks, stated that the neglect of literature
* 8 was the greatest fault in textbooks. In their opinion, all activities in the teaching of English must evolve around literature as the topic to be studied with all composition directly* related to writing about literature.
Discussing the importance of fashioning a means of communi cating knowledge that will serve more adequately the needs of our times, VJhite states that “the communications pattern of a political democracy of the future will require not only the ability to read, but the ability and the will to read more complex materials and to 9 understand more complex patterns.1* Other critics present arguments far courses which are necessary for utilitarian purposes, especially vocational purposes rather than artistic or aesthetic purposes.
Before making recommendations for change, one should assess these pressures for change thoroughly and carefully and seek ways to find adequate evidence regarding the recommendations.
Developing a better balance in the curriculum design requires attention in the teaching of language arts, composition, grammar, and literature relative to the proportion of time which can be spent
8Janies J. Lynch and Bertrand Evans, High School English Toxtbooks: A Critical Examination (Boston; Little, Brown and Company, ^63), p. 3f£
?L. W. VJhite, "Books and Reading in a Television Age,1* Adult Leadership, XIV(January, 1966), 2k7* 27 for this instruction. Cultivating a variety of reading interests and developing an appreciation of good literature are goals to achieve a better balance between reading for information and reading for experience. Any possible subject can be included in informative materials and in this study, informative materials are not identified only with scientific topics.
In his report from the Dartmouth Conference, Muller referred to this particular attitude. He regarded this distinction between literature and science as a question concerning how to "bridge the gap between the perscnal and impersonal,"'1*0 The members of the conference did not resolve the question of the English teacher*s role in teaching impersonal tad.ting. Neither did they discuss the means for teaching composition to students interested in science.
Ewer and Latorre succinctly state their concerns regarding this imbalance in the following:
. . .Most of these courses all over the world have . an overwhelmingly 'literary* content and approach, largely due to the fact that both textbook writers and teachers are traditionally trained exclusively on the arts side. However, in the light of the actual uses which pupils make of their knowledge of English in adult life, viz., to deal with business correspondence, catalogues, technical handbooks, newspaper and magazine articles, or (in the case under discussion) scientific literature, it is obvious that in most case3 there is an urgent need for a more balanced distribution of subject-matter between the 'everyday,* the literary, and the technico-scientific.H
•^Herbert duller, The Uses of English (New York: Holt, Rine hart and Winston, Inc., 1967), PP'•’"lDii-lO^T*
^Ewer and Latorre, 228. 28
Although this might bo tho case with the materials available for
teaching English as a second language, one of the purposes of this
study is to discover to what extent informative materials are used
in reading textbooks from Grades Four through Twelve.
Continuity, the third curriculum design problem, is important
for this study because accessibility to materials is necessary for
establishing some form of continuity from one grade level to ihe
next and especially during the transitions from one grade to the
next and especially during the transitions from elementary school to
junior high school and to senior high school. "What materials are
selected for the textbooks and how these materials are presented
can either lessen or increase the difficulties during these periods
of changes in the students* education.
Assuming that the textbook can provide the basis for continuity,
the researchers can analyze the merits and limitations of the differ
ent types of organization plans for these books. In her article
discussing the merits and limitations of textbooks, Cook justifies
the use of textbooks for the reasons that the average teacher lacks
the ability to organize materials in a satisfactory total design
and that the schools are unprepared to build their own materials.
Her case against the textbook*s use i3 lack of providing for
individual differences and "cover the book" learning.12
12Luolla B. Cook, "High School Textbooks and the Changing Curriculum: Introductory Remarks," English Journal, XXXVIII(April, 19U9), 20U. 29
Expressing his concern for the transition period when individual reading declines in Grade Nine, Diederich recommends
that the publishers and anthologists 11 should provide books . . .
that bridge the gap between juvenile and adult reading by easy
stages, and that furnish guides to interpretation and teaching,11^
By studying several series of books, one can look for similar
characteristics and decide if adequate provisions are made to
insure a reasonable amount of continuity.
Coordination, the fourth design problem with which this
study is concerned, characterizes the selection and arrangement
of courses designed to achieve the goals of the program. Redding presents his view about the decisions needed for improvement of
the textbooks in the futures
What is now needed is a reaffirmation of the place of the book in teaching, as well as in a series of essentially constructive proposals from the schools to the publishers which will help shape patterns of the books of the future. Whether these books are to be large or snail, bound in paper or cloth, issued singly or in series, colorful or austerely black and white, programed or traditional, singular in purpose or designed for a variety of uses, made to stand alone or” created to be used in conjunction with other teaching aids— all those answers mu3t come fran the schools.
^paul R. Diederich and P. R. Link, "Co-operative Evaluation in English," Evaluation as Feedback and Guide, ed. Fred T. Wilhelms (Washington, D.C.: Association for' Svpervision and Curriculum Development. NEA, 1967), p. 189.
•^M. Frank Redding, Revolution in the Textbook Publishing Industry, (Los Angeles, California: University oT^SoutHern California Press, 1963), p. 32. 30
In this paper., Redding was alluding to the many changes in publish ing practices due to the.mergers of many companies since 1959-
According to him, the publishers1 concern is. .to make books with,
'•sufficient intrinsic merit to capture the imagination of large segments of all the educational market."-^ As a result, the text book industry has become more influential during the last ten years.
Stating the need for research to give directions or guide lines for changes in textbooks, Zimet assigns the responsibility for this task to the education profession. He states:
. . . Research scholars* tasks are to follow through on ideas generated by teachers and researchers and to develop and improve research methods and techniques. Communication of the significant results to educators, to authors of children*s books, and to publishers of instructional materials should then become the responsibility of the education profession.!®
In order to provide communication with the education profession, the American Textbook Publishers* Institute was established. Some of the purposes of this Institute are to provide a clearing house for ideas and recommendations by both educators and publishers for more effective use of printed materials and to stimulate research directly affecting the use of such materials and to cooperate in every way possible with
^ Ibid. i p. It.
■^S. P. Zimet, ••Children*s Interest and Story Preferences; A Critical Review of the Literature," Elementary School Journal, LXVUCDecomber, 1966), 128. ~ 31
educational authorities and citizens in sound educational planning.
Since there have been many mergers of companies, one might assume
that maintaining this cooperation may become increasingly more
difficult in the years to come.
The role of the textbook in instruction, especially in reading
instruction, is a major issue in education today and the topic in
many articles in periodicals. The function of the textbook, based
upon principles of its organization, is to present organized know
ledge in a selected, orderly way.
Criteria for textbook preparation relate to selection of
the material, organization, presentation, style, and accuracy. The
problems in preparing a reading series are indeed complex. Limiting
onefs research to a specific category of materials throughout a
series can be useful for studying these four macro-curriculum design
problems.
Content Analysis and Reading Textbooks
•'Content analysis is a research technique for the objective,
systematic, and quantitative description of readily perceived content
of communication.”'1'® This particular research technique has been a
important method for the study of communications during the past
thirty years. Often journalists have used this type of research for
...... 17American Textbook Publishers* Institute, Textbooks Are Indispensable (New York: American Book-Stratford Press', She. ,"T956), TFBtL ---
^Berelson, p. 18, 32 analysing bias in newspapers, propaganda in mass media or quanti
tative studies relating to values' of organizations determined by the number of times a specific idea was mentioned and with what words or
terms.
Textbook analysis has often been associated with the use of
a form for selection of textbooks by school personnel. This form might include a series of categories and subcategories. Also, some method is utilized for determining quantitatively through numerical
ratings the quality and contents of the textbook. MalmstromTs guide
to this type of systematic analysis of a language textbook includes
the major headings as follows s Authority and Reliability of Authors,
Physical Format, Diction and Style, Adaptability, Motivation of
Students, The Teaching of Usage, The Teaching of Grammar, The Teach
ing of Communication Skills, The Teaching of Communication Appli- 19 cations, and The Teaching of Rhetoric. This particular rating was
limited to language textbooks and literature textbooks were not
considered. In Social Sducation, a list of categories was developed
for the evaluation of social studies textbooks in which the authors
divided the points to be considered for judging books into "Definites"
and “Indefinites." Under the category of "Definites" were listed
such items as page format, binding, maps, illustrations, and avail
ability of manuals and others. Under the category of "Indefinites,"
the content was classified into five major categories followed with
19 Jean Kalmstrom, "A Progress Report on a Textbook Analysis," English Journal, LI, No. 1(January, 1962), 3h~ 33
questions about these groups: style, scholarship, organization,
teaching aids, and philosophy. Content analysis which concerns the
“Indefinites11 requires special sldLHs in designing the textbook 20 research for quantitative, systematic, and objective study.*
A third type of analysis of textbooks is related to the work
of the International Textbook Institute at Braunschweig, Germany.
The purpose of this organization is to evaluate and to Improve history and other social studies textbooks. Sponsored by the
German Teachers Association and founded in 2Sh73 the members
qualitatively analyze textbooks used internationally and recommend
improvements in scholarship for factual reliability and points of
view relative to peaceful coexistence, international understanding,
and others.^
Morrisset and Stevens recognize that the two major sources
of information about curricula are examination of materials and 22 classroom experience. They present a guide for acquiring these
types of information and stress the urgency for research especially
for improvement of urban schools.
20 Ralph A. Brown and Maria Brown, “Selecting Social Studies Textbooks: The Challenge of Choice,“ Social Education, XXXHI(March, 196?), 318-23. ” 21Kent Pillsbury, “International Cooperation in Textbook Evaluation," Comparative Education Review, X(February, 1966), h8-l|9. 22 Irving Morrissett and W. Williams Stevens, Jr., “Content Analysis: Curriculum," Social Education, XXXI(October, 1967), k83. A bibliography by Finkelstein and others has included stadias of the social, moral, political, and intellectual content of materials written for school use, as well as materials such as books which children or youth might read. The authors agree that books and textbooks of a nation embody, in some measure, the ideals, aspirations, dreams, taboos, and values which an older generation seeks to transmit to a younger one.^ Much of the work presently being done in content analysis of textbooks seems to be research in social studies and in the social sciences.
Before discussing the methodology for the content analysis of this study, other types of textbook analyses should be listed and some further examples of specific studies done in social studies, language, and reading should be given. Rummel writes about a group of seven types of textbook study and after these typos are listed, descriptions of studies which use these types of analyses follow.
These categories are: Frequency of concepts, kinds of concepts, classification of techniques, tracing of historical trends, status studies based on definite criteria, studies of errors, distortions, ol. and biases in printed materials and story content studies.
Cogan used frequency of concepts in his thesis in which he searched for frequency and types of specific concepts and related
23 ‘ ' Barbara Finkelstsin and others, ‘'Bibliography of Research and Commentary on Textbooks and Related Works,” Social Education, XXXIII (March, 1969), 331-36. \j. Francis Rummel, An Introduction to Research Procedures in Education (New Tork: Harper, 195^7/ 20B. economic ideas in five series of twenty-six elementary social studies textbooks. Some of those concepts which he listed and counted were 2f> scarcity, resources, and income. Although much of his analysis after his defining of terms liras somewhat subjective, he did establish some specific standards to complete his systematic and quantitative analysis. In her study relating to kinds of concepts, Williams analyzed ten series consisting of eighty basic readers for critical reading skills totaling one-hundred eighty-six skills. She listed thirty-three skills and the number of series which contained these skills. Findings and implications for teaching were listed as resulting from this study.^
Using classification of techniques, Smith made an analysis of fifty-two science textbooks, sixty social studies textbooks, forty-nine mathematics textbooks, and forty-five literature textbooks to learn whether or not there might be special patterns of writing in the content of other subject fields. The study included analyses of questions, directions, explanations, and various types of exercises that the books contained. These aids were used because they are indicative of the ways in which the subject specialist wants
^John Joseph Gogan, "A Content Analysis of Elementary Social Studies Textbooks for Economic Concepts*1 (Unpublished Master’s thesis, Department of Education, The Ohio State University, 196$), ^Gertrude Williams, "Provisions for Critical Reading in Basic Readers," Elementary English, XXXVl(Hay, 19$9), 323-31* 36 students to tliink and work with materials in that special field. 27 Different patterns of writing were described.
A special study for the purpose of Investigating psychological variables to predict the cultural changes observed in the United
States from 1800-1952 was done by deCharms and Moeller. Four reading books for each twenty year period at the fourth-grade level were scored for achievement imagery, affiliation imagery, and moral teaching based upon Riesman*s inner-directed and other-directed . 28 types.
A final example of content analysis was a survey of eight sets of language textbooks completed by Slothower. His purpose was to answer a series of four general questions about the contents in the books. He especially stressed the responsibility of the teachers to know the book and the series well and to be selective in the uses of these materials.2^
This technique of content analysis research seemed suitable for
this particular study and thu3 an explanation of the specific method ology for the analysis of basic readers and literature anthologies from Grades Four through Twelve will follow.
2? Hila Banton Smith, “Patterns of Writing in Different Subject Areas,“ Critical Heading, ed. Martha King, et al., (Philadelphia; Lippincott, lyS?1),' 275-85. 2^R. deCharms and G. Moeller, “Values Expressive in American Children* s Readers 1800-1950,11 Journal of Abnormal and Social Psycho logy, IXEV(February, 1962), 136-2/2’." 29 William R. Slothower, “Language Textbooks; a Survey,“ English Journal, LIV, Ho. 1(January, 1965), 8-16. 37
Methodology of this Study
With the informative theme defined as a recommended type for use in the reading textbooks, the major problem , for designing a form
of content analysis was to find a way to determine in an objective and systematic tray what kinds of informative articles are in the reading textbooks.
One particular reason for selecting the informative theme as a possibility for recommendation was to originate the idea that a
specific single topic can be written in a set-form suitable to the topic and have a definite function which is to help students develop in their minds a verbal picture in the systematic tray which is represented in the theme. A set-form in a literary type «character- ised by invariable structure, organization, and style."3° Although
these particular characteristics of a set-form may seem insignificant
and uncreative for children and adolescents, recognition of verbal realities precedes higher levels of thinking and perhaps this would
be most useful from the elementary through the high school years.
Constructing a theme in which the style, organization, and structure represent a type of verbal reality for the reader can be beneficial
to all those who use the textbookB.
30 Paul Koefod, The Writing Requirement for Graduate Degrees (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Frentice-Hall, Inc., 19&0, p. 19. Before the specific Retails are given about the way this analysis of informative materials was pursued, the writer finds it necessary to define several problems which had to be resolved before the study was undertaken.
Prior to this study, decisions had to be made for distinguish ing informative articles from the remainder of the nonfiction prose in order to decide whether one could use the essay or article as a set-form for the analysis. It was necessary also to find factual materials for particular grade levels and to determine, in some cases whether the materials did or did not contain inferences, opinions, and judgments. These decisions were necessary in order to establish quantitative percentages of informative articles.
lynch and Evans listed miscellaneous materials found in textbooks such as biographical sketches, biographies and auto biographies, descriptive sketches, excerpts from accounts of true adventures, excerpts from scientific books, newspaper and magazine articles, extracts from journals and diaries, letters and excerpts from letters, orations, addresses, excerpts from political documents, 31 and extracts from reference works. Fowler expressed concern for putting the heading, nonfiction, in a section of the textbook and including everything as parts of biographies, excerpts from essays
Lynch and Evans, p. 71. 39 without specifying the particular form, and articles either partially factual or poorly-organised. She does make a distinction between formal and informal types of essays and notes differences in subject, 32 style, and structure.
One element seldom considered is the blending of fiction and nonfiction. These types of works are called either factual prose, narrative factual prose, or prose narratives. One textbook pub lishing company promoting its program for this "blend” or for using nonfiction articles written in a fictional style stated in its brochure that since the poor reader has to be enticed to read, this
"enticement is most complete when fiction is the mainstay of his diet."
Trying to limit the study to essays and articles proved even more difficult since there were many disagreements as to the definition of essays and articles. Fowler makes a distinction between literary essays and expository prose. In her opinion, expository prose "provides most of the material used in teaching reading for comprehension and much of what we use to teach the principles of writing, speaking, and listening . .
Carlin talks about modern essays in connection with articles and feature stories in a newspaper. His directions to teachers are
'3P " 11 ifery Elisabeth Fowler, Teaching Language, Literature and Composition (New fork: McGraw-Hill Book" Company, 196]?), p. 309. 33Ibid., p. 311. to introduce them as articles and then males clear later that these
expressions of ideas are called essays.^ Other persons who dis
cussed essays and articles referred to the personal opinions and moods being conveyed to the reader by the writer and regarded the
essay as a conversation form in which the essayist talks to the
reader.
After much deliberation, the eventual decision was to use
only those materials presented frcn an objective, impersonal point
of view in styles which explain or describe rather than narrative
forms employing the iirst person point of view.
An analysis of the textbooks for the informative contents in
five major series and four supplementary series of reading textbooks
totaling sixty-three books was designed to provide the number of
informative articles in each book, the total number of pages contain
ing these articles, and the percentage of pages of articles based
upon the total number of pages in each book. The approximate number
of words was tabulated for each article and the average length of the
articles in each book was computed. The basis for the selection of
the books was to have major companies represented and to include
supplementary texts for purposes of comparison to see if more factua]
articles are represented in supplementary series for special reading purposes. The textbooks were either published for the first time or
Jerome Carlin, "This I Believe about the Essay," English Journal, LI, No. 6(September, 1962), IjlO. revised editions frosn I960 to the present. As previously stated, preference was given to the most recent edition. To provide continuity within a series, the complete series was used when available.
The factual informative materials include impersonal approaches by authors as they tell about specific or general topics in categories such as science, biology, zoology, cybernetics, space travel, aeronautics, historical landmarks, types of communication, geography, expeditions, weather, sports, archi tecture, and otliers, reprints from newspaper reports, explanatory introductions to units in literature which include commentaries about social history or descriptions about the reprints of paintings by great artists, and excerpts from books and periodicals.
The impersonal style is one of the most important characteristics which helped to determine this decision for what materials to include.
Materials excluded from the percentage results were bio graphical sketches, narrative factual material, personal diaries, exercises of the workbook type for the teaching of composition, exercises in dictionary work, preliminary talks from the author of the text who gives explanations about the literary form or the materials to be read, or explanations placed after the work or poem, annotated bibliographies of books to be read, biographies and autobiographies of great persons, fictionalized articles containing facts, articles which describe procedures for telling b z how to build or create some idea, and critical reviews shout literature.
Factual reliability regarding the informative materials in the textbook used for this study was not tested.
The next three chapters will report the findings of this analysis. CHAPTER III
INFORMATIVE ARTICLES IN READING TEXTBOOKS
GRADES FOUR, FIVE, AND SIX
In this chapter, the results of the data collected from the analysis of five series of basal readers and two series of companion readers used in Grades Four, Five, and Six are presented in Table 1. Each series is arranged alphabetically according to the publishing company, with basal readers and canpanion series listed following the name of the company.
The results of the information collected from these seven series are found in Table 1. In this table are the three headings:
Grade Four, Grade Five, and Grade Six. For each of these grades, specific information v&s collected related to the following questions:
1) How many informative articles were found in each book?
2) How many pages of informative articles ware there?
3) What was the percentage of the pag03 of informative articles in each reading textbook?
In order far this information to bo presented systematically, each series will be described and the findings presented quantitative ly. Other findings regarding the styles of presentation, topics used in the articles, and general organization of the textbooks will be given. Following the discussion, of these findings, a summary of the results within each grade will be given and some significant relationships to the general findings will follow.
Description, Findings, and Organization of Each Series
The Sheldon Basic Reading Series, first published by Allyn and
Bacon, Inc. in 19£7, was revised in 1963 and again in 1968. The latter edition was used for this study. This series runs from
Kindergarten through Grade Eight.
Percentages of informative articles in the Sheldon Series were two per cent in Grade Four, thirteen per cent in Grade Five, and two per cent in Grade Six. Each book is organized around major themes such as "Animal Friends," or "Friends to the North," in Grade Five or "Adventure All Around" in Grade Six. The emphasis cn travel to different parts of the world and upon history tend to account for this larger number in the fifth grade.
General categories of topics used in all the articles were ancient people, archaeology, early Indians, growth of American industry, history of language, ranchers, stamp collecting, the space monkey, Project Sealab, and the history of the banana industry.
In some case3 specific persons were identified as authors of the articles and in one case, an article was adapted from another article.
The intermediate textboolcs called The Read Series, published in 1968 by American Book Company, ware developed for Grades One TABLE 1. - The number of informative articles and pages and percentages of pages of informative articles in reading textbooks in the intermediate grades
Grade U Grade 5> Grade 6
i Pages i Pages Pages h EO tn . O to rH H O 3 3 3 3
Allyn and Bacon, Inc. Basic Reading Series 2 12 3 13 6k lk 2 17 3
American Book Company Basic Reading Series 15 69 16 6 25 6 9 I* 10
Ginn and Company Basic Reading Series- 100 Edition 0 0 0 0 0 0 h 39 7
Harcourt, Brace and World
The Macmillan Company Basic Reading Series 9 31 6 9 39 7 18 103 19
Scott, Foresman and Co. Basic Reading Series 6 20 h 2 8 2 U 28 5 Wide Horizons Series 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Open Highways Series 7 38 8 11 kh 9 3 8 2 through Six. In each textbook in this series, approximately seventy to ninety pages are used as exercises for developing special skills in reading and writing and for discussing stories.
Percentages for the informative articles were sixteen per cent in Grade Four, six per cent in Grade Five, and ten per cent in Grade
Six. The pattern of the organization of the series consists of large divisions such as "Sports,1* "Space Stories," or '‘Machines," which set the theme for the materials to be read. General subjects about which informative articles were written in the fourth-grade textbook includes space research, brief articles about words and language, spiders, underwater exploration, cars, and chimpanzees. In the other two grades, seme topics written daout were Telstar, insects, heli copter cops, penicillin, the deep sea, machines, and the new Metro politan Opera House.
In style, the articles were not as lengthy and were more frequent than in the Sheldon Series previously analyzed. Some of the articles ware excerpted or adapted from informational books such as Ley*s Our Work in Space and Poole1s Frontiers of Science.
The Ginn Basic Readers, first published in I9I48-U9 , have been revised several times. The present edition, the 100 Edition, was published in 1966; the series program covers first through the eighth grades.
Because this particular series uses a narrative style or nonfiction articles written in a fictional style in presenting the stories and the factual materials, the percentages for Grades
Four and Five were zero. In Grade Six, however, there were four informative articles. The specific content included an article about an expedition to the Antarctic, another about the sea, another about space stations, and an adaptation from Gods, Graves, and
Scholars about archaeology.
The organization of the materials in each section centers around themes such as "Fun and Nonsense" and "Adventure Waits" in the fourth-grade book, "Bright Heritage" and "Outer Space" in the fifth-grade book, and "Rural America" and "Adventures in Living" in the sixth-grade book.
The Hacmillan Company began to develop its reading series for primary grades in 1965 followed by development of- the readers for the intermediate grades in 1966 and 1967.
The percentages of the informative articles vary frcm six per cent in Grade Four and seven per cent in Grade Five to nineteen per cent in Grade Six, which is the highest percentage of any single textbook in the intermediate grades. The eighteen articles in Grade
Six were twice the total in either Grades Four or Five.
In the fourth-grade text, some of the general topics were the history of languages, dinosaurs, details about the Eskimos, a volcano, and squirrels. Included in tha fifth-grade reader were articles about the early settlers, the immigration to America in
1930, railroads, clipper ships, baseball, and the state of Idaho. In the sixth-grade reader, subjects ranged from facts about the printing press, cameras, and the desert to moon exploration and
"Project I'lohole," th9 seven seas, life of the aquanauts, the fish ing industry, Pearl Harbor, the United Nations, types of scientists, elections, crystals, and computers. These particular books con tained the largest number of informative articles and the range of topics seems to be the one that is also the broadest. A particular characteristic of the Hacmillan Series is that each author is identified with his particular work. In some cases, there are maps and diagrams which clarify factual details; In others there are excerpts from encyclopedias.
The Hacmillan Heading Program has recently introduced the
1970 Edition of its reading series, which consists of fourteen levels of development. The intermediate grades would, in the new series, be considered levels twelve, thirteen, and fourteen.
Scott, Foresman and Company is represented in this study by a basic reading series with two special series designed for specific purposes. Because the uses of informative materials may vary in amount and types, studying other series can be helpful for purposes of ccmpari3on. These series have been in the process of development since 1965. The basic reading program extends frcm Grade One through
Grade Six. The Hide Horisons Series is provided for readers who meet and exceed the expectations of their particular grade. This series also covers Grades One through Six. Opon Highways is a series developed for children who are not achieving to the expectations of their grade. This series continues into Grades Seven end Eight and will be discussed also in the next chapter.
The percentages of informative materials for the basic reading series published by Scott Foresman ware four per cent for
Ckade Four, two per cent for Grade Five, and five per cent for
Grade Six. The frequency of articles included a total of twelve articles for all three books. Some of the subjects were quite specific, such as the Liberty Bell, the "White House, Monarch butterflies, and the Statue of Liberty. More general topics v?ere farm life in India, L'Enfant's Flan of Washington, D.C., and the forest. A theme for each section set the tone for the sections; such titles as "Thresholds,** “Conquests,11 and "Frontiers** were used.
Wide Horizons contained fiction, biographies, or parts of stories but did not contain informative articles of the types included in this study; therefore, no percentages are given for the Wide Horizons Series.
Percentages for the informative articles for the Open Highways
Series wore seven per cent in Grade Four, nine per cent in Grade
Five, and two per cent in Grade Six. Shorter lengths of the articles and more pictures characterize the materials in these books. Gener al topics in the fourth-grade book were mechanical baseball pitchers, children in the White House, and dinosaurs. In book five were $0 articles about a little league ball team, the capture of animals for a 200, early days of railroading, an earthquake in Anchorage, and types of medals awarded to servicemen. Book six had articles about floods, falcons, and the Cooper Union.
In summarizing the patterns in each series, one might notice from Grades Four through Six that there are few consistent patterns of increase or decrease in the number of articles and percentages.
Summary of the Results
Some comments seem appropriate concerning the findings for each grade and the similarities or differences among the different series. In Grade Four, the number of articles ranges from none to fifteen, the number-of pages from none to sixty-nine, and the percentages from none to sixteen per cent. In Grade Five, the number of articles ranges from none to thirteen, the page3 from none to sixty-four and the percentages from none to fourteen per cent. In Grade Six, the number of articles ranges from none to eighteen, the number of pages from none to one-hundred and throe, and the percentage of pages from none to nineteen per cent.
Thus the quantities vary considerably from one publishing company to another, but it is important to note that informative articles do make up five to six per cent of the total reading materials. Methods of presentation of this material vary considerably according to styles of presentation of informative materials. A number of articles were taken from informational books, adapted from magazine articles, or reprinted from encyclopedias. There seemed little evidence to support the uses of any set-form for the presentation of the information.
The topics or categories about which the information was presented were quite diverse; however, the tendency to use topics relating to some type of science seemed prevalent in each textbook.
Travels to both inner and outer space seemed a topic used most frequently. Since information can be about any subject, the arts were not represented except for music, which was the topic of the article written about the Metropolitan Opera House.
In some cases especially in the Open Highways Series, there ware limitations in the length of the articles to approximately five-hundred words; however, many of the articles in other books exceeded a thousand words or more. (See Table It). In this series where the length was limited, there was a tendency to limit the subject to a single topic and hence fewer abstract terms were used.
Open Highways was developed for the reader with problems.
It may be noted that there was no mention or use of the word "essay,11 in any of the books. In some readers, there are skills programs for growth and practice in composition but the actual representation of themes or set-forms of Khat is to be read is Slacking.
Discussion of the possibility of using informative themes as specific forms of the reading materials will follow the analysis of informative materials which are presently in the reading textbooks at the junior and senior high school levels. CHAPTER IV
INFORMATIVE ARTICLES IN READING- TEXTBOOKS
GRADES SEVEN, EIGHT, AND NINE
In this chapter, the results of the data collected from the analysis of five series of literature anthologies and four sets of basic readers and companion books used in Grades Seven, Eight, and
Nina are presented in Table 2. Each series is arranged alphabetical ly according to the publishing company, with basic reading textbooks companion books, and literature anthologies listed following the name of the company.
In this table are the throe headings: Grade Seven, Grade
Eight, and Grade Nine, For each of these grades, specific inform ation was collected relating to the following questions:
1) How many informative articles were found in each book?
2) How many pages of informative articles were there?
3) What was the percentage of the pages of informative articles in each reading textbook?
In order for this information to be presented systematically, each series will be described and the findings presented. Other findings regarding the styles of presentation, topics U3ed in the articles, and general organization of the textbooks will bo given.
Following the discussion of these findings, a summary of the results within each grade will be given and acme significant relationships to the general findings will follow.
Description* Findings* and Organization of Each Series
Selecting different series of reading textbooks for Grades
Seven* Eight* and Nine resulted in some decisions concerning the different types of series. Some of the basic reading programs continue through the eighth grade* while literature anthologies begin in either the seventh grade or the ninth grade. Companion series* such as Open Highways, New Companion Series* and the Galaxy
Series* have been developed to be used for students with reading problems.
The Allyn and Bacon Series is representative of the two types of programs. The textbooks for seventh and eighth grades, published in 1968* are continuations of the basic reading program from the elementary school grades. The ninth-grade anthology is the first of a series of four high school literature anthologies.
The high school series, purlished in 1963* has been discontinued recently.
The percentage of informative articles in a21 three books was minimal. There were two per cent of infonnative articles for the seventh grade, four per cent for the eighth grade, and one per cent for the ninth grade. TABLE 2. - The number of informative articles and pages and percentages of pages of informative articles in reading textbooks in grades seven, eight, and nine
Grade 7 Grade 8 Grade 9
i Pages t Pages i Pages E
h ! n j . .
0 X| ative Articles ative Percentage Number of Info Articles ative Number Number Info of Number Number Number of Info Number of Articles ative | Percentage | i | Percentage | Allyn and Bacon, Inc. Basic Reading Series 1 7 2 2 16 k - - - Literature Anthologies * *• ** 2 6 1
American Book Company Literature Anthologies 7 37 6 1 9 1 11 68 11
Ginn and Company Basic Reading Series- 100 Edition 8 37 7 6 28 5 - -- Literature Anthologies 2 11 2 - - - 3 26 3
Harcourt, Brace and World i New Companion Series 8 22 h 6 lU 2 2 6 1 Literature Anthologies- Classic Series 7 lU 2 9 28 h 13 29 k
The Hacmillan Company Basic Reading Series
Scott, Foresman and Cbmpar 7 Open Highways Series 1$ 68 13 11 1*3 8 Literature Anthologies 0 0 0 3 k 8 $ 9 .6 Galaxy Series 1 2 1 7 21 3 1 3 .U 56
General organization of the seventh and eighth-grade readers
was similar to many types described in the reading textbooks. Ex amples are "Science in Action" and "The Sporting Way" in the seventh-
grade textbook and "Han and Beast" and "In Search of Knowledge" in
the eighth-grade textbook. The ninth-grade anthology was organized
by types of literary forms.
Specific subjects, such as fossil hunting in the seventh
grade and Krakatoa in the eighth, were few in number. The ninth-
grade textbook had a biographical introduction preceding each
literary selection and other types of prose but only two inform
ative articles, one about the sea and the other about Annapolis.
The American Book Company has a sequential series of
literature anthologies published in 1963. The contents are grouped
into ten large unit3 of major themes such as "Adventure in Science"
or "Time for Sport." In seventh grade the percentage of inform
ative articles was six per cent; in eighth grade, it was one per
cent; and in ninth grade, eleven per cent.
One particular characteristic of the informative articles
in this series was the length of each one. They usually included
a wide range of vocabulary and many concepts within a single article.
Some particular topic3 were about space, the sun, the Nautilus,
chemistry and food, atomic energy, space, the atomic project, the
weather satellite, plastics, and robots. Travel articles were written from the first person point of •view and were not included.
The eighth-grade text was limited to only one article.
As with Allyn and Bacon* s basic reading series, the basic reading textbooks published in 1967 by Ginn and Company extend to the eighth grade. Also, the company has a literature anthology series, published in l?6li, which includes the seventh grade through the ninth grade. The basic readers will be discussed first. In the seventh-grade textbook, the percentage of informative articles is seven per cent. Articles deal with topics such as Braille,
J,Blue Angels,1' and a reprint of a news article while the eighth- grade reader had five per cent with major articles about underwater spaceships and about words. The general organization is quite simi lar to the intermediate program in the basic'reading series.
Although the books of the Ginn anthologies are approximately a hundred page3 longer than the basic readers, the percentage of informative articles is loss with two per cent for the seventh grade and three per cent for the ninth grade. (The eighth-grade textbook was not available.) The type of organization emphasizes the teach ing of literary forms. In the seventh-grade book, there were two informative articles about American history and in the ninth-grade book, the articles were about Schliemann's excavations and about the Trojan Women.' Arrangement was in two parts. The first part dealt with three themes: "The Individual," "America," and "Far Lands. The second part was about types of literary forms. Recently, there has been a revision with some changes although the format is quite similar. .
The Classic Series and the New Companion Series of Hare our t,
Brace and World, Inc. are similar in format to Ginn*s. The New
Companion Series has four per cent factual material for Grade Seven, two per cent for Grade Eight, and one-tenth of one per cent for
Grade Nine. The organization of the textbook is arranged in units such as “Enjoying Short Stories,” “l-lystery and Wonder,” or “Enjoying
Plays.” The selections are varied and there are suggestions for the study of literary forms. Examples of topics are articles about helicopters, jets, animals, the Washington monument, and airplanes.
In the Classic Series, the anthologies have two per cent of informative articles in Grade Seven and four per cent in both
Grades Eight and Grade Nine. Articles about the art paintings reprinted in the Classic Series for studies in art appreciation seem to be about the only ldnd of informative writing in the three books. The writing assignments are based upon the themes and ideas presented in the literature and pupils are asked to imitate the writers and their styles. There are no set-forms of factual writing in the series.
Three series published by Scott, Foresman and Company ware represented in this part of the study: Open Highways, a supplemen tary series for those who are not working at the specified grade level, continues at the seventh and eighth-grade levelsj the literature anthologies are used consecutively from Grades Seven through
Twelve, and the Galaxy Series is designed for the students who need additional work in the development of reading skills.
Beginning with the seventh-grade text in the Open Highways series, one can notice the highest per cent of informative materials, which is thirteen per cent. The eighth-grade text has eight per cent. This series is divided into sections which are colorfully introduced with abstract designs. The primary goal seems to be to encourage high interest, Topics include the moon, the Loch Ness monster, helicopters, volcanoes, skyscrapers, espionage, snakes, handwriting analysis, and tornadoes. Again, specific topics are recognizable here, as in the elementary textbooks in this series.
The literature anthologies are divided into specific units in Grades Seven and Eight while the ninth-grade textbook contains . divisions into literary forms. The percentage of informative materials is quite sparse in these books, with none in the seventh- grade book, in which there vra.3 heavy concentration upon stories and poetry. The percentage in the eighth-grade anthology was eight- tenths of one per cent and in the ninth-grade anthology six-tenths of one per cent.
The Galaxy Series was quite similar to the regular antho logies, This series had onotenth of one per cent for Grade Seven, three per cent for Grade Eight and four-tenths of one per cent for 60
Grade Nine. Thera were sections for helping the student improve his reading skills but informative materials were not included.
Summary of Results
By studying the characteristics of informative materials used in reading textbooks in the junior high school, one can observe a more diverse set of statistics in these results compared with the intermediate grades. There are both transition sets of books and series of literature anthologies. One can observe that, except for American Book Company, the informative articles in the
literature anthologies range from zero per cent to four per cent.
Ginn Basic Readers and Open Highways represent the highest percen
tage of informative materials ranging from five per cent to thir
teen per cent.
Even with the increased length of the reading textbooks,
the highest number of pages about informative topics is sixty-
eight pages.
In view of the fact that the junior high years are very
important for the transition stages of growth In reading and
writing, the diversity and inconsistency at this particular period
are surprising. Style and organisation patterns show a marked change for the students who use anthologies in the seventh grade
from those who use basic readers. The latter keep sane type of 61 continuity and balance of factual concrete materials while the anthologies tend to concentrate upon literature as a discipline.
Expressing concern regarding the decision about whether' literature or reading should be taught at the junior high school level, Jenkins states:
As my colleagues may attest— emphasizing liter ature to the neglect of reading— is the usual situation in the high school, while the junior high school frequently assumes the characteristics of no-man's land where neither literature nor reading is highlighted; where a stand has been taken, it is usually in favor of literature in the junior high school.
The next chapter will discuss the uses of informative materials in the senior high school and summarize the findings from intermediate grades through the senior high school.
^■Jilliam H. Jenkins, "Reading Skills in Teaching Literature in the Elementary School,M Elementary English, XII(November, 1961*), 780. CHAPTER 7
INFORMATIVE ARTICLES IN HEADING TEXTBOOKS
GRADES TEN, ELEVEN, AND TWELVE
In this chapter, the results of the data collected from the analysis of five series of literature anthologies and two sets of companion books used in Grades Ten, Eleven, and Twelve are presented in Table 3. Each series is arranged alphabetically according to the publishing company, with basic reading textbooks,
canpanion books, and literature anthologies listed following the name of the company.
The results in this table are placed under three headings:
Grade Ten, Grade Eleven, and Grade Twelve. For each of those grades,
specific infonnation was collected relating to the following questions*
1} How many informative articles were found in each book?
2) How many pages of informative articles were there?
3) What was the percentage of the pages of informative articles in each reading textbook?
In order for this information to be presented systematically,
each series will be described and the findings presented. Other
62 findings regarding the styles of presentation, topics dealt with in the articles, and general organisation of the textbooks will be given. Following the discussion of these findings, a summary of the results within each grade will be presented and some significant relationships to the general findings will follow.
Description, Findings, and Organization of Each Series
The Allyn and Bacon high school series called the Cavalcade
Series is classified into three specific groups of literature.
Tenth-grade students study war Id literature, eleventh-grade students
study American literature, and in the senior year, the concentration
is upon British literature.
Except for the companion series or other supplementary
materials this pattern seems to predominate in all anthology
series at the senior high school level. The most noticeable
characteristic is tlie extreme length of many of the textbooks.
In order to approach this section of the analysis, one must
recognize the complications involved in making the decisions as to
what styles of informative materials and what kinds of informative materials should be included in this study. At the end of this
study, some additional information about the variety of contents
in the many books is given.
As mentioned before, although the Allyn and Bacon series is
no longer available, an important characteristic to notice is the 6k
TABLE 3- - The number of informative articles and pages and percentages of pages of informative articles in reading textbooks in grades ten, eleven, and twelve
Grade 10 Grade 11 Grade 12
i Pages i Pages i Pages
. on0 S 3 HO HP
Q O®? O Percentage ative Articles ative Percentage ative Articles ative Number Number of Info: Number Info: Number of 1 KnJ i Percentage ! Allyn and Bacon, Inc. Literature Anthologies 3 6 8 0 0 0 2 10 1
American Eook Company Literature Anthologies 6 23 k lU 72 10 lU 68 9
Ginn and Company Literature Anthologies 2 16 2 5 29 k 12 132 lit
Harcourt, Brace and World New Companion Series 1 7 1 Literature Anthologies- Classic Scries 11 26 3 22 9k 6 .28 115 12
The Macmillan Company Basic Reading Series
Scott, Foresman and Co. Literature Anthologies 5 7 9 27 93 6 36 118 lk Galaxy Series 6 38 6 k 21 3 repetition of form in each book. The emphasis is on the study of
literature by types: short story, poetry, drama, and the like.
Each book contains a similar format with a biographical sketch preceding each work by the author. Essays seem to be primarily personal and the totals of this series for the percentages of
informative articles range from less than one per cent to five per
cent. The only article in the tenth-grade anthology was a factual
report about Hiroshima. There was also an essay by Bacon. The
eleventh-grade anthology had no informative articles. This series
i3 quite a contrast to the earlier reading series compiled by authors
for Allyn and Bacon.
In the series of anthologies published by American Book
Company in 1963, there are increases in the numbers and percentages
of informative materials. The tenth-grade textbook contains four per cent. The textbook is organized according to specific units.
Some of the topics treated are the Dalai Lama, Denmark cows, the
reasons for the importance of mathematics, and Shakespeare’s Lon
don. Articles were reprinted from such publications as Time, the
World Almanac, and The New Yorker. The eleventh-grade anthology
contained fourteen articles and totaled ten per cent. The first part
was by special units and the second part was chronological. Articles
were quite long and varied frctn historical commentary in the intro
ductions to atomic furnaces and Burdick’s article reprinted from
Holiday called "Smells of the Pacific,11 In the senior anthology, the 66 percentage of informative materials was nine per cent. The stress
was on British literature but there was also a section presenting
world literature. Special articles about London, Westminster Abbey,
and the background of the historical periods comprised the inform
ation content. The topics were treated in a general fashion.
Literature anthologies published by Ginn and Company continue
the series described in the analysis of junior high school antho
logies. The approach emphasizes the study of the types of literature.
Chute's 'Introduction to Shakespeare" and Robert Coffin's "The Lobster-
ing 1-Ian" are the only two informative articles j they comprise two
per cent of the total content. The American literature anthology,
designed for use in the eleventh grade, has an informative content
of four per cent. In the senior anthology, there are twelve inform
ative articles, constituting fourteen per cent of the textbook.
Many, are historical introductions to periods such as the Renaissance,
tile Enlightenment, the Victorian Period, and the Twentieth Century.
Those are very involved and complicated articles which would chal
lenge the students1 ability to read with understanding.
One tenth-grade textbook represents the companion series of
Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc, with one per cent of informational
content. The article mentioned i3 called "Operation Deepfreeze."
The book is divided into units. Thirty-one pages are devoted to
composition skills, which are exercises rather than informative
articles. The literature series of Harcourt, Brace and World is the
Classic Series, a continuation of the one previously described for use in the junior high school. The tenth-grade textbook contains three per cent of informative materials, dealing chiefly with the reproductions of famous paintings in the textbooks. The eleventh- grade anthology increases to six per cent and besides the inform ation d)out the paintings in the series, there are a few factual reports in the area of history.
The twelfth-grade anthology increases the proportion of informative articles to twelve per centj there are twenty-eight articles dealing with specific periods of literature and the growth of the English language. Others continue to present information about famous paintings reproduced in the textbooks.
The Scott Foresman series includes three literature antho logies and two textbooks in the Galaxy series. The literature antho logies will be discussed first.
The organization of the literature anthologies centered upon literature as a discipline. In the tenth-grade anthology, the percentage of informative articles was nine per cent with twenty- seven articles. The subjects included information about costuming for Shakespeare1 s plays, Woolf's "Waxworks in the Abbey," effigies in the Abbey, the Russian peasant, and "The Pearl of la Paz." In the eleventh-grade anthology, informative articles totaled six per cent and the informative articles were about the Nobel Prise in literature, the Pulitzer Prize, the "Book of Fsalms," introductions 68 to periods in American literature, several articles about the magazine in America, the Walden idea, the factory girls of Lowell, the English Maypole, and the DO-3 airplane. In the twelfth-grade anthology, the percentage of informative articles was fourteen per cent with a total of thirty-six articles about the treasure of
Sutton Hoo, the cathedrals of medieval England, the Elizabethan manor house, the growth of theater, the masque, the coffee houses,
The Edinburgh Review, the Foet Laureate, Wagner’s Ring, Coventry
Cathedral, Pritchett1s "River of History," an excerpt about the
Thames River, articles introducing each period, and facts about the English language.
In the tenth-grade textbook in the Galaxy Series, the percentage averages are quite minimal with respect to informative materials which totaled six per cent. Subjects for these articles were superstition, types of magical tricks, Captain Kidd’s treasures, and ways to detect language traps. In the eleventh-grade reading book in the Galaxy Series, the informative articles totaled four per cent. Subjects were archaeology, the "American Turtle," a type of submarine, and the Kinsington Stone. These articles were excerpts from books.
Summary of the Results
At the tenth-grade level in the series, the percentages ranged from one per cent to nine per cent. Articles were lowest in number at thi3 level compared with either the eleventh-grade or twelfth-grade anthologies. The eleventh-grade series ranged
from three per cent in the Galaxy Series to ten per cent in the
American Book Company anthology. The highest number of articles
was twenty-seven in the Scott Foresraan literature anthology although
the percentage of articles was six per cent. Shorter articles were
a significant, characteristic in American literature textbooks
with many introductions to the periods of history preceding the
literature. At the twelfth-grade level, the percentages ranged
from one per cent in the Allyn and Bacon Series to fourteen per
cent in the Scott Foresman English literature anthology, which
also had the highest number of articles, totaling thirty-six. Four
out of the five senior anthologies contained a higher number of
articles and percentages due to the significance of introductory materials to the literary periods and to the change in the history
of the English language.
Although the eleventh and twelfth-grade textbooks are higher
in percentage of informative articles, the types of articles differ
considerably from those in the intermediate table and in the junior
high school table. The latter two included more articles about
other subjects especially in general categories such as science and
sports.
An additional table was designed to represent the average
length of words in informative articles in each textbook. The TABLE k . - Average length of articles included in the percentage tables in the study
6 7 a ? 10 11 12 .
Allyn and Bacon, Inc. Basic Reading Series Too 1166 l3hJ 55S ko'tt XX XX Literature Anthologies X X XX X 975? 67- " 0 IT 60
American Book Company Basic Reading Series 923 876 X XXX X X
Literature Anthologies X X X 2101 ' i92c 2696 " ' l W y a i 3600
Ginn and Company Basic Reading Series-100 Edition 0 0 191C "“1135 13 jt X X X X Literature Anthologies X X X 22& X ~f(’6o 6521 32S6 U&k
Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc. Hew Companion Series X XX 6ii 1 1 5 ^ 236c X X Literature Anthologies-Classic Series X XX 66 c 119"d 736 6hC T 2B2"
The Macmillan Comoany Basic Reading Series m 1612"[' im X X X X X X
Scott, Foresman and Company Basic Reading Series k$7 63h 1912 XX X XX X Wide Horizons 0 0 0 X X X X X X Open Highways 322 IlLO 62E # 8 n X X XI X Literature Anthologies X X X 0 h03 ii66 5kc 660 Galaxy Series X XX £oc 101£ llh7 191C 132Q x 71 purpose of Table 1* was to learn whether or not one might know whether or not there was a consistency in the length of articles in each saiies from fourth through twelfth grades and to what degree the lengths varied at the grade levels.
In the Allyn and Bacon series, the averages were from none at the eleventh-grade level to over four-thousand words at the eighth-grade level. The seventh and eighth-grade averages were considerably higher compared with all other grades.
The basic reading series for American Book Company averaged from nine-hundred to eleven-hundred while the series from seventh grade through twelfth grade ranged from fifteen-hundred to three- thousand words.
The Ginn Basic Reading Series ranged between eleven-hundred and nineteen-hundred from Grades Six through Eighty however the literature anthologies from seventh through twelfth grade ranged from twenty-two hundred to forty-five hundred words.
The New Companion Series from seventh through tenth grade contained articles with average lengths from five-hundred to twenty- three hundred words. The Classic Series of the literature antho logies was consistent at the junior and senior high school levels with average lengths between six-hundred and twelve-hundred words.
Host of the informative articles in this series, however, were articles written about the art reprints. 72
The Macmillan Basic Reading Series ranged from eight-hundred to eighteen-hundred in Grades Four through Six, while the Scott
Forestnan Basic Reading Series increased from approximately four- hundred fifty to nineteen-hundred words.
The Open Highways Series from Grades Four through Eight had consistent lengths under six-hundred words and the literature anthologies from eighth grade through twelfth grade ranged from four-hundred to approximately eight-hundred fifty words. The informative articles in the Galaxy Series ranged from five-hundred to nineteen-hundred words.
The results of the findings in Table Jj. show that the lengths of the articles vary according to grade levels and types of series.
The Scott Foresman Open Highways Series and the literature antho logies seem to maintain a consistent length throughout the grade levels; however, among the other books, there seems to be an incon sistency in the average lengths of articles.
"With the varieties of types included in the informative articles, there is reason to doubt the frequency of the use of set-forms for presenting information according to a specific style, organization, or word length.
Summary of the Findings
The organization of the materials in a textbook series can provide continuity and balance when a clearcut decision has been made as to the theoretical basis of the series and the nature of the materials to be included. 73
This study attempted to find out Aether there was coordin ation of informative materials in some of the series of reading textbooks and literature anthologies in Grades Four through Twelve.
The examination of sixty-three textbooks reveals that objective impersonal presentations of information are inconsistent in emphasis, content, and style within the reading programs especially during
those transition periods between elementary and junior high school
and junior high school and senior high school. There is little indication of an effort upon the part of editors to develop a rationale for the utilization of informative articles.
The study also sought to determine the proportion of articles
which were suitable for reading and for use as models for pupils*
compositions. The findings suggest very strongly that there are few materials for that purpose.
Completion of this analysis of the informative articles in
reading textbooks leads the investigator to believe that there
is a need for definite guidelines in the use of informative themes
in reading textbooks from Grades Four through Twelve. In Chapter
Six, recommendations regarding these guidelines will be presented.
Chapter Seven will present a summary and further research which
might be undertaken as a result of this study. CHAPTER VI
CURRICULUM DEVELOR'IEt'JT AND USES
FOR IRFOR-IATIVE THEMES
The findings from the study of reading textbooks summarised at the end of Chapter Five show that more attention might be given to the selection, organisation, presentation, and style of the informative articles used in these textbooks. In the selection of informative materials recommended for future use, one should not only be attentive to the types and varieties of subjects used but also to the methods of organisation of the factual information, the style and clarity of expression, and tbs accuracy or reliability
of the factual information.
Since the verbal proficiency of the students for achieving competence in reading and writing requires a knowledge of vocabulary,
systems for organising one's language, the ability to comprehend many types of verbal expressions, and appreciation of the power of language for conveying meaning in many different ways, well-developed informative themes can be very useful at ail stages of verbal develop ment.
Although attention in this study up to this point has been centered upon the quantity and types of informative materials
7k presently available in reading textbooks for students in elementary and secondary schools, the concentration in this chapter will be upon a set-form of presenting information called the informative theme. The style of presentation of this type of theme should include a variety of approaches for conveying information accurately for students at different stages in the elementary and secondary schools.
One purpose of this chapter is to review the literature for background concerning a need in the curriculum for this form for use in teaching composition. Further discussion of the inform ative theme and ways this form might be developed and evaluated will follow.
Important to the total balance in the curriculum design for the contents of reading textbooks in the future is the distinction made by the publishing Industry between literary books and nonliterary books. The literary category includes fiction, biography, poetry, drama, and general literature. The nonliterary books include practi cal and professional works in such subject areas as agriculture, business, economics, education, law, medicine, science, and techno logy. Also in the nonliterary category are included handbooks, manuals, directories, statistical reports, and textbooks, Benjamin reports that since 1930, the "annual nonliterary book production ha3 increased by seme three-hundred eighty per cent, while literary 76 production increased by only forty per cent."3. At this rate of increase, students need to have variety in reading materials to prepare them adequately for the years ahead*
The classification of types of writing into personal and impersonal is often used to separate experiential writing from informative writing. In his discussion of personal and impersonal writing, Meckel also refers to the latter as a form to be mastered.
It should be pointed out, however, that objectivity in writing and the use of illustration and proof naturally place more responsibility on the writer and call for greater effort and control than does the expressions of feelings and opinions. Skill in such writing, even though more difficult to attain, has to be learned; the real instructional issue involves judgment as to when instruction should begin and to what extent it should be interspersed _ with assignments calling for less demanding writing.
Burrows defines two general categories called personal and practical in her book about teaching children how to write.
Personal writing is individual and imaginative while the practical is utilitarian, realistic, intellectual, and mechanical.^ These two types are often combined in the basic readers.
^Curtis G. Benjamin, "Book Publishing's Hidden Bonanza," Saturday Review, April 18, 1970, p. 19.
^Henry C. Meckel, "Research on Teaching Composition and Literature," ed. N. L. Gage. Handbook of Research on Teaching (Chicago: Rand McNally and Company, 1963,), ' ^Alvina Trout Burrows, et al., They All Want to Write (New York: Prentice-Hall Education Series, l9i?2), p,19h. 77
Helmkamp refers to a type of impersonal writing which informs us of facts and employs the ’'language of report.The language of report is used less frequently than the language of feeling.
Referring to coordination of composition programs, Hach proposes a program from the seventh grade through the twelfth.
This program begins with the paragraph and, at the eleventh-grade level, he recommends the teaching of the informational essay for helping students organize facts. Relating the informational essay to factual magazine articles and newspapers, he suggests the teach ing of a five-paragraph expository theme ranging from two-hundred fifty to three-hundred words.^ Regarding the five-paragraph theme,
Anderson and VJigington explain a methodology for teaching this theme to high school sophomores and juniors, who need to study the organization of this form and to learn the techniques for employ ing it. The intention is to teach expository writing and to omit the narrative and descriptive in order that students may write in 6 this manner systematically and well. The length of the theme is strictly limited so that students may learn to present facts clearly and concisely.
^Helmkamp, p. 102. ^Clarence Hach, "Needed: A Sequential Program in Composition," English Journal, XLIX(November, I960), .^Richard D. Anderson and Ralph Wigington, "An Aid in the Teaching of Writing," English Journal, LI, No. 8(November, 1962), £6 8 . ------Important to this chapter is the definition of a fora
useful for both elementary and secondary school students.
Distinctions dn forms seem to be carefully made in connection with
compositions for eleventh and twelfth-grade students and college
students, but the general categories of personal and Impersonal
writing are terras used to refer to the writing of students in the
intermediate grades or the junior high school. Creative writing
is also often identified with personal writing, although one might
be creative in writing in an impersonal, objective, informative
form. The use of these general labels often confuses students.
In talking about kinds of compositions, one should be quite specific
in explaining the form to be used.
Analyzing twelve books containing collections of essays used in college, Larson questions the goals and strategies for the
teaching of composition. He recmmends the reorganization of
collections of essays and suggests arranging essays in groups "by overall design, by kinds of tone, by kinds of audience addressed, or by the occasion that prompted them.”? Most collections of essays at the present time seem to be organized either by subject or chronology or according to methods of exposition employed.
7 Richard L. Larson, ''Anthologies of Essays, '* College Composi- tion and Communication, XX(February, 19(9), £8.. 79
Because such terms as the essay, article, report, expository essay, factual prose, and persuasive easay are misleading in their definitions and connotations, the miter wishes to make clear the nature of the informative theme. Basically, it is used for the communication of accurate information.
Although the essay can reveal the author* s moods, personality, ■ observations, points of view, philosophy of life, or humorous outlook, the informative theme is the outcome of the author*s attempt to collect, review, relate, combine, classify, organize, or present facts about a topic. The purpose of the essayist can be to teach, demonstrate, persuade, inform, or stimulate the thinking of the reader. The writer of the informative theme must understand the facts about a subject and present them objectively with precision and clarity.
One might define a fact as a statement whose truth or falsity can be proved by objective means. Facts can be related to persons, places, objects, or occurrences that actually exist or existed in the past. Facts can lead to new ideas through the discovery of certain patterns that they form when put together in a distinctive arrangement.
Different types of subjects require particular patterns of presentation. In her analysis of textbooks, Smith discusses the types of patterns that can be found in informative writing. An article on a scientific subject may utilize classification patterns, explanations of technical processes, instructions for carrying out 80 an experiment, statements of facts, and techniques for problem solving. A social studies textbook may employ picture and map displays, cause and effect patterns, sequential events viith dates, comparison patterns, and propaganda analyses. A mathematics textbook may stress the presentation of a problem, the explanation Q of a process, and the reading of graphs and charts. Although textbooks deal with broad topics they can be useful in helping a student to become familiar with the special techniques used in informative writing.
These patterns, models, or examples of informative themes, however, must contain material that is factually accurate. Invalid statements obviously give a distorted picture of reality. Gulley expresses his concern for the deceptive, irresponsible statements sometimes found in the mass media when he states that "America* s public statement making is less dependable, reliable, and candid
it 9 than it was two decades ago. He also declares that "we are witnessing a national drift toward Irresponsibility in public utterance,"’*’0 He believes that the public schools must provide better courses in speech and communication. In order to learn how to read intelligently, student should have experience in both elementary and secondary schools in the critical analysis of informative materials.
bSnjithy 2 7 5 -8 5 . : ^Halbert E. Gulley, "The Hew Amorality in American Communi cation," Today1 s Speech, XVIII, No. 1(Winter, 1970), 3. Iftlbid., p. 3. 81
In writing factual compositions, students should learn to limit their topics judiciously, search diligently for needed information, and present this information in a clear, systematic way. They should become familiar with reference sources, study different methods for presenting findings, and develop a constant awareness of the necessity of accurate observation and clear description. Thus, the informative themes that the students read should contribute to the furthering of their skill in communication.
To see these themes, to study the way they are presented, to listen to examples read aloud, and to note unity, coherence, and accuracy exhibited therein are ways of developing sensitivity to the principles of effective factual writing.
The subjects about which they are learning should be interest ing and varied enough to stimulate interest in further reading of both fiction and nonfiction. The growth in vocabulary that stems from wide reading should be helpful to students when they come to write their own themes.
Just as communication of abstract thoughts can be challenging to both writers and readers, so can the presentation of facts by means of concrete words and images be a significant experience.
Through her work with deaf children, Groht came to believe that such children can develop a real interest in language, a feeling for
V 82 words, a desire for self-expression, and an appreciation of good writing. She states:
All deaf children whom I have taught have enjoyed any work that has enriched their vocabu laries. They have loved acquiring new words. They have been enthusiastic to learn about the choice of words, the different pictures made by changing words, and the descriptions of the same picture in different language.
Consideration of the methods used by persons who teach
the deaf can be valuable in the study of techniques of informative
writing, for no word can be confusing or ambiguous. Reading materials that are factually accurate, well-organized, and effective
ly presented can serve as models for student writing. Since reading
textbooks are used consistently from the fourth grade through the
twelfth grade, informative themes would be useful not only for
increasing pupils' knowledge of a variety of subjects but would
serve as examples of good writing,
Tilley states that "a rudimentary principle of writing is
to distinguish the difference between writing to inform and writing
to influence."12 As he concentrates upon writing that informs,
the student learns how to collect and arrange information, how to define and limit a subject to a specific topic, how to present facts effectively and how to employ concrete language.
Mil d r e d A. Groht, Natural language for Deaf Children (Washington, D.C.: Alexander Graham Boll Association for the Deaf, Inc., 1958), p. 139. 12Weslay H. Tilley, "The Role of Principle in Teaching Writing to Undergraduates," ed. Earl James HcGuth, Communication in General Education (Dubuque, Iowa: William C. Brown Company, 19U97T’p. 190. Ilaman gives sorae of the techniques for reading a theme. The reader should determine the precise meaning of the author's words,
]Qiox7 the relationships of the words to one another, note the sections and the order of their arrangement, observe the interdependence of structure and content, and recognize the basic idea and the pattern used to present it. For x*riting, the student needs to write' at some appropriate length and arrange ideas by structural units 13 in a logical order. 'When informative themes are analyzed care fully, the student should be able to perceive the form and arrange ment that have been employed and accordingly increase his own sensitivity to the importance of these elements in-effective communication.
Ho3t important to this awareness is the growth in word perception, defined as the discerning of differences between symbols and of distinguishing one from another. Russell has defined the percept as "what is known of an object, a quality or a relationship as a result of sensory experience."1^ He classifies percepts into nine categories. Four of these, important especially in organizing information, are percepts of space, time, movement, and number.
Information about space involves the size, shape, relation of the object to other objects in space, and knowledge of the words needed for specifying these aspects of reality. In dealing with s
1 3 i - i -■ i ■ . i.. L , , - - - , -..-.i., n •James B. Haman, "How to Read a Theme," Creative Writing, . XVI, No, 6(December, 196ii), Ij-fJ, ^David H. Russell, Children's Thinking (Waltham, Massachusetts Blaisdell Publishing Co., a Division of Ginn and Co., 1956), p. 3 6 . spatial relationships, the writer might include information about
the shape, the similarities of objects to one another, the names and uses of parts within an object, and the design used in the construction of a complex entity such as a building or a machine.
The order of presenting this information should be logical and refer
to the relationships of physical objects in space.
Information about time includes a chronological presentation
of events, the divisions of time in one1s environment through mechanical devices such as clocks, and observations of the sequence
of actions of animate beings. Since the child slowly develops an understanding of units of time, he nay need help in conveying factual
information about time. Accuracy is necessary for creating themes containing facts about time.
Observations of movement such as the size and actions either
in nature or machines can be difficult to present. The facts might
include the naming of parts, describing their function, shape, and
action, or comparing of similar objects in motion. In this parti
cular category, a vocabulary relating to the phenomenon of sounds
would be important in conveying precise impressions.
The arrangement of any set of items is affected, in most cases, by the number of items presented. The classifying of numer
ical facts requires special attention if there is to be exactness in
the presentation of this information. Pratt discusses the importance
of determinate numbers in communicating information accurately. Ha explains that indeterminate numbers are, by nature, vague and in definite. Such terms as plurality, scarcity, function, repetition, and infinity are usually difficult to comprehend. Overuse of these terms without further clarification can lead to many false impressions.
Pratt comments upon the extreme relativity of the use of indeterminate numbers and raises questions regarding their "utility or communicative function in human affairs."^ Since numerical facts are used fre quently, accurate and exact presentation is an important requirement.
Percepts and factual information are only a part of the informative theme. The order of presentation must also be considered in writing. Upton has classified seven types of order, of which four might be useful for developing factual themes: structural order, which is a logical order concerned with the relation of physical objects in space; numerical order, which is a logical order in which a set of items has been arranged according to a regular series of numbers; scalar order, which is a logical order of rank, degree, intensity, and value; and conventional order, which comprises orders of arbitrary arrangements such as alpha betical orders.-1*^ Principles of good organization require a
^ K a r l G. Pratt, "Indeterminate Number Concepts: 1. Classi fication and Relation to Determinate Numbers," Journal of Genetic Psychology, LXXII(March, 19lj8), 209 • ■** Albert Upton, Design for Thinking: A First Booh in Semantics (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1961), p. 197 • 86 constant use of order and these types of arrangements of order can assist one in writing about subjects which require listings of specific chronological, numerical, or personal facts, naming of
the parts of an object, describing buildings and animate beings, grouping types of information, and comparing two items.
Intensive reading requires a particular set-form which can be studied. Assuming that the informative themes have been developed
as set-fonns ranging in number of words from two-hundred to one-
thousand, one would have to know what characteristics can be analyzed in the themes, what procedures are necessary before writing them, and
that standards might be available to evaluate informative themes.
First of all, the characteristics of the theme should include a specific number of details arranged in a logical order, a vocabul-
ary appropriate to the subject of the theme, a design and form of presentation suitable to the perceptions needed such as space or
time, a balance in the use of facts, and the subject at the lowest
levels of abstraction so that there can be denotative responses and
literal meanings.
Before writing the theme, careful research is needed for
accuracy. Several sources should be used for factual reliability.
Since information is received by the senses of a person, the writer
should utilize words having appeal to one or more of the senses.
Often, the use of illustrations lessens the need for words represent
ing visual images. As noted earlier, studying the verbal needs of blind and deaf can lead to improved writing. Deciding upon the form and order for the topic selected and designing the theme- accordingly constitute the third step. The use of varied sentence patterns and of concrete language is important for achieving success in this form.
The standards for evaluating the themes should be literary quality, excellence in format, authenticity of content, suitability of length, and appropriateness of vocabulary. Also important are the use of precise sensory observation and the relationships of the parts of the theme to the canplete theme.
Consistently reading about many subjects written in this form, students should become familiar with criteria for judgment appropriate to the type and purpose of the work. Some topics and styles of writ ing can be specified as required reading at various grade levels.
The informative theme could be developed as a set-form to be in cluded as a part of the students* reading program in the curriculum.
Continuity is needed for its use from the intermediate grade levels through the twelfth grade.
Standards of evaluation for informative themes in high school were developed' in an experiment conducted by Barrilleaux. A group of teachers were asked to check papers written by ninth graders about their science projects. One group used only library references and the other used only textbooks. The purpose was to evaluate the groups to see which could write more effectively. The panelists formulated the- criteria by which, in their opinion, the quality of 88 writing about scientific topics could be judged. The criteria were?
1) The need for accurate evidence to support conclusions. 2) The ability to separate conclusions from mere opinions •that are unsubstantiated by factual information. 3) The ability to evaluate factual information for relevancy and accuracy. k) The ability to make comparisons and to note cause and effect. _ £) The ability to find and create knowledge. .
Although these criteria ware specifically directed to scientific studies only, the application of these standards would be useful for evaluating the effectiveness of any composition which is designed to inform.
The teachers* evaluations of the quality of the students1 writing served to reveal the significance of clear thinking and effective use of language as factors in written communication.
Johnson also stresses the element of language in a program aimed at better communication*
Ability. . . to use language clearly and with validity is basic to personal efficiency and general development. It is basic to sanity itself and it is fundamental to intelligent social organization and to the adequate management of national and inter national problems.
l?Louis E. Barrilleaux, “Experiment on the Quality of Student Writing as Related to Reading Materials," School Science and Mathematics, LXVII(December, 1967), 772. ^Wendell Johnson, “You Can't Write Writing," ed. James H. Campbell and Hal W. Hepler, Dimensions in Communication (Belmont, California: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 196)?)/ 223-21?.' 8 9
In conclusion, it seems feasible to use informative themes consistently in reading textbooks from Grades Four through
Twelve to assist students in their stages of development in reading and writing. The mutual cooperation of teachers at all levels is necessary in order to achieve the objectives relating to the curri culum design problems of balance, coordination, and continuity and to the communication of information with these types of themes. CHAFER VII
SUMMARY, FINDINGS AMD CONCLUSIONS, HECOH-IENDATIONS FUTURE RESEARCH
This study was undertaken to ascertain what amount, types, and styles of informative articles we^e available in the basic readers and literature anthologies of nine series of textbooks ranging from Grades Four through Twelve. In addition to this purpose, another objective was to determine whether or not a specific form called the informative theme might be appropriate for use in reading textbooks as an example or model for presenting factual information about specific topics.
Summary of Procedures
Content analysis was the research technique used in the examination of sixty-three basic readers and literature anthologies
to determine the number and percentages of informative articles in the books and the average length of such articles in each book.
Only those informative articles written in an impersonal style
v»re included.
The collected data were arranged in tabular form for the purpose of reporting this information. Following the report of the analysis, an explanation of procedures for the development of a set-form of writing called the informative theme was presented.
90 Findings and Conclusions
Several conclusions may be drawn from the data. Although, there are informative articles in most of the reading textbooks, these articles vary considerably in quantity, style of presentation, number of words, and type of subject treated. The results reveal that, as far as objective, impersonal presentations of information are concerned, there are inconsistencies in emphasis, content, and style within the reading programs.
Guidelines were suggested for developing informative themes of a quality suitable for use in all reading textbooks in order to help provide continuity, coordination, and balance iri the curriculum.
Recommendations
Since the textbook serves as an important educational instrument in most schools and in seme instances acts as the reading and literature curriculum, careful planning of these series with a specific rationale for the total series seems to be necessary. The textbook has a vital role in providing content for a program in reading. The quality of the form in which the ccntent is presented during the years of the students1 development wall determine whether students are to have the well-balanced education needed, for better communication now and in .the future. 92
Future Research
Black has predicted that by 1980 schools will have to
educate approximately 73,600,000 children.1 This is almost twice
the number going to school at the present time. The urgency of
the need for improvement in ways to communicate information cannot
be overestimated. Combined with this projected increase in school
population is the increase in knowledge and the need for all future
citizens to be able to interpret and to communicate information
effectively. Meredith states that
the nation which first adapts the flow of information to the resonance of minds will create the new culture, not by mechanizing the mind but by humanizing the machine. For information is merely the material on which the mind works. To create a new^culture, there must be no barriers to information.
The responsibilities of the education profession to recommend ways
to improve the approaches to this process are evident.
Future research for improvemevt of the curriculum should
include more studies of textbooks at all grade levels in order to
develop objective standards for the selection of suitable texts
by school systems and states. Another purpose of textbook research
Hillel Black, The American Schoolbook (New Yorks William Morrow and Company, Inc,, 1967), p. lbO. p George Patrick Meredith, Communication and Education, Communication Media and the Schools The Yearbook of Education^ I960,"eds. George Z. F. Bereday and Joseph A. Lauwerye (How York: World Book Company, I960), p. 5>8. 9 3 ia for tha improvement of communication between tha publishers and the educators so that a better education may be provided for students in all subjects.
In order to develop informative themes, more attention should be given to the measurement of the level or degree of abstraction in written communication. According to Gillie, no completely accept able method of measuring abstraction has yet been devisedj however, he has developed a formula that attempts to simplify the measure ment of abstraction in language through the use of a few carefully selected elements, derived frcm the Flesch abstraction formula, which discriminate between abstract and concrete writing. Tha formula involves counting tha noun3 of abstraction, arbitrarily defined as those ending in certain suffixes which are used to denote generalisations, abstract conditions, and qualities. These suffixes are: -ness, -ment, -ship, -dom, -nee, -ion, and -y.
The utilisation of this formula for the selection of informative materials for textbooks might do much to provide more suitable curricular materials.
Further study is also needed to determine the extent to which students can communicate accurately the knowledge they possess of a given subject. Gillie's formula might be applicable to learn at
^F. A. Gillie, "A Simplified Formula for Measuring Abstraction in Writing,11 Journal of Applied Psychology, X U , No. 2 (August, 1957), SJCTr. what level of abstraction students write. Honks analyzed the
content of essays written by adolescents from the Netherlands,
the title of the essay was ’'From Now to 2000 A.D." The purpose
of this study was to clarify the role which future time perspective
has in the behavior of adolescents anticipating their own futures.^
Additional studies of this type might provide insight into what
students know and how wall they can communicate this knowledge.
Tests are needed to measure students* ability to select and
classify information, to recognize distortions in advertising, to
employ the vocabulary of special fields, and to note and retain
factual information.
In their work with the retention of factual details, Schachtel
and Richardson have been concerned with verbal memory. Schachtel
expresses his concern for the causes of childhood amnesia among
adults of Western cultures and the reasons for the limited verbal
recall of childhood days."* Richardson points out the categories that
the language of a society provides and indicates that this factor
V . Monks, ‘'Future Time Perspective in Adolescents," Human Development, XI, No. 1(1?68), 107-123. " v v. ' ^ -’Ernest G. Schachtel, "On Memory and Childhood Amnesia," ed. Toby Talbot. The World of the Child; Birth to Adolescence from the Child* s VioV/pohit ^Gai^en^Tti^Hew fork; Doubieday and Company, Inc., 19^7), 10-^3. is important in "influencing the degree of concreteness or abstract ness of memories."^ More research in this area might lead to new approaches for the teaching of specific types of composition.
Informative themes might be designed to be used for longi tudinal research in school systems in order to study the effects of the use of these forms over a period of several years. This type of curriculum research requires a period of five to ten yearns to discover to what extent the use of such themes might help students acquire more facility and proficiency with their language.
Simeon Potter states that "Thinkirg in words without images is the highest form of conceptual cognition of which a human being is capable."1 If this is true, the students' factual accuracy and their verbal precision will determine the degree to which our society becomes a more articulate one in which its members are able to communicate with one another.
^Alan Richardson, Mental Imagery (ITew Yorkt Springer Publish ing Company, Inc., 1969) ,p". 7simeon Potter, language in the M o d e m World (Pattimore: Penguin Books, I960), pTT?*2. APPENDIX
READING TEXTBOOKS USED IN THE STUD!
Series A. - Allyn and Bacon, Inc.
Grade i|. Sheldon, William D. and Rosalind Sheldon. Believe and Make-Believe. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc., 1968, hhhpp*
Grade $, Sheldon, William D. Finding the Way. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc., 1968, 473 pp.
Grade 6. Sheldon, William D. Arrivals and Departures. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, IncV, 1968,’ U7o pp." '
Grade 7. Sheldon, William D. and Robert A. McCracken. High Trails. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc., 1968,* h32 pp.
Grade 8. Sheldon, William D. and Robert A. McCracken. Widening Views. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc., 1968'/'h30 pp.
Grade 9. Sullivan, Catherine I. A Cavalcade of Life in Writing. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc., 1963, 6^8 pp.
Grade 10. Horn, Gunnar. A Cavalcade of World Writing. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc/,'1961, 718 pp.
Grade 11. Horn, Gunnar. A Cavalcade of American Writing. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc,’,"* 1961, 786 pp.
Grade 12. Horn, Gunnar. A Cavalcade of British Writing. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc., 1961, 816 pp / 1-""
96 97
Series B. - .American Book Company*
Grade it. Johnson, Marjorie Seddon, Roy A. Kress, John D. McNeil, and Pose Lamb. Joys and Journeys. New York: American Book Company,' 1968, U32 pp.
Grade 5. Johnson, Marjorie Seddon, Roy A. Kress, John D. McNeil, Elsie B. Black, and Millard H. Black with Virginia M. Porter. Kings and Things. New York: American Book Company, 1955, h31 pp.
Grade 6, Johnson, Marjorie Seddon, Roy A. Kress, John D. McNeil, Elsie B. Black, and Millard H. Black. Launchings and Landings. New York: American Book Company, 19 68 , t o pp .
Grade 7. Bailey, Matilda and Ullin W. Leavell. A World of Events. New York: American Book Company, 19657 ^ 9 pp.
Grade 8. Bailey, Matilda and Ullin W. Leavell. A World of Experience. New York: American Book' Company,1 1963,' 592' pp.
Grade 9. Bailey, Matilda and Ullin W. Leavell. A Mo rid to Discover. New York: American Book Company, 1963, §25 pp.
Grade 10. Bailey, Matilda and Ullin W. Leavell. A World Expanding. Now York: American Book Company, m z r m pp.
Grade 11. Bailey, Matilda and Ullin TJ. Leavell. A World of American Literature. New York: American Book Company, 1963, 70& pp.
Grade 12. Bailey, Matilda and Ullin W. Leavell, Literature around the World. New York: American Book * Company, 1965, 726 pp. 98
Series C. - Ginn and Company
Basal Reading Series. 100 Edition
Grade it. Russell, David H., Theodore Clymer, Doris Gates, and Constance M. McCullough. Roads to Everywhere, Boston: Ginn and Company, 1 9 6 6 7 ^ 0 pp.
Grade $, Russell, David H., Theodore Clymer, Doris Gates, and Constance H. McCullough. Trails to Treasure. Boston: Ginn and Company, 19&6, £L1 pp.'
Grade 6. Russell, David H., Theodore Clymer, Doris Gates, and Mabel Snedaker. Mings to Adventure. Boston: Ginn and Company, ‘ i$6S'^'$3S "pp
Grade 7. Gunn, Mary Agnella, Mabel Snedaker, and David H. Russell. Discovery through Reading. Boston: Ginn and Company, 1967, 511 pp.
Grade 8. Gunn, Mary Agnella, Thomas G. Devine, Ralph C. Staiger, and David H. Russell. Exploration through Reading. Boston: Ginn and Company/'19&7, 512 pp.
Literature Anthologies
Grade 7. Gordon, Edward J., William Eller, and Betty Yvonne Weld. Introduction to Literature. Boston: Ginn and Company, !L96i*, '630 pp .
Grade 8. Not available for perusal.
Grade 9 • White, Elizabeth, Joan Wofford, and Edward J. Gordon. Understanding Literature. Boston: Ginn and Company, 1 9 & , pp.
Grade 10. Bennett, Robert A., Verda Evans, and Edward J. Gordon. Types of Literature. Boston: Ginn and Company, 7 ^ PP. 99
Grade 11. Porter, Andrew J., Henry L. Terrie, Jr., and Edward J. Gordo: , American Literature. Boston: Ginn and Company, 19 6U, 012 pp..
Grade 12. Gordon, Edward J., G. A m o u r Craig, and Frank M. Rice. English Literature. Boston: Ginn and Company, 196ii, 579 pp.
Series D. - Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc.
Literature Anthologies - Classic Series
Grade 7. Nieman, Egbert 17., Elisabeth O'Daly, and Thomas M. Folds. Adventures for Readers. Book One. Hew York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1968, 608 pp.
Grade 8. Nieman, Egbert 17. and Elisabeth O lBaly. Adventures for Readers. Book Two. Hew York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1968, 672 pp.
Grade 9. Connolly, Francis X., Joyce Stribling Steward, Virginia Rutledge Taylor, G. B. Harrison, A. R. Gurney, Jr., V. S. Pritchett, Robert Jameson, Evan Lodge, and Thomas M. Folds. Adventures for Reading. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1968',’ 7§ 6 pp.
Grade 10. Perrine, Lawrence, Robert Jameson, Rita Silver!, G. B. Harrison, A, R. Gurney, Jr., V. S. Pritchett, Walter Loban, and Thomas M. Folds. Adventures in Appreci- ation. New York: Harcourt, Brace" and' WorldsInc., 195^,^821 pp.
Grade 11. Early, James, Robert Freior, Emily Ellison, A, R. Gumey, Jr., Jean Sisk with Louis Eisenhauer, and Thomas M. Folds. Adventures in American Literature. New York; Harcourt', Brace and World,'inc.", 1968’, 8B6 pp.
Grade 12. HcConnick, Paul, 17inifred Post, Quentin Anderson, G. H. Harrison, J, B. Friostley, A. R, Gurney, Jr., Blight Lindley, Alan Pr yea-Jones, and Thomas H. Folds. Adventures in English Literature. . New York: Har court, Brace and World, Inc .'/ 1968, 89U pp. 100
New Companion Series
Grade 7. Humphrey, Eva Neushaw and Erio W. Johnson. Adventures for You. Second Edition. Hew York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1968, $$9 pp.
Grade 8. Kincheloe, Isabel M. and Elizabeth Locke. Adventures Ahead. 'Second Edition. Hew York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1968, 591 pp.
Grade 9. Christ, Henry I. and Herbert Potell. Adventures for Today. Third Edition. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1968, 6l|2 pp.
Grade 10. Potell, Herbert and Henry I. Christ. Adventures in Living. Third Edition. New York: Harcourt, Brace endlJorld, Inc., 1968, 626 pp.
Series E. - The Macmillan Company
Grade U. Harris, Albert J., Marion Gartler, Caryl Roman, and Marcella Benditt. The Magic Word, Hew York: The Macmillan Company, 19^6, 5>02 pp.
Grade 5. Harris, Albert J., Marion Gartler, Caryl Roman, and Marcella Benditt. Bold Journeys. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1966, 53k pp.
Grade 6. Harris, Albert J., Marion Gartler, Caryl Roman, and Marcella Benditt. Into New Worlds. New York: The Macmillan Company,1" 1967,"' pp. 101
Series F. - Scott, Foresman and Company, Inc.
Basic Readers
Grade 1*. Robinson, Helen H., A. Sterl Artley, William A. Jenkins, Marion Monroe, Charlotte S. Huck, and Samuel Weintraub. Ventures. Chicago: Scott, Foresman and Company, 196^7 *?11 pp.
Grade $, Robinson, Helen M., A. Sterl Artley, William A. Jenkins, Marion Monroe, Charlotte S. Huck, and Samuel Weintraub. Vistas. Chicago: Scott, Foresman and and Company,' 19657 £11 pp.
Grade 6. Robinson, Helen M., Marion Monroe, A. Sterl Artley, Charlotte S, Huck, and William A. Jenkins. Caval- cades. Chicago: Scott, Foresman and Canpany, 19<£7'£12 pp.
Literature Anthologies
Grade 7, Niles, Olive Stafford, Edythe Daniel, Edmund J. Farrell, Alfred H. Grommon, and Robert C. Pooley. Projection in Literature. Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Foresman and Company, 1967, £09 pp.
Grade 8. Pooley, Robert, Edythe Daniel, Edmund J. Farrell, Alfred H. Grommon, and Olive Stafford Niles. Counterpoint in Literature. Glenview, Illinois: 'Scott,' Foresman ancT Company, 1967, 626 pp.
Grade 9. Pooley, Robert C., Jesse Stuart, Lillian White, Jay Cline, and Olive S. Niles. Outlooks through Literature. Glenview. Illinois: Scott, Foresman and“ Coinpany, 1968 , 7£n pp.
Grade 10. Pooley, Robert C., Lillian Zellhoefer White, Edmund J. Farrell, and Joseph Kersand. Exploring Life through Literature. Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Foresman and Company, 1968, 728 pp. 102
Grade 11. Blair, Walter, Paul Farmer, Theodore Homberger, and I-largaret Wasson. The United States in Literature. Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Foresman and Company, 1968, 820 pp.
Grade 12, Pooley, Robert C., George K. Anderson, Paul Farmer, and Helen Thornton. England in Literature. Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Foresman and Company, 1968, 820 pp.
Wide Horizons - Companion Series
Grade U. Robinson, Helen M., Marion Monroe, A. Sterl Artley, Charlotte S. Huck, William A. Jenkins. Wide Horizons. Chicago: Scott, Foresman and Company, £11 pp.
Grade Robinson, Helen M., Marion Monroe, A, Sterl Artley, Charlotte S. Huck, William A. Jenkins, and Ira E. Aaron. W ide Horizons. Chicago: Scott, Fores man and Company, 19S%J~%12 pp.
Grade 6. Robinson, Helen M., Marion Monroe, A. Sterl Artley, Charlotte S. Huck, William A. Jenkins. Wide Horizons. Chicago: Scott, Foresman and Company, 5^2 pp.
Open Highways - Companion Serie3
Grade U. Robinson, Helen M., Marion Monroe, A. Sterl Artley, Charlotte S. Huck, William A. Jenkins, and Ira E. Aaron. OpenHighways. Chicago: Scott, Fores man and Company, pp.
Grade. $, Robinson, Helen M., Marion Monroe, A. Sterl Artley, Charlotte S. Huck, William A. Jenkins, and Ira E. Aaron. OpenHighways. Chicago: Scott, Fores man and Company, l9"557 TJ79 pp.
Grade 6. Robinson, Helen M., Marion Monroe, A. Sterl Artley, Charlotte S. Huck, William A. Jenkins, and Ira E, Aaron. OpenHighways. Chicago: Scott, Fores man and Company,” T9?^7TiH’0 pp. ' I
103
Grad© 7. Robinson, Helen M,, Marion Monroe, A. Sterl Artley, Charlotte S. Huck, William A. Jenkins, and Ira E. Aaron. Open Highways. Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Foresman ancfCompany, 1967, 527 pp.
Grade 8. Robinson, Helen M., Marion Monroe, A. Sterl Artley, Charlotte S. Huck, William A. Jenkins, and Ira E, Aaron. Open Highways. Glenview, Illinoiss Scott, Foresman and Company, 1967, 527 pp.
Galaxy Series
Grade 7. Dunning, Stephen, Elsie Katterjohn, and Olive Stafford Wiles. Thrust. Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Fores man and Company, 1969, 608 pp.
Grade 8.Dunning, Stephen, Elsie Hatterjohn, and Olive Stafford Niles. Focus. Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Fores man and Company, 1969, 608 pp.
Grade 9. Pooley, Robert C., Virginia Belle Lowers, Frances Magdanz,and Olive Stafford Niles. Vanguard. Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Foresman and Company, 1967, 623 pp.
Grade 10. Pooley, Robert C», Alfred H. Grommon, Elsie HatterJohn, and Frances Magdanz. Perspectives. Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Foresman and Company, 1969, 637 pp.
Grade 11. Pooley, Robert C., Alfred H. Grommon, Virginia Belle Lowers, Elsie Hatterjohn, and Olive S, Niles. Accent, U.S.A. Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Fores man and Company, 1965, 736 pp.
Grade 12. Pooley, Robert C., Alfred_H. Grommon, Virginia Belle Lowers, Elsie Hatter john, and Olive S. Niles. Compass. (In the process of being published), 1970. BIBLIOGRAPHY
Books
Beardsley, Monroe C. Aesthetics: Problems In the Philosophy of Criticism. Hew York: Hare our t, Brace" and Company, 195^7
Berelson, Bernard. Content Analysis in Communication Rosearch. Glencoe, Illinois: The Free Press,' 1 9 ^ 1
Berman, Ionise M, Hew Priorities in the Curriculum. Columbus, Ohio: Charles E, 'iferriOX Publishing Company, 1968.
Black, Hillel. The American Schoolbook. New York: William Morrow and Company, 67.
Blocm, Benjamin S. Taxonomy of Educational Objectives: Handbook 1; Cognitive DonaiGn New York: "ibngraahs, Green and" Company,
Burrows, Alvina Trout, et al. They All Want to Write. New York: Prentice-Hall Education 'Series,' 19 ^ 7
Church, Joseph, Language and the Discovery of Reality: A Develop mental Psychology of Conation", New York: Random House,
Evans, 'William H. and Walker, Jerry L. New Trends in the Teaching of English in Secondary Schools. Chicago: itend llchally and Company7 1^661
Falberg, Roger M. The Language of Silence. Wichita, Kansas: Wichita Sc«ia"Sct^'c"e?TOTrSirD5a?, 1963.
Fowler, Mary E. Teaching Language , Literature, and Composition. New York: Me Graw-HiljT"Book Company^ 1966.
Goodlad, John I., et al. The Changing School Curriculum New York The Fund for the Advancement of Education, 1935. lOU 10$
Groht, Mildred A. natural Language for Deaf Children* Washington, D.C.: Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf, Inc., 1958.
Holsti, Ole R. Content Analysis for the Social Sciences and Humanities. Reading, Massachusetts*:*" Addison-Wesley''* Publishing Company, 1$69.
Hunnicutt, C. W. and Iverson, William J. Research in the Three R's. Hew York: Harper and Brothers, 1958.
Huston, W. H. One-Hundred Lessons in English Composition. Boston: New Publishing Company, lUb9. ~*
Johnson, Wendell. People in Quandaries. Hew York: Harper and Row, Inc., 19U6.
Koefod, Paul E. The Writing Requirements for Graduate Degrees. Englewood cEffsT’Hew Jer s e y:'"prehtice-KalY," 19
Lynch, James J. and Evans, Bertrand. High School English Textbookst A Critical Examination. Boston: Li'ttle,' Brown and Company, m r . ------
Moffett, James. Teaching the Universe of Discourse: A Theory of Discourse. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1958.
Muller, Herbert. The Uses of English: Guidelines for the Teaching of English from' the Jbiglo-^Jnerican Conference at Dartmouth College. ' Hew York*:* Holt,' Rinehart"ahd'Hinstonj Inc., l96f.
Potter, Simeon, Language in the Mo d e m World. London: Penguin Books, I960.
Richardson, Alan. Mental Imagery. Hew York: Springer Publishing Company, Inc,1, i969/ ' ’
Rummel, J, Francis. An Introduction to Research Procedures in Education. He'w*'Yo rkVHaiTper^l^oT*
Russell, David H. Children^ Thinking. Waltham, Massachusetts: Blaisdell Publishing Company, a Division of Ginn and Company, 1956. 106
Smith, Nila Banton. American Reading Instruction; Ita Development and Its Significance inHjaihing a' perspective on Current" 'practices in Reading. Newark, Delaware: International " Heading Association, 1969*
T^jton, Albert. Design for Thinking: A First Book in Semantics. Stanford, California: Stanford**University Press,' T961.
Villey, Pierre. The World of the Blind: A Psychological Study. Translated by Alys Haklardpseudonym".''London:' DuclaTOr't'h, 1930.
Walpole, Hugh. Semantics; The Nature of Words and their Meaning. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, Inc.,*~l’9Ijl.
Articles and Periodicals
Anderson, Richard D. and Wigington, Ralph. "An Aid in the Teaching of Writing," English Journal, LI(November, 1962), 968-971*
Artley, A. Sterl. "Critical Reading in the Content Areas," Elemen tary English. XLI (February, 1999), 122-129.
Barrilleaux, Louis E. "Experiment on the Quality of Student Writing as Related to Reading Materials," School Science and Mathe matics, LXVH(December, 1967), 772-78. 1 1 ‘
Benjamin, Curtis G. "Book Publishing* s Hidden Bonanza," Saturday Review (April 18, 1970), 19-21, 81-82.
Bossone, Richard M. "Developing and Extending Reading Interests," Education, LXXXVII(October, 1966), 103-106.
Broughton, G. "Teacher and his Textbook," English Language Teaching, XXX(May, 1967), 262-6U.
Brown, Ralph A. and Brown, Maria. "Selecting Social Studios Text books: The Challenge of Choice," Social Education, XXXHI, No. 3 (March, 1969), 311i-32i++.
Carlin, Jerome. "This I Believe about the Essay," English Journal, LI, No. 6 (September, 1962), lj03-l*0U, J4O7 , Ijll. 107
Carroll, John B. “Neglected Areas in Educational Research,'1 phi Delta Kappan, XUI(May, 1961), 339-^3 - .
Cook, Luella B* "High School Textbooks and the Changing Curri culum: Introductory Remarks,” English Journal, XXXVIH (April, 19h9), 20l*. . ~ deCharras, R. and Moeller, G. "Values Expressive in American Child ren1 s Readers 1800-1950," Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, LXIV(1962), 13 DeMott, Benjamin* "Reading, Writing, Reality, Unreality," Education- al Record, XLVEIl(Sumtner, 1967), 197-205* . Eash, Maurice J. "Supervision: A Vanishing Breed?,” Educational Leadership, XXVI, No. l(0ctober, 1968), 73-79. Eisner, E. W. "Levels of Curriculum and Curriculum Research,” Elementary School Journal, LXVl(December, 1965), 155-62, English, Fenwick. "Textbook: A Procrustean Bed of Learning with Reply by S, Soghomonian,” Phi Delta Kappan, XLVHI{April, 1967), 393-96. Evertts, E. L. "Composition through Literature,” Instructor, LXXV(March, 1966), 105+. Ewer, J. R. and Latorre, G. "Preparing an English Course fear Students of Science," English Language Teacher, XXl(May, 1967), 221-29. Fichtenau, Robert. "Rhetorical Considerations for Teaching the Young Writer,” English Journal., LIV, No. 8(November, 1965), 720-23, 737. . Finkelstein, Barbara et al. "Bibliography of Research and Commentary on Textbooks anci' Related Words,” Social Education, XXXHI (March, 1969), 331-36. . Fisher, Robert J. "Too Many Textbooks, Say the English," Educational Forum, XXXIII(Hay, 1969), 527-32. . Frazier, Alexander. "The Teaching of Writing as Writing," English Journal, LUI, No. 6(Septembor, 1961*), 1*35-38. 108 Friedman, Paul and Phillips, Gerald A. "Toward a Rhetoric for the Poverty Class," The Journal of Communication, XVII, No. 3 (September, 1967')~~’23 H - W ' Gillie, P. A. "A Simplified Formula for Measuring Abstraction in Writing," Journal of Applied Psychology, XLI, No. 2(August, 1957), 2lli-17. Gulley, Halbert E. "The New Morality in American Communication," Today*s Speech, XVIII, No. l(Winter, 1970), 3-8. Hach, Clarence. "Noeded: A Sequential Program in Composition," English Journal, XLEX(November, i960), 536-h7. Haman, James B. "How to Read a Theme," Creative Writing, XVI (December, 196U), l*-8. Hoyt, Morris H. "Adapting Textbooks to Curriculum Changes," English Journal, XXXVIII(April, 19^9), 213-217. JenldLns, William A. "Reading Skills in Teaching Literature in the Elementary School," Elementary English, XLI (November, 19610, 780-81. Johnson, Terry D. "A Bibliography for Self-Directed Practice in Reading," Journal of Reading, X H I , No. 5 (February, 1970), 370-73. King, E. M. "Critical Appraisal of Research in Interests, Preferences, and Habits," Canadian Educational Research Digest, VH(Decem ber, 1967), Kitahaber, A. R. "Search for Better Ways to Teach Writing," CTA Journal, LXIII(March, 1967), 13-15. Larson, Richard L. "Anthologies of Essays," College Composition and Communication, XX(February, 1969), 5l-5h. Malmstrocn, Jean. "A Progress Report on a Textbook Analysis," English Journal, LI, No. l(January, 1962), 3h~h3. Mingoia, Edwin M. "Classifying Development in Reading for Teaching and Research," Education, LXXXVIII(February, 1968), 262-66. 10? Monks, F. "Future Time Perspective in Adolescents," Human Develop ment, XI, No. 1(1968), 107-123. Horrissott, Irving and Stevens, W. Williams, Jr. "Content Analysis: Curriculum," Social Education, XXXl(October, 1967), l$3-86+. Nunnally, N. "Magazines and Newspapers for Children," Childhood Education, XLII(April, 1966), 517-21. Pillsbury, Kent. "International Cooperation in Textbook Evaluation: the Braunschweig Institute," Comparative Education Review, X(February, 1966), li8-52. / Pooley, Robert C. "Curriculum Research and Development in English," Journal of Experimental Education, XXXVII(Fall, 1968), 56-6U. Pratt, Karl C. "Indeterminate Number Concepts: I. Classification and Relation to Determinate Numbers, Journal of Genetic Psychology, LXXH(Harch, 19l;8), 201-220. Raidman, Herbert C. "The Informational Needs and Reading Interests of Children in Grades IV through VIII," Elementary School Journal, LV(May, 1955)* 502-512. Rapoport, Anatol. "Integrating Knowledge and Action," ETC: A Review of General Semantics, XXVII(March, 1970),' 7-26.' Redding, W. Charles. "The Most important Problems of Collage Courses in Communication," The Journal of Communication, I, No. l(May, 1951), 30-35. Roberts, J. "Curriculum Development and Experimentation: English Language Art3 K-12," Review of Educational Research, XXXVI (June, 1966), 35^-56. Roselle, D. "In Defense of Good Textbooks," Peabody Journal of Education, XUV(SeptembQr, 1966), 88-90. Savage, John F. "What's Right with Basal Readers," Catholic School Journal, (January, 1970), 22-2^. Shoben, Edward J., Jr. "Texts and Values: The Irrelevance of Literary Education," Liberal Education, LHI(May, 1967), 2Wt-5l. 110 Shugrue, Michael. "New Materials for the Teaching of English: The English Prograns of the TJS0E," PtfLA, LXXXI, No. li(September, 1966), 3-36. Silberberg, Hoitnan and Silberberg, Margaret C. "The Bookless Curri culum: An Educational Alternative," Journal of Learning Disabilities, II, No. 6(June, 1969) Slothower, William R. "Language Textbooks: A Survey," English Journal j LIV, No. 1( January, 19 6$), 8-16. Steinmann, Martin, Jr. "Rhetorical Research," College English, XXXVII, Ho. U( January, 1966), 278-8$. Summers, E. G. "Reading in the Secondary School," Review of Educational Research, XXXVU(April, 1967), 13k-151. West, W. W. 'Written Composition," Review of Educational Research, XXXVII(April, 1967), l$9-67. Westbury, Ian. "Curriculum Evaluation," Review of Educational Research, XL, No. 2(April, 1970), 239-26SV White, L. W. "Books and Reading in a Television Age," Adult Leadership, XTV(January, 1966), 221-22+. Williams, Gertrude H. "Provisions for Critical Reading in Basic Readers," Elementary English, XXXVl(May, 1959), 323-31. Young, William P. "Curriculum Generalist in the Current Scene," Educational Leadership, XXIIl(December, 1966), 235-38. Zimet, S. P. "Children*s Interest and Story Preferences: A Critical Review of the Literature," Elementary School Journal, LX7H(Decomber, 1966), 122-130. Essays and Articles in Collections Cherry, Colin. Telecommunication - Social Background and Devalop- ment. Communication Media and the School. The Yearbook of Education,' Y$T6o7 k’dited by George Z. F. Boreday and JosepH A. Lauwerys. Hew York: World Book Company, I960. Ill Diederich, Paul R. and Link, F. R. Co-operative Evaluation in English. Evaluation a3 Feedback and Guide. 1967 Yearbook. Edited by Fred TVwilheims! WasMngtdn,"i).C.: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, NEA., 19 67, pp. 181-231. Johnson, Wendell. You Can*t Write Writing. Dimensions in Communication. Edited by James H. Campbell' and Hal W. Hepler. Belmont, Califomias Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1965. Lee, W. R. Mass Media and the Pupil-Teacher Relationship. Communi cation Media and the School. The Yearbook of Education^ 1960. IdrfceTby^oiFge^TTT^ereHay^nS^osepKTrrTauvyerys. New York: World Eook Company, I960, pp. 9U-104. Meckel, Henry C. Research on Teaching Composition and Literature. Handbook of Research on Teaching. Edited by N. L. Gage. cKxcago: Rand McNally and Company, 1963. pp. 966-1006. Meredith, George Patrick, Communication and Education. Communi cation Media and the School. The Yearbook of Education, Y9'6bT Edited by George Z. F. Bereday and Joseph’ A. Lauwerys. New York: World Book Company, I960, pp. UO-58. Palmer, Richard. Experience, Information, and the Mass Media. Communication Media and the School. The Yearbook of Education/ Y96Q. Edited by George Z. FV'Bereday ahci Joseph A. Lauwerys. Now York: World Book Company, I960, pp. 59-70. Russell, Claude V. The Effect of Television on Textbooks. Communi cation Media and the School. The Yearbook of Educatioh",~l9'60. Edited"by George Z'.' F, Bereday and Joseph A. Lauwerys. New York: World Book Company, I960, pp. 105-111. Russell, David H. and Fea, Henry R. Research on Teaching Reading. Handbook of Research on Teaching. Edited by N. L. Gage. Chicago: Rand McNally and Company, 1963. pp. 865-928. Schachtel, Ernest G. On Memory and Childhood Amnesia. The World of the Child: Birth to Adolescence from the Child-* s View-'" point. Edited by Toby Talbot. Garden"City,' New ’York: Doubleday and Company, Inc., 1967. pp. 10-53. 112 Smith, Nila Banton. Patterns of Writing in Different Subject Areas. Critical Reading. Edited by Martha L. King and Others. Philadelphia":' Lippincott, 1967. pp. 275?-285?. Tilley, Wesley H. The Role of Principle in Teaching Writing to Undergraduates. Communication in General Education. Edited by Earl James McGutfi. Dubuque, Iowa: William C. Brown Company, 19 U9. pp. 180-198. Publications of Learned Societies " ‘ and Other Organiz^lohs Bouverat, Roberta A. Guide to Children^ Magazines, Newspapers, and Reference Books’.^ Washington, D.C.: Association for Childhood Education International, 1968. Buswell, G. T. Organization and Sequence of the Curriculum, Fart U : The Psychology of Learning. The Forty-first Yearbook'of 'the National Society"‘ior the Study of Education. Edited by Nelson Henry. Bloomington, Illinois: Public School Publishing Company, 19k2, pp. hli£-l;63. Reports Austin, Mary C., Morrison, Coleman, et al. The First R: The Harvard Report on Reading in Elementary*5cKools. New York: The Macmillan Company/ 'W€T» Clements, H. Millard. Inferences and Reading Instruction. Clare mont Reading Conference Yearbook, Volume XXVIII. Edited by I'ialcolm Douglass. Claremont, California: Claremont Graduate School and University Center, 196iu pp. 3M-1£>6, Groff, P. Culture and the Single Textbook. Claremont Reading Conference Yearbook, Volume XXXI, Claremont,"Califorhia: Claremont' GraduatoSchooI and University Center, 1967. pp. 191-205). Helmkamp, Eunice. Training Pupils to Cope with language Diffi culties in Interpreting What Is Read in Grades 7 to 10. Promoting Growth toward Maturity in Interpreting What Is Read".’ ‘rVolvme"SEci. Proceedings’Vf^tHe' 7^ua!f Conference on Reading held at' the University of Chicago, November, 19^1. Compiled and edited by William S. Gray. Chicago, Illinois: The University of Chicago Press, 195*1. pp. 101-105>. 113 Rhodes, Silas H. The need for Trained Artists in Communication. Communication; The Art of Understanding and Being Under stood^ A Report" on the SeventK"Communica'tiohs Conference of the Art Directors Club of New York. Edited by Robert 0. Bush. New York; Hastings House, 1963. pp. 10U-107. Squire, James and Applebee, Roger. A Study of English Programs in Selected High Schools Which Consistently Educate Outs't&ftSg Students in English Co-operative Research' 'Project, NoT 199V. Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois, 1966. Strang, Ruth. Problems Met When Reading Critically. Promoting Growth toward Maturity in Interpreting What Is Read. Volume Xlli. Proceedings of 'the ^Annual Conference in Reading" Halcf" in November, 1951 at the University of Chicago. Compiled and edited by William S . Gray. Chicago, Illinois t The University of Chicago Press, 1951. pp. 153-157. '•Urban Schools and Education: Intensified Pressures for Change.11 Report of a Conference sponsored by the American Education Publisher1s Institute and the Research Council of the Great Cities Program for School Improvement. Publisher^ Weekly, CXCV(January 6, 1969), 27-31. Unpublished Materials Cogan, John Joseph. "A Content Analysis of Elementary Social Studios Textbooks for Economic Concepts." Unpublished Master's Thesis, Department of Education, The Ohio State University, 1965. Other Sources American Textbook Publishers Institute. Textbooks Are Indispensable. New York: American Book-Stratford Press, inc.\'~WS6. "" Ebel, Robert L. (ed.). Encyclopedia of Educational Research, Uth ed. Toronto, Ontario:' CoUier-Macmillan Company, 1^*69. 11U Good, Carter V. (ed.)* Dictionary of Education* 1st ed. New Yorks McGraw-Hill Book' cVmpany-j I n c . WW* Harris, Chester W. (ed.). Encyclopedia of Educational Research, 3rd ed. New Yorks The' Macmillan Cocipany, I960. Redding, M. Frank. Revolution in the Textbook Publishing Industry. Los Angeles, California: University of Southern California Press, 1963.