1. Results of the Reading Programme in the
United States, Japan and China: In the
Pre-school and in the Home
2. Research was done with
both pre-school groups and
with children in the home.
3. 3
For the pre-school groups, the regular teachers
did the teaching. The pre-school children ranged
in age from 1 to 4 years.
For the children at home, parents did the
teaching. The children were between the ages of 1
and 2.5 years.
4. “
Research with English Reading
4
In the home (Steinberg & Steinberg, 1975)
This research involves a single subject, the first
author's first son.
5. In the home (Steinberg & Steinberg, 1975)
before 12
months
• Began
introducing
words to
the son
12 months
•Able to correctly
identify four
written words,
“car”, “baby”,
“boy”, and “girl”
24
months
•able to identify 48
words, phrases, and
sentences,
•able to identify 48
words, phrases, and
sentences
2.5 years of
age
•could read
181 different
items
6. In the home (Steinberg & Steinberg, 1975)
3.5 years
• could read
short
sentences
in a text
fluently
and with
natural
intonation
4 years 11
months
•standardized
tests placed
his reading at
generally
beyond the
third-grade (8
years) level.
about 8 years
old, and a third
grader
• His reading
achievement
equalled or bettered
sixth graders on
vocabulary and
comprehension and
eleventh graders on
speed and accuracy
12 years old and a
seventh grader
•he scored higher
than most tenth
graders, and
equaled twelfth
graders in terms
of vocabulary,
comprehension ,
speed, and
accuracy.
7. In the pre-school (Steinberg, 1980)
7
The reading programme was introduced to 2-, 3-, and 4-year-
old children in one of the most disadvantaged areas on the island
of Oahu in Hawaii. It was a short-term study. The teachers did
the teaching under the guidance of the first author and his
Chinese research assistant.
8. During an average of 17.2 weeks of instruction with a mere
average of 10 to 12 minutes of instruction daily, the children
learned to read a mean of 28.7 words and 6.3 phrases and
sentences.
In the pre-school (Steinberg, 1980)
9. One 3-year-old child who rarely spoke learned 29 words and 12
phrases and sentences during 20.4 weeks of exposure and that
the highest achiever was a boy who learned 94 words and 41
phrases and sentences during 23.6 weeks of exposure.
In the pre-school (Steinberg, 1980)
11. In the home (Steinberg, Yoshida, & Yogi,
1985; Steinberg & Tanaka, 1989)
11
The four-phase reading programme was administered to three
Japanese children in the city of Hiroshima. The parents spent
about 15 minutes per day on average in teaching the children.
12. Two girls (sisters)
The sisters were 18 months and 29
months of age.
The girls were more linguistically
advanced, being able to utter
sentences.
The children were from two upper-
middle-income families.
Boy
The boy was 20 months of age.
The boy could only utter a few
words although he could understand
many words and some phrases and
sentences.
12
13. 13
During the first five months of the programme, the boy learned a
remarkable total of 311 written words (Chinese character kanji
and syllabic kana) and 62 phrases and sentences, while the girls
learned 189 words and 86 phrases and sentences. (The
progress of the girls is identical because the mother kept the
older girl to the slower pace of the younger girl.)
14. 14
At the eighth week that he began to identify particular items. In
that week, he learned a surprising number of 46 words, 31 of
which were kanji. In terms of his ability to say these items,
his mother noted that in the early weeks of the Word
Identification phase he could pronounce only a small number of
the items.
15. 15
It was further noted that after just the first few weeks of
identifying words, he began to remember written items after
just one or two presentations.
16. 16
After just 1 week of Word Familiarization, the girls began to
identify their first words. They began with 10 words the first
week, 5 of which were kanji. Their progress was much more
gradual and less explosive than the boy's. Evidently, there are
great individual differences in children's rate of learning.
17. After about two years, all three children were given a
standardized reading test, Each child scored between Grades 2
and 3 (7 and 8 years) in overall achievement on sentence
comprehension and vocabulary. Their ages at the time of the
testing were 4 years 2 months for the boy, and 3 years 11
months and 4 years 11 months for the girls.
18. A project involving the reading programme was introduced
to a class of 2-year-olds and a class of 3-year-olds in a
middle-income neighbourhood in Hiroshima.
18
With Japanese in a pre-school
(Steinberg & Sakoda, 1982)
19. Both the 2-year-old and 3-year-old groups proceeded from the
Word Familiarization to the Word Identification phase within the
first month of the reading programme. During the eight-month
course of the research, on average
the 2-year-olds learned 97.3 words (71.0 of which were
kanji) and 3.0 phrases and sentences
the 3-year-olds learned a total of 99.3 words (81.3 being
kanji) and 1.93 phrases and sentences.
20. While the high degree of similarity might indicate that
the learning capacity of the two age groups was much the same, it
is the researcher's opinion that the 3-year-olds would have done
much better had the quality of instruction for the older class been
as good as that for the younger class. The teachers for the 2-
year-olds were more lively and enthusiastic in their teaching.
21. 21
Research with Chinese Reading
In the home (Steinberg & Xi, 1989)
Three children from a variety of parental educational
backgrounds were taught to read by their parents in their
homes in Tianjin, China. There were one girl and two boys
ranging in age from 2 years 2 months to 2 years 4 months.
22. 22
Findings
The children learned 140 or more character words in their first
15 weeks. The programme lasted nearly two years, during which
time Ke-Ke (the girl) learned 401 characters, Bei-Bei (one of
the boys) learned 293 characters, and Xia-Xia (the other boy)
learned 270 characters. All were able to read simple books.
23. 23
In a pre-school (Steinberg & Xi, unpublished)
Thirty 2-year-olds in one class were taught reading in a pre-
school in Tianjin. The programme lasted nearly 11 months. The
children varied greatly in their achievement. Some progressed to
reading paragraphs and simple books while others were still at a
sentence level.
24. Implications of Results
The results of the English, Japanese, and Chinese studies provide
evidence in support of the effectiveness of the four-phase
teaching programme. The findings strongly indicate that the
guiding principles and the teaching program itself are optimal and
universally applicable.
