The Orton-Gillingham ® and TouchMath ® systems of instruction were implemented to improve language and mathematics skill development for 6-and 7-year-olds in a 1st-grade classroom. After 2 years of intervention, the participants were found to be no longer in need of special education services. All the participants showed marked improvement in reading scores on the Wide Range Achievement Test-III. The students who were considered to be at risk for reading and mathematics difficulties at the beginning of their 1st-grade year were no longer in need of special education services at the end of their 2nd-grade year.Practitioners, researchers, administrators, parents, and policymakers have been concerned about the reading and mathematics skill development of students in schools all over the world for more than a century. Teachers often cite reading difficulties as the main reason for referring students to special education services. Failure to learn to read in the first grade can have serious and long-term consequences on an individual's literacy development (see Stein

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Stimulus-response compatibility refers to the correspondence between a sensory event and the motor response which it specifies. A discrete aimed movement task with two conditions of stimulus-response compatibility tested whether higher compatibility would decrease the reaction time of 5 subjects with normal movement and 6 subjects with cerebral palsy. A board with 3 distances (13.5, 28.0, 40.5 cm) along each of 3 rays (45 degrees, 90 degrees, 135 degrees) provided 9 target sites for a detachable leaf switch. A light on the switch was turned off or on for the low or high compatibility condition. The independent variables were the Index of Difficulty, target position and compatibility. The dependent variables were reaction time and movement time. The reaction times for both groups were less during the high compatibility condition than during the low compatibility condition as shown by a t test for differences between means. Multiple regression analyses showed that reaction time of the normal group was a positive linear function of compatibility and movement time was a positive linear function of the Index of Difficulty for both groups and of position for the normal group, 3 normal subjects and 2 cerebral palsied subjects. There were indications of ballistic rather than aimed movements. The results are discussed with regard to the role of visual fixation in aimed movement, the similarities between groups in conformance to Fitts' Law and differences between groups in reaction and movement times.

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52 learning disabled students were assessed to evaluate the relationships among self-concept and (a) school achievement, (b) maternal self-esteem, and (c) sensory integration abilities. Of these variables, perceptual motor abilities as measured by the Southern California Sensory Integration Tests contributed to reported self-concept of learning disabled students.