Maximizing What Exceptional Students Can

Learn: A Review of Research on the

Keyword Method and Related
Mnemonic Techniques
Margo A. Mastropieri, Thomas E. Scruggs, and Joel R. Levin

This paper reviews recent research involving the use of

mnemonic techniques with exceptional students. All results
to date indicate that students instructed in these techniques
consistently and significantly outperform students who are
given alternative modes of studyincluding direct
instruction on a variety of school-learning tasks. Both
theoretical and applied research issues are considered
throughout the paper.

T he major goal of education is to provide optimal

learning environments for all students. Often, how-
ever, these learning environments fail, and students are
placed in special education classes. Although these place-
ments are intended to provide learners with sufficient
skills so that they may ultimately return to mainstream
settings, frequently these environments also fail (Heller,
Holtzman, 3c Messick, 1982). A major focus of research
with exceptional students has concentrated on discover-
ing effective learning environments and optimal instruc-
tional techniques. Previous research efforts have inves-
tigated such variables as antecedent and consequent
events (White & Haring, 1981), monitoring of learner
progress (Fink &c Carnine, 1975), specific teacher beha-
viors (Denham & Lieberman, 1980), peer tutoring (Ger-
ber & Kauffman, 1981), and metacognitive training
(Brown &t Palincsar, 1982). Rosenshine (1979) combined
many of these alterable variables and referred to them
as "direct instruction." To date, direct instruction
methods and materials have been strongly advocated for
exceptional students (Karoly 6c Steffen, 1982).
Recently, however, a different approach to maximiz-
ing the learning of such students has been reported in the
literature (e.g., Mastropieri, Scruggs, & Levin, in press-c;
Pressley & Levin, in press). This approach exploits the
educational potential of mnemonic techniques, or sys-
tematic procedures for enhancing learning and memory
(Bellezza, 1981; Higbee, 1979; Levin, 1981a). One associ-
ative mnemonic technique that has proven to be extremely
versatile is known as the "keyword method" (Atkinson,
1975; Pressley, Levin, & Delaney, 1982). Basically, the
keyword method attempts to enhance learning and mem-
ory by facilitating the encoding of information so that
it can be more easily retrieved. To this end, it encom-
passes what Levin (1983) refers to as the "three Rs" of
associative mnemonic techniques: recoding, relating, and
retrieving. For example, to remember that the Spanish
vocabulary word pato (pronounced something like "pah-
toe") means duck, the learner first recodes the unfamiliar
word pato into an acoustically similar and easily pictured
"keyword." In this case, a good keyword for pato would
be pot, in that it sounds like a salient part of pato and
is easily pictured. Second, in the relating stage, the
recoded keyword {pot) is related to the unfamiliar word's
meaning {duck) by means of an interactive picture or
image. For this example, a good interactive picture or
image might be a duck with a pot on its head. Finally,
when the learner is asked for the meaning of the word
pato, a direct systematic retrieval path has been estab-
lished: The vocabulary word pato leads to the keyword
pot, which in turn leads to the picture of the pot on a
duck's head, which results in the desired definition {duck).

RASE 6(2), 39-45 (1985) 0741-9325/85/0062-0039$2.00PRO-ED Inc. 39

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 It is important to distinguish between mnemonic tech-
niques as specifically defined here, and other strategies
that some researchers have described as "mnemonic."
Mnemonic techniques, strictly defined, include a sys-
tematic retrieval component, along with either a recod-
ing component, a relating component, or both. "Recod-
ing" in this sense requires transformations (Levin, 1981b)
of the to-be-learned material into a more meaningful form
(as in transforming pato into pot). "Relating" requires
additions to, or elaborations of (Rohwer, 1973), the
material to be associated (as in the construction of an
interaction between a pot and a duck). A good deal of
literature documents the efficacy of such mnemonic tech-
niques with exceptional students (e.g., Jensen & Roh-
wer, 1963; Martin, 1978; Mastropieri, Scruggs, & Levin,
in press-b; Taylor & Turnure, 1979). In contrast, inves-
tigating alternative memory strategies (such as verbal
rehearsal, clustering, imaging, questioning, paraphrasing,
and the like) has appearedwith varying outcomesin
the special education literature (e.g., Pressley & Levin,
in press; Worden, 1983). Such purportedly "mnemonic"
strategies do not satisfy the present definition and thus
they are not included here. In the review that follows,
we will describe mnemonic strategy applications in spe-
cial populations as well as effectiveness comparisons with
direct instruction procedures.
Before proceeding, however, we should briefly discuss
the theoretical impetus behind the advocacy of mnemonic
techniques as optimal associative-learning strategies (see
also Levin, 1981a). Efficient associative learning and
memory depend on the establishment of a reliable path-
way (or multiple pathways) from the stimulus to the
response (Anderson & Bower, 1973), which in turn
involves response-learning and associative subprocesses
(Underwood & Schulz, 1960). The response-learning
subprocess refers to acquiring familiarity with the separate
to-be-associated elements, whereas the associative sub-
process refers to acquiring specific stimulus-response con-
nections. Thus, methods that enhance the familiarity or
meaningfulness of the stimuli, as well as methods that
strengthen stimulus-response connections, will hasten the
learning process. The keyword method and related mne-
monic techniques facilitate mastery of both these learn-
ing subprocesses.
I n particular, the recoding component of the keyword
method serves to transform unfamiliar, nonmeaningful
stimuli into more meaningful entities. Because it has been
empirically established that meaningful stimuli are learned
more rapidly than are nonmeaningful stimuli (e.g., Pai-
vio, 1971), phonetic transformations of this kind would
be expected to be helpful. In addition, the relating com-
ponent of the keyword method serves to integrate initially
unrelated elements into a meaningful whole. Again it has
been established empirically that thematically elaborated
stimuli are remembered better than are unelaborated sti-
40
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muli (e.g., Bransford et al., 1982; Pressley & Levin, in
press; Rohwer, 1973). Consequently, the shared seman-
tic relationship conveyed by an interactive picture or vis-
ual image would be expected to be beneficial. Finally, if
the retrieving component of the keyword method is
capitalized on by providing explicit retrieval instructions
to the learners, the meaningfulness and relatedness qual-
ities of the initial learning process should be re-evoked,
thereby affording a retrieval path leading directly from
the "asked" stimulus to the "asked for" response. Empir-
ical research has repeatedly shown that the success of a
mnemonic technique depends critically on the extent to
which each of the underlying "three R" components is
operational during encoding and retrieval (e.g., Bower,
1970; Levin, McCormick, Miller, Berry, & Pressley,
1982; McCarty, 1980; Pressley, Levin, Hall, & Miller,
1979).
Research on Mnemonic Techniques
In a recent study by Mastropieri, Scruggs, and Levin
(in press-b), the utility of a pictorial mnemonic strategy
for learning disabled (LD) students was investigated. In
this study, 90 ninth-grade LD students (divided into "rela-
tively higher" and "relatively lower" reading achievement
levels) were individually taught the hardness levels of 14
minerals (Bishop, Lewis, & Sutherland, 1976) accord-
ing to one of three instructional variations: (a) a key-
word/pegword mnemonic condition, (b) an experimenter-
led direct questioning condition, or (c) a free-study con-
dition. The keyword/pegword strategy is an adaptation
of the keyword method previously described, as applied
to learning numbered or ordered information. For this
strategy, the numbers 1 through 10 are represented by
rhyming "pegwords" (i.e., 1 is bun, 2 is shoe, 3 is tree,
4 is floor, etc.). The mineral represented by a keyword
is shown in an interactive illustration with its associated
pegword. For example, to learn that wolframite is num-
ber 4 on the hardness scale, learners were first taught the
keyword for wolframite, wolf. They were then reminded
of the pegword for 4, which is floor, and shown a line
drawing of a wolf standing on a floor. Learners were told
that when they were provided with the mineral wolf-
ramite, they should: (a) think back to the keyword wolf,
(b) think of the picture with the wolf in it, (c) remember
that the wolf was standing on a floor, (d) recall that//oor
stood for 4; and (e) respond with the appropriate hard-
ness level, 4. This strategy is more complex than the one
described above for foreign language vocabulary learn-
ing because two stimulus transformations are necessary
one for the keyword mineral component and one for
the pegword-number component.
In the free study condition, students were given sam-
ples of different study strategies and asked to learn the
minerals and hardness levels on their own. In addition,
a direct questioning condition was added to control for
the effects of experimenter interaction per se in the
Volume 6 Issue 2 March/April 1985
 mnemonic condition. All students were given the same
amount of time to learn the minerals and their hardness
levels.
Results indicated that students in the mnemonic con-
dition significantly and substantially outperformed stu-
dents in both the free-study and direct questioning con-
ditions. This was equally true for students classified as
relatively lower and relatively higher reading achievers.
Across achievement levels, the mean percentage of items
correctly recalled in each condition was: 75% (mnemonic
condition), 36% (free-study condition), and 28% (direct
questioning condition). It was thus demonstrated that
ninth-grade LD students could learn and benefit from the
complex pictorial mnemonic strategy. In addition to the
immediate recall test that was given to all students, stu-
dents were tested on the same minerals 24 hours later.
It was found that whereas the students in the direct ques-
tioning and free-study conditions retained little of what
they had learned in the first session, students in the
mnemonic condition retained virtually all of the infor-
mation they had learned the day before. Although a brief
strategy-report interview held immediately after the ini-
tial test for all learners may have provided differential
practice for mnemonic subjects, the delayed recall find-
ings nevertheless indicate the durability of mnemonic
strategy effects in students often characterized as having
memory deficits. In a followup investigation utilizing
nondisabled students two years younger (Mastropieri,
Scruggs, & Levin, in press-b), it was found that the degree
of mnemonic strategy facilitation was comparable to what
had been observed in the LD sample.
These results were encouraging enough to warrant
additional research to replicate and extend the find-
ings. In that research (below), mnemonic instructional
approaches were compared directly with direct instruc-
tion approaches.
Mnemonic Versus Direct Instruction
One of the most interesting findings of the Mastropieri,
Scruggs, and Levin (in press-b) study was that the stu-
dents performed so much better under mnemonic instruc-
tion than under the experimenter-led direct questioning
condition. Further, even the students who had free-
studied the material performed descriptively higher than
students in the direct questioning condition. This direct
questioning condition, however, was intended to provide
interaction with the experimenter and did not combine
certain of the elements of formal direct instruction proce-
dures (such as rapid pacing and cumulative review) that
are thought to be so powerful with exceptional students
(Becker, Engelmann, Carnine, 6c Maggs, 1982). Conse-
quently, a condition was designed to reflect more faith-
fully these specific direct instruction components.
Mastropieri, Scruggs, and Levin (in press-a) taught the
hardness levels of the same minerals to 56 LD students
under two conditions, direct instruction and mnemonic
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instruction. All students were seen in small instructional
groups, which corresponds to one of the elements of
direct instruction procedures (Becker, 1977). Students
learned the minerals and their hardness levels either via
mnemonic illustrations subsequent to keyword/pegword
instructions or via fast-paced experimenter-led drill and
practice using elements of direct instruction (including
rapid pace, unison responding, immediate feedback, and
cumulative review). Students in the mnemonic instruc-
tion condition recalled 63% more mineral hardness levels
than did students in the direct instruction condition.
An a second experiment in the same investigation,
mnemonic instruction procedures were modified to suit
the needs of a junior high school age educable mentally
retarded (EMR) population. In a crossover design (in
which each student received both treatments in a counter-
balanced order) under mnemonic instruction students cor-
rectly recalled an average of 64% of the mineral hard-
ness levels in contrast to 38% under direct instruction.
When individual scores were examined, it was noted that
all students had learned more information when they were
given mnemonic instruction than when they were given
direct instruction.
Further mnemonic comparisons with direct instruction
procedures were made in the area of native-vocabulary
learning. A study by Berry (1983) stimulated optimism
regarding the potential of mnemonic instruction in this
domain. Fourth- and fifth-grade LD students who were
taught the definitions of unfamiliar English vocabulary
items according to the mnemonic keyword method
remembered significantly more definitions in comparison
to nonmnemonic control students. Incorporating the
Berry (1983) vocabulary materials, Mastropieri, Scruggs,
Levin, Gaffney, and McLoone (in press) taught adoles-
cent LD students 14 words and their definitions by either
mnemonic instruction or direct instruction. Students in
the mnemonic condition were taught a keyword for each
vocabulary word and shown a picture with the keyword
interacting with its corresponding meaning. For exam-
ple, for the English vocabulary word dahlia (whose mean-
ing was given as flower, students were first taught the
keyword for dahlia {doll), and then were shown an illus-
tration of a doll sniffing a flower. For retrieval, students
were told that when they were asked for the meaning of
dahlia, they should think of the keyword doll, think back
to the picture with the doll in it, recall that the doll was
sniffing a flower, and respond with the appropriate
answer {flower). In the direct instruction condition, stu-
dents received drill and practice at a rapid pace, with cor-
rective feedback and cumulative rehearsal, for an amount
of time equivalent to vocabulary learning plus keyword
learning in the mnemonic condition. The results of this
investigation replicated those of Mastropieri, Scruggs,
and Levin (in press-a) in that students in the mnemonic
condition statistically outperformed students in the direct
instruction condition by a wide margin (averages of 80%
41
and 3 1 % correct, respectively). In both studies, students
in the direct instruction condition received nearly 40%
more time specifically studying the vocabulary words and
their meanings (or minerals and hardness levels) than the
mnemonic subjects, who spent part of their time learn-
ing keywords for the to-be-remembered items.
In a second experiment in the same investigation, an
attempt was made to determine whether or not LD stu-
dents could successfully generate their own internal
mnemonic images. The materials in the direct instruction
condition were the same as those used in the first experi-
ment. In the mnemonic imagery condition, however, stu-
dents were provided with the keyword and meaning of
each vocabulary word, but were asked to come up with
their own interactive image. For example, for dahlia stu-
dents were told that the keyword for dahlia was doll and
that dahlia meant flower, and so they should think of a
picture of a doll and flower doing something together.
Again, it was found that students in the mnemonic key-
word condition statistically outperformed students in the
direct instruction condition (averages of 69% and 47%
correct, respectively). Although the difference was smaller
than that of the first experiment, the results nonetheless
indicated that LD students could generate their own inter-
active images and that this strategy was superior to
experimenter-led direct instruction. A notable aspect of
these findings is that successful self-generation of a
mnemonic strategy represents a critical first step toward
application of the strategy in other situations. Investiga-
tions focusing on students' maintenance and transfer of
mnemonic strategies are needed to determine the extent
to which, and the conditions under which, mnemonic
strategies can be successfully implemented in exceptional
populations.
In another English vocabulary-learning study, Scruggs,
Mastropieri, and Levin (in press) provided EMR students
with both mnemonic illustrations and direct instruction
in a crossover design. The results supported those of the
earlier investigations. When students were instructed
mnemonically, they recalled far more definitions (an aver-
age of 72% correct) than when they were taught via direct
instruction (48%).
Two additional studies comparing direct and
mnemonic instruction in LD populations will now be
reviewed. Both of these studies followed from the
hardness-of-minerals research that was described earlier.
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In these studies, however, students had to learn about
each mineral's color and common use as well as hard-
ness levels. The basic question here was whether simul-
taneously presented information about multiple attrib-
utes of minerals could be taught effectively via mnemonic
procedures.
In one study (Scruggs, Mastropieri, Levin, & Gaffney,
in press), for example, students had to learn that wolf-
ramite is number 4 on the hardness scale, is black in color,
and is used for making lightbulbs. The corresponding
mnemonic illustration depicted a black (color) wo//(key-
word for wolframite) standing on a stage floor (pegword
for number 4) that was lit up with lightbulbs (use). Stu-
dents were told to remember that the keyword for wolf-
ramite was wolf, to think back to the picture of the wolf,
and to recall what else was there. They were told that
the wolf was black because wolframite was black in color;
that, because the wolf was standing on the floor, wolf-
ramite was number 4 on the hardness scale; and that,
because the floor was lit up by lightbulbs, wolframite was
used for manufacturing lightbulbs.
In this experiment, mnemonic instruction was com-
pared with three other conditions: free study, direct
instruction, and reduced-list direct instruction. The free-
study condition was included to permit comparison of
an unstructured study condition with both the mnemonic
and direct instruction conditions. Also, because some
would argue that the low level of performance associated
with direct instruction in the earlier studies resulted from
too much content being dealt with in too little time, a
reduced-list direct instruction condition was implemented
in which the experimenter presented only half as many
minerals as were presented in the direct instruction, free-
study, and mnemonic conditions.
The findings replicated those of the previous research.
It was found that the LD students could successfully apply
a pictorial mnemonic strategy to the learning of multiple
mineral attributes. In particular, performance in the
mnemonic condition (an average of 69% correct)
exceeded that exhibited in the two full-list comparison
conditions (averages of 24% and 30% for direct instruc-
tion and free study, respectively). Moreover, mnemonic
students mastered about 17 attributes (out of 24 possi-
ble) in the same amount of instructional time that
reduced-list direct instruction students were able to mas-
ter only about 6 attributes (out of 12 possible). Note also
that as in the previous investigations, students given full-
list direct instruction did not outperform free-study con-
trol students.
In a second multiple-attribute study with LD students,
Mastropieri, Scruggs, McLoone, and Levin (1984) found
that mnemonic instruction (with an average of 95% cor-
rect) was superior to both direct instruction (64%) and
free study (77%) when the attributes to be learned
represented dichotomous classificationsas is typical of
scientific taxonomies. For hardness levels, the minerals
were classified as either hard or soft; for color they were
classified as either dark or pale; and for use, they were
classified as either home or industry. In the mnemonic
Volume 6 Issue 2 March/April 1985
 illustrations, hardness levels were represented by a pic-
ture of either an old man (hard) or a baby (soft); color,
by either blackened in (dark) or not blackened in (pale)
keyword objects; and use, by either a home or an indus-
try setting. Again, not only did direct instruction not sur-
pass free study; it was statistically worse!
The rehearsal strategy employed in the above direct
instruction conditions has been the dominant strategy
used in published SRA direct instruction materials for
teaching science facts and vocabulary such as, ''Indolent"
means lazy. What does indolent mean?" (Engelmann,
Haddox, Hanner, & Osborne, 1978, p. 45). Recently,
however, the use of a "visual-spatial display" has been
promoted as being optimally suited for the teaching of
fact systems in a variety of content domains (Engelmann
& Carnine, 1982; Engelmann, Davis, & Davis, 1981).
Although no prior published research could be found sup-
porting the effectiveness of such visual-spatial displays
with handicapped learners, this strategy was tested empir-
ically against mnemonic instruction in two experiments
(Scruggs, Mastropieri, Levin, McLoone, Gaffney, &
Prater, 1984). In the first experiment, the use of visual-
spatial direct instruction was compared with free-study
and mnemonic conditions in a lesson on attributes of
minerals in which LD students had to learn specific infor-
mation as in the previously discussed Scruggs et al. (1984)
study. In this experiment, the mnemonic students again
significantly outperformed students in both visual-spatial
and free-study conditions, with mean percentages correct
of 58, 29, and 26, respectively. In the second experiment,
in which the dichotomous mineral classifications were
taught (e.g., hard-soft), mnemonically instructed students
again outperformed students in both visual-spatial and
free-study conditions (mean percentages correct of 87,
65, and 60, respectively). Of special interest is that, con-
trary to recent speculations about the effectiveness of
visual-spatial displays for factual learning, in neither
experiment did such displays facilitate students' attribute
recall relative to free study.
Discussion
These findings indicate that (a) mnemonic instruction
constitutes a powerful tool for increasing handicapped
learners' memory, and (b) direct instruction is not as
universally effective for handicapped learners as some
would like to believe (Karoly & Steffen, 1982). Concern-
ing the second point, our review of research on excep-
tional students' memory for novel factual information
suggests that direct instruction has not fared at all well,
even in relation to free-study conditions wherein learners
were provided an equivalent amount of time to study the
material however they wished. And, as has been noted
in the past, rapid-paced experimenter-enforced repetitive
instruction can inhibit students' selection or use of more
effective study strategies (e.g., Rohwer, 1973; Scruggs,
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in press). Even in LD populations, students' spontane-
ous utilization of mnemonic-like strategies has been
associated with higher levels of recall, in comparison to
strategies that rely solely on rote repetition (Mastropieri,
1983). It is possible that the direct instruction operation-
alizations in the studies reviewed here prevented any kind
of effective strategy utilization, thereby depressing per-
formance to some extent (relative to free study).
V^oncerningthe value of mnemonic instruction, the size-
able advantage of this approach over both direct instruc-
tion and free study in all of the studies reviewed is indeed
impressive. It is true that in the present context, direct
instruction and mnemonic instruction have certain ele-
ments in common: (a) Both teach to a very specific objec-
tive, (b) both employ interaction with the experimenter,
and (c) both require careful structuring and sequencing
of lessons. However, several elements of the mnemonic
method distinguish it from the essentially "operant" ele-
ments of direct instruction. Associative mnemonic strate-
gies capitalize on Levin's (1983) "three Ks"recoding,
relating, retrieving. These elements require active stimu-
lus transformations and meaningful encodings on the part
of the learner, whereas direct instruction lends itself to
the production of rote verbal responses. One of the
important principles of direct instruction is that the infor-
mation is presented at a low cognitive level (Becker,
Engelmann, Carnine, & Maggs, 1982). By contrast,
mnemonic instruction demands much more extensive
information-processing of the learner (Levin, 1981a).
Finally, rapid experimenter pacing is not an inherent fea-
ture of mnemonic instruction. Students are simply shown
(or are told to generate) a mnemonic picture, told how
to encode the information, and given a period of time
to perceive and reflect on the presented information. In
contrast, direct instruction demands that the learners
actively respond to teacher questions in a rapidly paced,
rote rehearsal format, e.g., ''Masticate means chew. What
does masticate mean?" (Engelmann et ah, 1978, p. 3).
During the research program reviewed here we became
increasingly convinced that the overt rehearsal compo-
nent of direct instruction can lead the teacher to a false
sense of the degree of students' content mastery. In the
direct instruction approach, when a student gives an
erroneous response, he or she is immediately corrected
and asked the same question again. Because the student
then invariably responds correctly to the same question,
the teacher may be led to believe that the student has
remembered the item when in fact it has merely been
repeated. The Scruggs et al. (in press) EMR vocabulary-
learning study presents an example of the fragility of stu-
dents' associative memory following direct instruction.
In that study, a substantial proportion of subjects' errors
was "intralist intrusions," or incorrect responses consist-
ing of other definitions from the same list. Such intru-
sions represented a much more prevalent source of errors
43
following direct instruction (73%) than following
mnemonic instruction ( 2 5 % ) . The preponderance of
intralist intrusion errors following direct instruction sug-
gests that strong associations between specific vocabu-
lary items and specific definitions were not made. In con-
trast, the relative scarcity of such errors following
mnemonic instruction suggests that the established mne-
monic connections were much more stable and retriev-
able.
The preceding data, discussion, and analysis provide
a working hypothesis about the optimality of direct
instruction as a pedagogical technique. Simply stated,
direct instruction does not appear to be well suited to
facilitating students' memory for associative content, in
contrast, mnemonic techniques are especially well suited
to that purpose. If direct instruction does prove to be
beneficial, it is likely to be with respect to facilitating stu-
dents' acquisition of specific skillsas would follow
directly from the success of operant techniques in the
behavior analysis literature. The distinction here is
between "learning that" (memory for facts, or what cog-
nitive psychologists have come to call "declarative knowl-
edge") and "learning how" (skill acquisition, or "proce-
dural knowledge"). Recent literature reviews and data
appear to support such a distinction (e.g., Gaffney, 1984;
Graves, 1984). Of course, direct empirical assessments
of the hypothesis are needed to document the presumed
strengths and weaknesses of direct instruction, on the one
hand, and mnemonic instruction, on the other. The pres-
ent authors are currently engaged in such an effort. .**.
References
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Atkinson, R. C. (1975). Mncmotcchnics in second-language
learning. American Psychologist, 30, 821-828.
Becker, W. C. (1977). Teaching reading and language to the
disadvantaged: What we have learned from field research.
Harvard Educational Review, 47, 518-543.
Becker, W. C , Engelmann, S., Gamine, D. W., & Maggs, A.
(1982). Direct instruction technology: Making learning hap-
pen. In P. Karoly & J. J. Stcffcn (Eds.), Improving children's
competence: Advances in child behavioral analysis and ther-
a\ry (Vol. 1, pp. 151-204). Lexington, MA: Heath.
Bellez/.a, F. S. (1981). Mnemonic devices: Classification,
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51, 247-275.
Berry, J. K. (1983). Unpuhlishcd doctoral research. University
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44
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Margo A. Mastropieri, PhD, is assistant professor of
special education and research/evaluation specialist,
Early Intervention Research Institute, Utah State
University, Lngan. Her current research interests
include mnemonic strategy instruction, academic
characteristics of behaviorally disordered students,
and early intervention in special education. Thomas
E. Scruggs, PhD, is research/evaluation specialist,
Developmental Center for Handicapped Persons, Utah
State University, Logan. Dr. Scruggs' current research
interests include mnemonic strategy instruction, peer
tutoring, and test-taking skills. Joel R. Levin, PhD, is
professor of educational psychology, University of
Wisconsin, Madison. Dr. levin's research interests
include learning, memory, children's prose
comprehension, and statistics.
Authors' Note
The authors would like to thank Dr. Hal McGrady and the
teachers and staff of the Mesa Puhlic Schools as well as the
teachers and staff of the Scottsdale Public Schools, Arizona, for
their support of much of the research described here. We would
also like to thank Marilyn Tinnakul, Ursula Pimentel, and Jill
Barry for their assistance in the preparation of this manuscript.
The first author's contribution to the preparation of this man-
uscript was supported in part by a postdoctoral fellowship
awarded by the Exceptional Child Center and Utah State
University. The third author's contribution was supported in
part by the National Institute of Education through the Wis-
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