Author: P. David Pearson
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Learning to Read… in first grade at Pleasant Prairie Grammar School
I went to a one room schoolhouse in the wide-open spaces of the Sacramento Valley in post-World War II California. In 1947, when I started first grade, all 42 of us-from first graders through eighth graders were taught by Mrs. Millsap, a matronly lady in her early sixties who was driven daily to and from…
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Toward a Theory of Reading Comprehension Instruction—Pearson, P. D. & Spiro, R. (1980)
Rand Spiro and I wrote this piece over a period of a couple of years in 1978-80, building off my earlier accounts of the utility of schema theory and Rand’s characterization of the ways in which Schema Theory was able to explain the typical roadblocks that kids run into when trying to render text meaningful.…
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Where the P in “P David” comes from
This is the second installment of the name saga… Fast forward from Grade 1 to my sophomore year in high school. 16th birthday coming up in April of 1957. In the 1950s, turning 16 is a triple witching hour of sorts—have to get a driver’s license, register for Social Security, AND register for Selective Service…
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How I learned my real name…
The first week of first grade was especially hard for me. I was greeted with not one but two surprises, both of which were traumatic for my not very resilient 6-year-old ego. But first a word about my school—a classic prairie style one room schoolhouse in what were then, just after WWII, the wide open…