NEWSrelease

News from the National Captioning Institute, Inc.

Date: March 5, 2003

Contact: Jay Feinberg

703-917-7600 (V/TTY)

703-917-9853 (FAX)

jfeinberg@ncicap.org

Captioned Television Improves Reading & Literacy Skills

Washington, DC – The National Captioning Institute (NCI) announces the publication of a captioning instruction manual entitled, Using Captioned Television in Reading and Literacy Instruction. The manual, created to provide teachers and parents with specific information on how to use captioned television as an essential part of reading and literacy programs, offers in-depth information on how to access the closed captions available on most television programs and videos, how captions are created, and how captions can serve as an educational tool to improve reading and vocabulary skills.

More than 20 years of research conducted by the National Captioning Institute and others has shown that children and adults with visual, auditory and other learning styles can improve their literacy skills by viewing television programming with captions. Captioned television programs create a rich learning environment by allowing students to hear the words, see the words as captions and experience the meaning of the words by watching the images on the TV screen. This multi-sensory educational approach to reading comprehension has been found to be beneficial by reading and special education teachers as a way to motivate slow or reluctant readers, students with learning disabilities and individuals learning English as a second language. Much of the research was funded by grants from the U.S. Department of Education.

In an effort to encourage the use of captioning as an educational tool, NCI and Inclusion Incorporated, the Washington, D.C.-based consulting firm that prepared the publication for NCI, has made the 36-page Using Captioned Television in Reading and Literacy Instruction available to all elementary, middle and high schools; special education programs; English as a Second Language (ESL) programs; and other learning institutions where reading education and comprehension courses are provided.

Since its introduction, more than 5,000 copies of the captioning instruction manual have been distributed at no charge to schools and special education programs nationwide. Teachers, specialists and parents are learning techniques and tips provided in the manual for using captioning to teach children and adults how to read or how to improve reading skills.

In recent months, school systems nationwide have expressed a renewed interest in NCI’s captioning instruction manual and how it can further enhance the current educational tools utilized by the nation’s elementary and secondary school teachers. This renewed interest has been spearheaded by the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act signed into law in January 2002. This act, designed to make comprehensive changes to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESAE) of 1965, requires all states to implement statewide accountability systems to set improved academic standards in each content area, including reading comprehension.

“NCI is excited to be part of the research and publication of Using Captioned Television in Reading and Literacy Instruction,” stated NCI President and COO Jack Gates. “We have always focused on how our captioning services enhance the lives of those who are deaf or hard of hearing, but we also want to be able to help millions of others who can benefit from captioning through improvements in reading and vocabulary skills. Through this manual, captioning will become a more effective teaching tool in this area of learning.”

In partnership with NCI, Inclusion Incorporated presents information about the captioning instruction manual at education conferences and can provide additional training and technical assistance to teachers, special educators and other education professionals.

For more information on how to receive copies of Using Captioned Television in Reading and Literacy Instruction and to learn more about training opportunities for teachers, please call (800) 377-8070, send an email to captioning@inclusioninc.com or visit online at www.inclusionresearch.org/Captioning.htm

With offices in the Washington, DC metropolitan area; Burbank, CA; New York, NY; Dallas, TX; and London, England, the nonprofit National Captioning Institute is the global captioning leader, supplying the highest-quality closed captioning and related services for broadcast and cable television, home video and DVD, and government and corporate video programming.

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