ABSTRACT
One important goal of the Early Training Project was to construct an environment that would be relatively rich in learning potential but at the same time structured in such a way that figure-ground relationship and predictable sequences might emerge. The Early Training Project is an intervention research study which attempts to test the possibility of offsetting, with specially planned techniques, the progressive retardation in school achievement and general cognitive development that is the usual fate of the culturally deprived child. The pre-school summer experiences were arranged so that each group of approximately twenty had a head teacher, who was an experienced primary teacher with special training for the project, and three or four assistant teachers. The assistants being largely trainees in people school psychology program or undergraduates especially recruited for the program. This made possible a high ratio of adults to children, which was of particular importance for the form of intervention the authors planned.
