The purpose of the study was two-fold: 1.to investigate the effects of teaching phonetic-radical characters on second-grade normal students and students with learning disabilities; 2. to compare the teaching effects and benefits between these two types of students. Both types of students were assigned to an experimented group or a control group with pre-and post-test comparisons. Also included in the methodology were interviews and questionnaires. Results of the post-test revealed that students who received phonetic-radical characters teaching were significantly better in the ability of character identification, recognition of phonetic part and radical part, and character identification, recognition of phonetic part and radical part, and charaction combination. Students' parents and teachers also held positive attitude toward teaching of phonetic-radical characters. Suggestions on teaching strategies and further research direction were provided at the end of the paper.