Many schools identified by states as needing improvement through their Elementary and Secondary Education Act waivers have selected Response to Intervention (RTI), a three-tiered instruction program sometimes referred to as tiered levels of instruction, as one of their main strategies for improving school performance and closing achievement gaps.…

Regional Educational Laboratory Midwest assisted Milwaukee Public Schools in developing a fidelity monitoring system for measuring schools' progress in implementing Response to Intervention (RTI). The study examined the ratings produced by that system to determine the system's reliability, schools' progress in implementing RTI, and whether ratings…

The aim of this study is to determine which values are included in education songs in elementary school textbooks and the level of these values. This study, conducted using document analysis method, involved primary education music class textbooks. Education songs in textbooks were analyzed within the frame of 29 values determined based on…

The aim of this participant observation was to understand the efficacy of a modified International Baccalaureate Primary Years Program for fourth-graders at a public school with a large percentage of language and socioeconomically disadvantaged students. Data collection over a five-month period concentrated on teaching interactions including…

This study examined the role of reading disability (RD) risk and environmental protective factors in reading fluency in grade 4. The sample consisted of 538 Finnish-speaking students. Kindergarten measures included the students' risk for RD based on poor achievement in phonological awareness and letter knowledge as well as information on the three…

Project Linking Learning ("Link") was created to target the needs of gifted students in urban school districts with historically underserved populations. Project Linking Learning implemented a linking curriculum between in-class instruction and an afterschool enrichment program for selected students in second through fifth grade.…

Educational administrators face the unprecedented challenge of increasing student achievement for all students. One response to this challenge has been to increase and improve teacher collaboration. This study analyzed the relationship between elementary principals' leadership behaviors, teacher collaboration, and student achievement. The…

A newsletter can be an effective component of a comprehensive plan for sharing information. A newsletter, in contrast to progress reports, surveys, open houses, or conferences, is a regular opportunity that allows for consistent sharing of information about the program. In this article, the authors discuss how to plan and produce newsletters and…

The author designed this book, like Volume I of the set, to give elementary school librarians a quick, enjoyable way to coordinate with teachers to teach information literacy and literacy skills aligned with national standards. The chapters in the book include: (1) Kindergarten Lesson Plans; (2) First-Grade Lesson Plans; (3) Second-Grade Lesson…

Average-ability students often do not take full advantage of learning in mixed-ability groups because they hardly engage in the group interaction. This study examined whether structuring collaboration by group roles and ground rules for helping behavior might help overcome this participatory inequality. In a plant biology course, heterogeneously…

The Experimental Reflection Portal, or "XRePort" is an online system that pairs students and teachers from different schools and allows them to "talk" about their common science investigations. In this way, students communicate their science knowledge "and" experience firsthand the benefits of the collaborative nature…