Prop boxes are a collection of materials for sociodramatic play in which children act out authentic roles and scenes of the real world. Teachers collect materials around a topic or theme that connects to students' interests and addresses academic standards across multiple subjects. In this article, the authors suggest that prop boxes can make more…

A growing number of states are interested in tracking the readiness of children entering kindergarten. In 2010, just seven states (Alaska, Connecticut, Florida, Hawaii, Maryland, Minnesota, and Vermont) collected Kindergarten Entry Assessment (KEA) data for the purposes of aggregating data at the state level. Since this time, most states report…

There is growing interest in student-centered learning as a model to better support individual learners. In recent years, state policymakers have pursued multiple approaches to implement this instructional model, but many leaders still experience policy barriers that affect progress. This Policy Brief offers an analysis of policy trends,…

Third grade is a critical checkpoint in a child's educational journey. By the end of third grade, children need literacy skills that prepare them for increasing curriculum demands in fourth grade and beyond. Students who are not reading on grade level by this point are significantly more likely to drop out of high school or fail to graduate on…

Purpose: This study examined performance of dual language learners (DLLs) on Spanish- and English-language narrative story retells and unique tells. Transcription and analysis focused on comparisons of common microstructural language sample measures in Spanish and English across tasks. Each language sample measure was evaluated for its possible…

Teacher certification is an important topic in the history of teaching in American education. Policymakers have recognized that for students to meet high standards, their teachers must also be of high quality (Goldhaber, Perry & Anthony, 2004; McCaffrey, Lockwood, Koretz, & Hamilton, 2003). The National Board for Professional Teaching…

Working with the South Carolina Department of Education, the authors surveyed prekindergarten and kindergarten teachers whose schools participated in a quality rating system to see what they did to get ready for the observation and what they thought of the evaluation process. The authors also asked them what they thought about the quality of their…

To complement the information gathered on middle school and high school literacy initiatives as reported in "Middle and High School Literacy across the Curriculum" (Task 1.2 Fast Response Project), the Regional Educational Laboratory Southeast (REL-SE) staff conducted a scan of the six southeast states to gather the following information…