This article describes the challenge of engaging educators in professional development (PD) that is timely and relevant to their work, and effective in stimulating instructional changes to improve student learning. The authors highlight the competing needs and goals for PD that create tensions among the external accountability demands, school…

In this foreword to the special issue of the "Journal of Education" celebrating the 30th anniversary of the publication of "Becoming a Nation of Readers: The Report of the Commission on Reading" ("BNR") (Anderson, Hiebert, Scott, & Wilkinson, 1985), we share the backstory of the making of "BNR." We view…

Purpose: In this epilogue, we review the 4 response articles and highlight the implications of a multidimensional view of reading for the assessment and instruction of reading comprehension. Method: We reiterate the problems with standardized tests of reading comprehension and discuss the advantages and disadvantages of recently developed…

The teaching of reading is one of the consistent topics for discussion in education. It exercises the minds of teachers, parents and politicians alike. This is especially so because levels of literacy are regarded as one of the most important indicators of educational well-being and progress, such is its position of status in such international…

Taiwan's National Development Council recently announced plans for the country to become bilingual by the year 2030. However, the Council did not lay out a clear road map for how this major accomplishment is to be achieved, and the curriculum presently in place does not seem to meet the challenge. This article will review the current status of…

Middle schools were designed to promote exploration in the curriculum in a way that is appropriate for young adolescents. However, this vision has not been fully embraced, and many middle schools still function as junior versions of high school. Gary Weilbacher explores the history of the middle school movement and describes how the…

Reading skills are important in terms of listening, creating comprehension as well as supporting narrative skills (speaking and writing). There are various strategies, methods and techniques related to reading in the literature. Although it is not common today, text commentary method was common in the past. Text commentary method is described as…

This article is a response to claims made by proponents of "science of reading" and "structured literacy" reading instruction approaches, in regard to their effectiveness with emergent bilingual students. The author argues that the strong knowledge base generated from studies examining the dynamic literacy practices of emergent…

The authors examined whether exposing young students to spellings as they learn proper names would facilitate memory for the spoken names when tested without the spellings present (i.e., orthographic facilitation), whether emergent readers with letter knowledge would show this effect, and whether phonemic segmentation (PS) training would enhance…

Teaching reading successfully requires deep knowledge of the reading process and development, as well as the implementation of impactful reading instruction and differentiation. This book aligns Montessori didactic materials and pedagogy, developed over a century ago, with current research on reading development. Readers will gain a solid overview…

Virtual Reading Coach assesses student reading abilities with MindPlay's Universal Screener and automatically develops a unique, differentiated syllabus of instruction and mastery-based activities for every student, thus improving their reading fluency. This report includes its logic model, foundational literature review, and summaries of…

By definition, an epilogue is a concluding segment of a literary work that often describes the futures of its main characters. It can also be a short speech at the end of a play or musical interlude that addresses the audience directly. Leaning in the direction of the latter, we propose as writers of this epilogue to engage in a bit of poetic…

Freshman students learning English as foreign language have problems in comprehending English texts such as inability to identify main ideas, paragraph topics, supporting details and the organizational structure of a text. They have difficulty writing a summary or making an outline of the main ideas and important supporting details in a single, or…

Developing young children's vocabulary is essential for later reading success; thus, early childhood classrooms require a comprehensive vocabulary approach that teaches academic vocabulary. Yet even providing young children with child-friendly definitions of sophisticated words can be a challenge. First, the authors outline the components of a…

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused countries to lockdown. Like all other affected sectors, educational institutions have also been affected and closed to sustain the spread of the virus. With this situation, the Department of Education adopted the Basic Education Learning Continuity Plan and implemented the Modular Distance Learning (MDL) modality…