This study compared the effects of 2 supplemental interventions on the beginning reading performance of kindergarteners identified as at risk of reading difficulty. Students (N = 206) were assigned randomly at the classroom level either to an explicit/systematic commercial program or to a school-designed practice intervention taught 30 min per day…

Explores the effectiveness of "word boxes" phonics instruction on beginning first-grade children's word identification and spelling performance. Finds that children in the word boxes condition significantly outperformed children in a more traditional phonics condition. Indicates that word boxes lessons can be a viable phonics approach to…

A program to teach young children about phonological structure was evaluated with 64 experimental group and 62 control group preschoolers in Australia. Results support the efficacy of the program and the principle that phonological awareness and letter knowledge are necessary but not sufficient for acquisition of the alphabetic principle. (SLD)