Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine if word reading and vocabulary are reciprocally related. Method: We followed a sample of 172 English-speaking Canadian children (82 girls, 90 boys; M[subscript age] = 75.87 months at the first measurement point) from the beginning of Grade 1 until the beginning of Grade 3 and assessed them three…

This paper reports on a mixed-methods study of the "Total Reading Approach for Children Plus" (TRAC+) program, with a particular focus on its mobile learning element, where tablets and an app called "Aan Khmer" (Read Khmer) were introduced into Cambodian schools to assist 'struggling students' in Grades 1 to 3 learn early…

Learning to decode is critically important to the process of becoming literate. As such, a thorough understanding of decoding development is critical as well. Extant theories contribute to such an understanding but do not provide a complete description of decoding development; a different theory is needed to address limitations in the extant…

This study explores current reading profiles and concurrent and early predictors of reading in children with autism spectrum disorder. Before the age of 3 years, the study cohort underwent a neurodevelopmental assessment following identification in a population-based autism screening. At age 8 years, reading, language and cognition were assessed.…

This report summarizes Austin Independent School District's spring 2015 English language learners' early reading performance in kindergarten through grade 2.

The purpose of this study was to identify an indicator that the School District of Philadelphia (SDP) could use to measure the percentage of entering kindergarteners who are on-track to read on grade level by the end of grade 3. To develop the indicator, this study examined relationships between student scores on SDP's different assessments that…

Finnish ABC books present words with hyphens inserted at syllable boundaries. Syllabification by hyphens is abandoned in the 2nd grade for bisyllabic words, but continues for words with three or more syllables. The current eye movement study investigated how and to what extent syllable hyphens in bisyllabic ("kah-vi" "cof-fee")…

For students who have limited expressive language skills, both verbally and in writing, it is difficult for a teacher to assess the acquisition of reading skills. The authors examined the effects of computer-aided instruction (CAI) on the early reading and reading comprehension skills of six students with autism spectrum disorder, and other…

The current article examines what factors explained the success of a reading program delivered by older adult volunteers to at-risk early readers. The article also examines the direction of the relationship over time (both direct and mediated) between reading achievement, frequency of reading at home, and academic self-beliefs. Two hundred and…

Children from low-income families are at risk of learning outcome difficulties, particularly in literacy. Various studies link poor literacy results with performance later in primary and secondary school, and suggest that poverty, literacy skills and weak instructional methods combine to drastically limit the educational opportunities for many…

An embodied approach to reading comprehension suggests that emerging readers must learn to map words and phrases onto their remembered experiences, but this is made difficult by the necessity of focusing attention on decoding. Having children manipulate toys to correspond to what they are reading overcomes this problem, but introduces its own…

This report describes a cluster randomized control trial (RCT) intervention study of the effectiveness of the ABRACADABRA (ABRA) Web-based literacy system using a classroom-level RCT intervention with 1,067 children in 74 kindergarten and Grade 1 or Grade 1/2 classrooms across Canada. The authors closely followed the CONSORT criteria for executing…

In the present study we examined the processing demands of three reading comprehension tests, namely the Woodcock-Johnson Passage Comprehension (WJPC), a Curriculum-Based Measure test (CBM-Maze), and a Recall test, in the early elementary years. Our investigation was theoretically motivated by Perfetti's Verbal Efficiency Theory and examined the…

This study estimates program effects (English immersion versus primary language instruction using varying degrees of Spanish) upon English and Spanish word identification in the context of changing classrooms (cross-classification) from kindergarten through second grade. Letter-word identification is an important predictor of early reading…

This paper presents an effectiveness study of a computer-based English reading program, the Waterford Early Reading Program (WERP), among first and second grade students in Israel. Students who used the program were compared to a control group only receiving English as a foreign language (EFL) instruction as part of the school curriculum. First…