This Spotlight will help readers investigate one state's plan to improve literacy with daily summer reading instruction; review how teachers can better support struggling older readers; gain expert insights into strategies for boosting reading proficiency; evaluate the merits of audiobooks for improving reading engagement; explore how short bursts…

Ensuring teacher and speech and language pathology graduates are prepared to work collaboratively together to meet the diverse language literacy learning needs of children is an important goal. This study investigated the efficacy of a 3-h inter-professional education program focused on explicit instruction in the language skills that underpin…

As governments, donors and implementation organisations re-focus Education for All Goals in terms of quality of education, increasing concerns have been raised over low literacy levels in developing countries. This paper provides key learning from the application of an early reading intervention applied in post-conflict Liberia, which included a…

At-risk prekindergarten students (i.e., low SES, speech-language impaired) typically lag behind their peers in phonological awareness and other emergent literacy skills such as letter knowledge and vocabulary (Duursma et al., 2008; Lundberg, 2009). However, there is a limited amount of research that has studied the efficacy of phonological…

The purpose of this study was to examine the concurrent validity of the assessment for an early language and literacy project. The goal of the project was to promote a successful transition to kindergarten for preschoolers who were at risk for reading difficulties by equipping them with the necessary language and literacy skills needed for early…

This study compared the effects of Tier 2 reading interventions that operated in response-to-intervention contexts. Kindergarten children (N = 90) who were identified as at risk for reading difficulties were stratified by school and randomly assigned to receive (a) Early Reading Intervention (ERI; Pearson/Scott Foresman, 2004) modified in response…

Researchers have found that teacher preparation programs are not universally preparing teacher candidates in concepts associated with the alphabetic principle. Yet, the majority of students with reading disabilities or who struggle with beginning reading have difficulty with phonology and concepts associated with the alphabetic principle. The…

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…

This study examined the effectiveness of a classroom teacher intervention, the Targeted Reading Intervention (TRI), in helping struggling readers in kindergarten and first grade. This intervention used biweekly literacy coaching in the general education classroom to help classroom teachers use diagnostic strategies with struggling readers in…

The study examined whether preschoolers who were exposed to a media-rich literacy curriculum had better early reading skills than preschoolers who were exposed to a media-rich science curriculum. The study randomly assigned 80 preschool classes to incorporate either a media-rich literacy curriculum or a media-rich science curriculum. The final…

Rigorous research provides information that will allow ECE (Early Childhood Educator) programs to select interventions that have a scientifically based track record of effectiveness in increasing teachers' skills and teaching quality. This paper shares implementation and impact results as well as the lessons learned in conducting an evaluation of…

Entry-level kindergartners in classrooms from five middle class school districts were given a test of letter identification and children who scored at or below the 30th percentile on the test were classified as "at risk" for early reading difficulties. Half of these children were randomly assigned to a project-based intervention condition where…

In this article, the authors report achievement outcomes of a multisite cluster randomized field trial of Open Court Reading 2005 (OCR), a K-6 literacy curriculum published by SRA/McGraw-Hill. The participants are 49 first-grade through fifth-grade classrooms from predominantly minority and poor contexts across the nation. Blocking by grade level…

Twin-study research suggests that many (but not all) of the same genes contribute to genetic influence on diverse learning abilities and disabilities, a hypothesis called "generalist genes". This generalist genes hypothesis was tested using a set of 10 DNA markers (single nucleotide polymorphisms [SNPs]) found to be associated with early reading…

This study determined the effectiveness of Kindergarten Peer-Assisted Learning Strategies (K-PALS) for English Learners (ELs). We compared 20 K-PALS ELs to 20 Control ELs and to 20 K-PALS non-ELs on early reading skill acquisition, using a pretest-posttest control group design with matched samples. We also compared proportions of ELs unresponsive…