Like many states, Massachusetts has intensified efforts in recent years to improve literacy outcomes, particularly in the early grades. Initiatives have focused on providing guidance and resources for implementing changes in curriculum, instruction, and additional screening and support for struggling students. In September 2022, the Board of…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between parent concerns about children's oral language, reading, and related skills and their children's performance on standardized assessments of language and reading, with a particular focus on whether those relationships differed between children recruited for in-school versus…

This article presents an evaluation of the first 2 years of a research-based summer learning program that provided self-selected and developmentally appropriate books to students in low-income and low-resource elementary schools by a local philanthropic organization in a large urban district. The evaluation found evidence of a positive effect of…

Oral Reading Fluency (ORF) is a widely-used index of reading ability in early elementary grades; however, little information exists on predictive value of student characteristics on ORF scores (Wang, Algozzine, Ma, & Porfeli, 2011). A three-step sequential model was used to analyze the influence of student characteristics on scores (N = 2649)…

This quantitative non-experimental study was conducted to determine the effectiveness of Istation, a computer-assisted instruction program, as a form of intervention to improve students' overall reading ability score after use for three consecutive full years (2012-2013, 2013-2014, 2014-2015). Achievement was measured by Istation's Indicators of…

The simple view of reading proposes that reading comprehension is the product of word reading and language comprehension. In this study, we used the simple view framework to examine the early prediction of reading comprehension abilities. Using multiple measures for all constructs, we assessed word reading precursors (i.e., letter knowledge,…

Using reliable and valid measures of students' outcomes which are sensitive to change is critical for obtaining interpretable and therefore useful results from evaluations of school-based interventions. While measurement development for use in experimental evaluations receives a great deal of attention in the U.S., it lags behind in low-income…

We investigated the effects of morphological awareness on five measures of reading in 103 children from Grades 1 to 3. Morphological awareness was assessed with a word analogy task that included a wide range of morphological transformations. Results indicated that the new measure had satisfactory reliability, and that morphological awareness was a…

The positive effect of early intervention upon the reading abilities of struggling students has been well documented by research. Unfortunately, the current economic situation has eliminated the positions of many interventionists serving in school districts across the country. Cross-age tutoring has been implemented in many places as a replacement…

Over the past few decades, reading assessment has been pushed to the forefront of the national discussion about education. The most recent reauthorizations of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (1994, 2001) made assessment a priority as administrators and teachers are attempting to meet increasing accountability standards, but measuring…

This study examined the acceptability, reliability, and validity of the Arabic translated version of the Rapid Automatized Naming and Rapid Alternating Stimulus Tests (RAN/RAS; Wolf & Denckla, 2005) for Jordanian students. RAN/RAS tests are a vital assessment tool to distinguish good readers from poor readers. These tests have been…

The purpose of this inductive and quantitative research study is to examine the influence of dual language education upon the development of literacy skills in English proficient kindergarten through grade 2 students. Secondly, this research is purposed to aid in filling the void in the limited way in which educational researchers have examined…

The present study investigated the reading attitude of struggling elementary students at risk for reading failure. Twenty-nine first-grade and 32 second-grade struggling readers were given the Elementary Reading Attitude Survey (McKenna & Kear, 1990). First-grade struggling readers favored more academic reading activities while second-grade…

To determine the effect of oral responses on cloze test, particularly at the primary grade level and with students of below average reading ability, was the purpose of this study. A total of 135 students from second, fourth, and sixth grades were included in the study. At each grade level the students were divided into above-average, average, and…