Start Making a Reader Today[R] (SMART[R]) is a volunteer tutoring program widely implemented in Oregon for students in grades K-2 who are at risk of reading failure. The program is designed to be a low-cost, easy-to-implement intervention. Volunteer tutors go into schools where at least 40% of students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch…

"Reading Recovery"[R] is a short-term tutoring intervention program intended to serve the lowest achieving (bottom 20%) first-grade students. Students are chosen for "Reading Recovery"[R] by school staff, and selection is based on prior reading achievement, diagnostic testing (the Clay Observation Survey of Early Literacy…

A school district located in the southern region of the United States is implementing the Reading Recovery (RR) Program in 10 elementary schools. The RR program is an initiative to help elementary schools improve student learning, especially in the area of reading. A broad literature review framed this quantitative investigation. The overall…

Boys Town cares for boys and girls (average age 15 years) who are socially and emotionally at risk because of problems such as chronic neglect or abuse, broken homes, and school failure. The majority are behaviorally disordered and emotionally impaired. Within a week of coming to Boys Town, students take the Diagnostic Assessments of Reading Test.…

Reading Recovery is a short-term intervention program for first-graders who are at risk of failure in reading and writing. More than 1.5 million children have been served in the United States since 1984, and pre- and post-test Observation Survey scores have been collected across the nation for the past 20 years. Yet there is a need to determine…

In this study, Reading Recovery teachers reported the program plans for students who had not successfully discontinued the Reading Recovery program. Despite the existence of policy and monitoring devices in New Jersey, a number of schools did not have plans in place to offer ongoing intensive literacy instruction for their lowest-performing…

Reports on the second year of a supplementary reading program. Notes the program was successful with nonreading or delayed-reading students from regular and special education classrooms in grades one through eight. Argues that labels such as at-risk, learning disabled, and dyslexic are excuses for not initially teaching children how to read. (SR)

There is a body of literature suggesting that involving parents in their children's education is an effective strategy for children at risk of reading failure. In a pre-test/post-test control group design, parents in an experimental group received reading materials and were trained on techniques to stimulate their child during paired reading at…

This newsletter describes the Reading Recovery program, developed in New Zealand to help low-achieving first-grade students "recover" 90 percent of average first-grade reading and writing skills after 12 to 18 weeks of intensive instruction. It is currently being implemented by school districts in the United States as well--statewide in…

Children are faced with an increased potential for academic failure due to less stable family lives and career-oriented parents. Cross-cultural reading instruction practices and programs can provide insights that could prevent such failure for children at-risk. One such program is the reading maintenance program used in Denmark, wherein groups of…