The article describes a reading fluency intervention called Reading Together that combines the method of repeated readings (Samuels, 1979) and the Neurological Impress Method (Heckelman, 1969). Sixteen volunteers from various backgrounds were recruited and trained to deliver the Reading Together intervention to struggling readers in third through…

In recent years, the Education for All movement has focused more intensely on the quality of education, rather than simply provision. Many recent and current education quality interventions focus on literacy, which is the core skill required for further academic success. Despite this focus on the quality of literacy instruction in developing…

A 2-year, randomized control trial with 9th to 10th grade students with significant reading problems was provided for 50 minutes a day in small groups. Comparison students were provided an elective class and treatment students the reading intervention. Students were identified as demonstrating reading difficulties through failure on their state…

Middle schools are important because they launch students on trajectories that they are likely to follow throughout their formal educations. This study explored the relationship of first-generation segregation (elementary and middle school racial composition) and second-generation segregation (racially correlated academic tracks) to reading and…

Having access to research-based materials is an essential component for designing effective interventions for low-achieving and disadvantaged students. The purpose of this study was to compare the effectiveness of two types of reading material intervention for low-achieving and disadvantaged students. The students were divided into experimental…

We explored the usefulness of 1st and 2nd grade reading measures and responsiveness criteria collected within a Response-to-Intervention (RtI) framework for predicting Reading Disability (RD) in 3rd grade. We used existing data from 387 linguistically diverse students who had participated in a longitudinal RtI study. Model-based predictors of RD…

This article reviews published experimental studies from 2000 to 2012 that evaluated the effects of providing reading interventions to English learners who were at risk for experiencing academic difficulties, including students with learning disabilities. Criteria included: (a) the study was published in a peer-referred journal, (b) the study was…

The number of countries that regularly participate in international large-scale assessments has increased sharply over the past 15 years, with the share of countries participating in the Programme for International Student Assessment growing from one-fifth of countries in 2000 to over one-third of countries in 2015. What accounts for this…

Response to Intervention (RTI) models of reading instruction have received much attention in the literature (Fuchs, Mock, Morgan, & Young, 2003; Hosp & Ardoin, 2008; Justice, 2006). Such models call for frequent and high-quality assessment of students' skills. One skill that is vital in the process of learning to read is the ability to…

When administering tests across grades, vertical scaling is often employed to place scores from different tests on a common overall scale so that test-takers' progress can be tracked. In order to be able to link the results across grades, however, common items are needed that are included in both test forms. In the literature there seems to be no…

This study focused on the relationship between percentage of vocabulary known in a text and level of comprehension of the same text. Earlier studies have estimated the percentage of vocabulary necessary for second language learners to understand written texts as being between 95% (Laufer, 1989) and 98% (Hu & Nation, 2000). In this study, 661…

It is now widely acknowledged that early intervention programs should be provided for young students who are experiencing difficulty in learning to read. It is important, therefore, to have efficient ways of identifying students who are most in need of intervention. The aim of this study was to establish preliminary performance benchmarks to…

A number of studies claim that knowledge of 5,000-8,000 of the most frequent words should provide at least 95% coverage of most unsimplified texts in English, arguably enough to guess or ignore most unknown words while reading (Hirsh & Nation, 1992; Hu & Nation, 2000; Laufer, 1991; Nation, 2006). However, perhaps hidden in that 95% figure…

Effective reading instruction and intervention are rooted in effective assessments of children's developing skills in reading. The article aims to describe the development of new reading assessments to help promote beginning reading in Singapore primary schools. We begin with an introduction to the educational landscape and policies before…

Preschool parent interventions may produce downstream benefits if initial intervention gains are sustained and improve later socialization experiences. This study explored associations between initial effects of the REDI (Research-based Developmentally Informed) Parent program and later benefits. A randomized trial involving 200 Head Start…