This study examined a new screening tool (Get Ready to Read) for assessing early reading skills in 73 three-year-old and 79 four-year-old children from low-income families and relating performance to more extensive assessments of phonological sensitivity and language skills (vocabulary and print knowledge) that have been found to be related to the…

Education aims to enable students not only to acquire knowledge but also to become capable and enthusiastic lifelong learners. Prior research has found that learning is more likely to be effective where a student plays a proactive role in the learning process. Such a proactive process, including learning on students' own initiative and strategies,…

This paper examines reading achievement when the maternal/paternal language has become a de facto second language. The performance of a cohort of Greek-Australian high school students (N = 270) on a diagnostic Greek reading test was significantly below that of pupils in second to fourth grades in Greece. The mean item difficulty for…

This study examined student, parent, and teacher perceptions of the use of testing accommodations and the relationship between student perceptions of testing accommodations and their disability status and grade level. Students with and without disabilities completed math and reading achievement tests with and without accommodations. Students,…

This article looks closely at a subset of books about literacy in and out of school by analyzing images of children learning and struggling to learn to read in realistic fiction. There are several books in which characters wish to learn to read, worry about being poor readers, and work hard to learn to read. These books raise important questions…

This study examined the phonics and reading achievement of 117 primary grade students in 14 schools and 42 classrooms. Students received instruction in one of six different reading programs or models based upon the school they attended. Through qualitative data collection and analysis of specific instructional practices, it was determined that no…

The empirical evidence about whom charter schools serve is extensive but inconclusive. Some studies conclude that America's charter schools serve a larger percentage of minority and low-income students than do the nation's traditional public schools (TPS) (U.S. Department of Education, 2004). Other studies find charter students are not more…

This is the 10th annual report on conditions affecting the Racine Unified School District RUSD). Analysis continues to focus on the long-term historical trends in RUSD, comparing RUSD to nine peer school districts and the State of Wisconsin. RUSD peer districts are Wisconsin's largest (Milwaukee Public Schools are not included) and their…

This booklet provides a variety of checklists to assist parents with their children's learning process and needs from the time they are in preschool to high school, as they begin to consider options for college. Examples of checklists include: Know What Your Preschooler Needs; Watch for School Resources; Partner with Teachers and Counselors; and…

The purpose of this action research project report was to increase reading comprehension by using cooperative learning. Reading comprehension was a concern for the three teacher researchers at both research sites. There were 51 first and second grade students, 28 elementary teachers, and 51 families of the first and second grade students involved…

This document records testimony regarding the Department of Education's slow pace in providing States the assistance they require to implement No Child Left Behind's provisions for English Language Learners (ELLs) and the status of recent efforts to correct that; practices for training teachers of ELL students and for improving their academic…

The report addresses the reporting requirements of Public Law 26-26 and the programs and activities that affect student achievement as described in the Guam Public School System's Board-adopted District Action Plan (DAP). This is an annual report on progress towards increasing student achievement with the ultimate aim of Preparing Students for…

Due to recent political changes in Latvia, it has been possible to conduct national comparative studies that may result in reforming the educational system. The first national survey in the field of education was the International Association of Educational Achievement (IEA) Reading Literacy Study. This study was done in Latvia as a parallel to…

Teachers conducting a thematically organized literature-based reading program centered around student-led discussion groups wanted to explore ways in which the values they wanted to promote could be reflected in the ways they assessed their students. This study considers how valuing a broader scope of language and literacy abilities and making…

Some standard-setting methods require judges to estimate the probability that an examinee who just meets an achievement standard will answer each of a set of items correctly. These probability estimates are then used to infer the values on some latent scale that, in theory, determines an examinee's responses. The paper focuses on the procedures…