This ethnographic study of language shows the importance of educators' appropriate use of linguistic, nonlinguistic, and paralinguistic communication techniques when working with elementary students within two classrooms who have behavioral and emotional disorders. This study focused on communication techniques used by teachers and…

This qualitative study investigated the experiences of four elementary teachers who have elected to use science to teach math and reading/language arts in an attempt to identify what motivates them to do so. Identifying what experiences have motivated these teachers to go against the gain and teach elementary science in this current era of…

The Texas Literacy Initiative (TLI) was first implemented in Austin Independent School District during the 2012-2013 school. This report summarizes Spring 2014 survey responses from teachers at TLI campuses.

Zhao (2009) notes that when people are intrinsically motivated, they will become courageous. By inviting texts that students value into literature classrooms, educators can reconcile the sometimes seemingly disparate goals of engagement and accountability. Our work with preservice teachers revealed an intersection between motivation and new…

The Great Leaps Reading Program (GLRP) was developed to supplement the reading instruction of students with reading difficulties (Campbell, 1995). Repeated readings, within each component of the GLRP intervention, were used until a predetermined criterion for mastery was achieved. Three secondary students educated in a rural, Title One school…

Reading Recovery (RR) is an early intervention program that addresses the needs of struggling readers in 1st grade. Numerous studies support the positive effect RR has with struggling readers, but research is limited on the effects of RR with English language learners (ELLs). The purpose of this study examined the relationship between oral…

Driven by Lev Vygotsky's Sociocultural Theory (1986), my study investigated the self-perceptions and interactions of seven underperforming, third-grade readers while using Technology-Actuated Reading Instruction (TARI). Partnered with same-age peer tutors, readers used digital tools to listen to, read/record, and playback oral reading passages.…

This study was conducted using a qualitative approach to evaluate the effectiveness of READ 180 Program in improving students reading interests and achievement at West Bolivar Middle School (WBMS). A number of interviews and observations were conducted. Two teachers and nine students were interviewed, and nine classroom observations were…

School district leaders are faced with numerous decisions in the administration of America's schools. One crucial decision that must be made is the selection of elementary reading or math curricular materials. The curricular materials purchased for classroom use are often influential in determining instructional practices and often guide the…

The high level of acceptance in US society of the preschool years as a critically important time for building early literacy skills has led to a flurry of activity in early childhood research and policy. The National Early Literacy Panel (NELP) report "Developing Early Literacy" (2008) is one example of this activity. The NELP report is…

A successful lecture that includes meaningful class discussions requires students to be familiar with the topics covered in the assigned reading. However, because college students frequently do not complete such reading prior to class, instructors are faced with the challenge of finding methods that would encourage students to do so. The purpose…

When asked what Facebook is for, kids will say that it's there to help them make friends. The kids the author celebrated in his early books as "digital natives," capable of seeing through all efforts of big media and marketing, have actually proven less able to discern the integrity of the sources they read and the intentions of the programs they…

This article defines comprehension as a pragmatic social and intellectual practice. It reviews literature on current approaches to reading instruction for linguistically and culturally diverse and low socioeconomic students, noting the current policy emphasis on the teaching of comprehension as autonomous skills and strategies. The Four Resources…

This paper presents the qualitative results of a study of students' reading of multimodal texts in an interactive, online environment. The study forms part of a larger project which addressed image-language interaction as an important dimension of language pedagogy and assessment for students growing up in a multimedia digital age. Thirty-two Year…

Researchers have reported that two types of instructional approaches--strategy instruction and high-level talk about text--lead to reading comprehension improvement in elementary-age students. One hypothesis is that both approaches have similar student outcomes because they develop high-level thinking about text. This article examines the…