Considers oral reading fluency as an indicator of overall reading competence. Summarizes several studies substantiating that oral reading fluency may reflect overall reading competence. Provides an historical analysis of the extent to which oral reading fluency has been incorporated into measurement approaches during the past century. Concludes…

Discusses the kinds of texts that are appropriate for students at various stages of their reading development and shares criteria for determining the difficulty levels of early reading materials. Lists five general considerations: vocabulary, size and layout of print, predictability, illustration support, and complexity of concepts. (SG)

Examined achievement differences between year-round and traditional calendar students using 2 years of data from North Carolina public school students in grades 3-8. Results indicated that achievement in year-round schools was no higher than in traditional calendar schools, and differential effects for certain student subgroups, although…

Tests the developmental lag hypothesis, which assumes that a surface pattern of reading difficulties should be attributed to a general developmental delay. Compares a sample of very low birth weight children with a group of same-age, normal readers. Provides further evidence that a surface pattern of reading difficulty should be attributed to a…

Discusses research on the National Curriculum Key Stage Two reading tests for years 1998, 1999 and 2000. Shows that in 1999 and 2000 the reading tests were progressively easier: the number of questions requiring higher-order reading skills, particularly those of inference and deduction, decreased each year, while the number of questions requiring…

The purpose of this article is to review the research on policy and professional development undertaken by the Center for the Improvement of Early Reading Achievement (CIERA) and to suggest how this work has advanced knowledge in these areas. This research provides a base for understanding the relations between effective teaching and learning in…

In this article, the author, a team teacher in a multi-age elementary school classroom, relates the story of Nya, a new student in her third-grade class. Nya was drug-affected, and her family had moved around a lot, so she tended not to stay in one school for very long. As a result, her reading level was that of a beginning first grader, and she…

The aim of this study was to investigate differences, if any, in reading achievement among Swedish pupils 9 years of age with respect to school size and location. Data from the IEA reading tests for approximately 3400 children in 124 different schools were used for the analyses, which were carried out using a structural equation modelling…

Thousands of schools around the country have implemented whole-school reform programs to boost student performance. This paper uses quasi-experimental methods to estimate the impact of whole-school reform on students' reading performance in New York City, where various reform programs were adopted in dozens of troubled elementary schools in the…

Event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded from 27 children (14 girls, 13 boys) who varied in their reading skill levels. Both behavior performance measures recorded during the ERP word classification task and the ERP responses themselves discriminated between children with above-average, average, and below-average reading skills. ERP…

The role of orthographic processing skill (OPS) in reading has aroused the interest of many developmental researchers. Despite observations by Vellutino that current measures of OPS primarily are indicators of reading (and spelling) achievement, OPS commonly is distinguished from both reading achievement and phonological skills. An analysis of the…

An urban school district was able to improve its students' reading achievement substantially by implementing a variety of literary coaching models. The six literary coaching process strategies used by schools are discussed.

This study examined how the interaction between student and teacher characteristics affects teachers' predictions of students' academic and social success. Three hundred and eighty-four general education teachers responded to (a) one of 32 possible case studies describing a student, in which gender, reading achievement, social behavior, and…

This study examined the influence of interactions between first graders' fall language-literacy skills (vocabulary and decoding) and classroom instructional practices on their spring decoding scores. Instructional activities were coded as teacher managed or child managed and as explicit or implicit, as well as for change in amount of time spent in…

Reading became a hotbed of policy activity during the 1990s with both state and federal policymakers launching major initiatives to raise reading achievement. When President George W. Bush introduced his Reading First initiative in early 2001, we saw a unique opportunity to investigate the policy processes, antecedents, and unplanned events…