Melissa Fogarty

Literacy and Text Reading in Middle and High School Social Studies and English Language Arts Classrooms.

This study reports vocabulary and reading comprehension instructional practices implemented in middle and high school social studies and language arts classrooms. It also describes text reading practices. We conducted 137 observations of 11 social studies and 9 language arts teachers over the course of 1 academic year. We observed instructional practices supportive of vocabulary and reading comprehension to differing degrees in social studies and language arts. The proportion of time spent reading text was roughly the same across the 2 subjects, with differences by text type, reading mode, and grade level within both subject areas.

Adjusting Beginning Reading Intervention Based on Student Performance: An Experimental Evaluation:

This experimental study evaluated a model in which the delivery of a supplemental beginning reading intervention was adjusted based on student performance. Kindergarten students identified as at risk for reading difficulties were assigned to one of two versions of the Early Reading Intervention (ERI; Pearson/Scott Foresman, 2004). Students assigned to the experimental condition received the intervention with systematic adjustments based on student performance. Students in the comparison condition received the same intervention without instructional modifications. The experimental group outperformed the comparison group on all posttest measures at the end of kindergarten. Follow-up analyses at the end of first grade revealed a continued advantage for the experimental group. Findings suggest that systematically adjusting intervention support in response to student performance may be feasible and efficacious.

Integrating Content Knowledge-Building and Student-Regulated Comprehension Practices in Secondary English Language Arts Classes

Abstract In this experimental study we examined the effects of integrating teacher-directed knowledge-building and student-regulated comprehension practices in 7th- to 10th-grade English language arts classes. We also investigated the effect of instructional quality and whether integrating practices differentially benefitted students with lower entry-level reading comprehension. The study was conducted in 6 schools, involving 17 teachers and 921 students. Teachers’ English language arts classes were randomly assigned to intervention (n = 36) or typical practice comparison (n = 29) conditions, and all teachers taught in both conditions. Students in both conditions grew significantly from pretest to posttest on proximal measures of narrative (ES =.09) and expository comprehension (ES =.22), as well as a standardized distal comprehension measure (ES =.46); however, no statistically significant between-group differences were found. Although intervention fidelity did not significantly influence outcomes, observational data indicated that teachers increasingly incorporated comprehension practices in their typical instruction. Effect sizes indicated a differential influence of entry-level reading comprehension on proximal and distal comprehension with higher performing readers in the intervention condition benefiting more than their lower performing peers on expository comprehension.

Examining the Effects of Linking Student Performance and Progression in a Tier 2 Kindergarten Reading Intervention

Despite the emerging evidence base on response to intervention, there is limited research regarding how to effectively use progress-monitoring data to adjust instruction for students in Tier 2 intervention. In this study, we analyzed extant data from a series of randomized experimental studies of a kindergarten supplemental reading intervention to determine whether linking performance on formative assessments to curriculum progression improved kindergarten reading outcomes over standard implementation. We were interested in whether specific progression adjustments would enhance the effects of supplemental reading intervention. Growth-mixture modeling using data from kindergarteners (n = 136) whose intervention progression (e.g. repeat lessons, skip lessons) was adjusted every 4 weeks based on mastery data identified four latent classes characterized by unique profiles of curriculum progression adjustments. Multilevel analyses comparing the performance of students in the four classes with that of propensity matched groups whose intervention was not adjusted (n = 101) indicated positive effects of curriculum progression for (a) students whose formative assessment performance exceeded 90% and received early and sustained lesson acceleration and (b) students who initially performed below 70% on assessments and who repeated early lessons and progressed to conventional implementation. Effects of curriculum adjustments for the two smallest groups were less clear.

Using SWPBS Expectations as a Screening Tool to Predict Behavioral Risk in Middle School.

School-wide positive behavior support (SWPBS) focuses on promoting social competence through the establishment of behavior expectations that are explicitly taught and reinforced by all teachers across all settings. This study investigated the validity of using adherence to SWPBS behavior expectations as a screening tool for predicting behavior risk status. A total of 961 students at a middle school serving Grades 6 through 8 were screened using the school’s SWPBS expectations and a standardized norm-referenced emotional and behavioral screener. Results revealed strong associations between the extent of students’ adherence to SWPBS expectations and the adaptive, externalizing, and school problem constructs derived from the norm-referenced screener items; associations with the norm-referenced screener’s internalizing construct were weaker. Classification analyses yielded mixed results despite the comparability between the results of the SWPBS expectations procedure and the standardized norm-referenced screener.

Skill Moderators of the Effects of a Reading Comprehension Intervention

This study utilized secondary analyses of a randomized controlled trial and investigated the extent to which prestest word identification efficiency, reading fluency, and vocabulary knowledge moderated the effects of an intervention on reading comprehension outcomes for struggling readers in sixth through eighth grades. Given that the experimental intervention included components that targeted word reading, reading fluency, and vocabulary, we hypothesized that students with lower pretest performance in those skill domains would benefit more from the intervention compared to students with relatively stronger pretest performance or students who received school-implemented (business-as-usual) intervention. Results indicated that pretest word identification efficiency and vocabulary did not moderate the effects of the intervention; however, moderation effects were observed for pretest oral reading fluency such that reading comprehension gains of students with lower pretest fluency were greater in the experimental intervention compared to students with higher pretest fluency or in the comparison condition. Reasons for the moderation effect are discussed. Findings underscore the use of moderation analyses when evaluating multicomponent interventions.

Using Relevance Prompts: An Exploratory Study to Promote Eighth Graders’ Comprehension and Retelling of Narrative Text

ABSTRACT This exploratory study investigated the effects of modifying eighth grade students’ purposes for reading through a prompt designed to increase engagement with the text. The current study was conducted using a randomized between-subjects design, with a relevance prompt as the between-subjects factor and reader proficiency as a covariate. A sample of eighth grade students (N = 32) were stratified as proficient or struggling and randomly assigned to either the relevance (n = 16) or no relevance (n = 16) condition. Students in the relevance prompt condition were asked to make personal connections to a narrative text as they read. Results indicated statistically significant differences favoring the relevance prompt condition when reader proficiency was considered. These preliminary results suggest that prompting adolescent struggling readers to make connections with text can increase comprehension.