Sharon Walpole

Effective Schools and Accomplished Teachers: Lessons about Primary-Grade Reading Instruction in Low-Income Schools

We investigated school and classroom factors related to primary-grade reading achievement in schools with moderate to high numbers of students on subsidized lunch. 14 schools across the United States and 2 teachers in each of grades K-3 participated. 2 low and 2 average readers per class were tested individually in the fall and spring on measures of reading accuracy, fluency, and comprehension. The teachers were observed 5 times by trained observers between December and April during an hour of reading instruction, completed a written survey, completed a weekly log of reading/language arts activities in February and again in April, and were interviewed in May. Each school was identified as most, moderately, or least effective based on several measures of reading achievement in the primary grades. A combination of school and teacher factors, many of which were intertwined, was found to be important in the most effective schools. Statistically significant school factors included strong links to parents, systematic assessment of pupil progress, and strong building communication and collaboration. A collaborative model for the delivery of reading instruction, including early reading interventions, was a hallmark of the most effective schools. Statistically significant teacher factors included time spent in small-group instruction, time spent in independent reading, high levels of student on-task behavior, and strong home communication. More of the most accomplished teachers and teachers in the most effective schools supplemented explicit phonics instruction with coaching in which they taught students strategies for applying phonics to their everyday reading. Additionally, more of the most accomplished teachers and teachers in the most effective schools employed higher-level questions in discussions of text, and the most accomplished teachers were more likely to ask students to write in response to reading. In all of the most effective schools, reading was clearly a priority at both the school and classroom levels.

The Relationships between Coaching and Instruction in the Primary Grades: Evidence from High-Poverty Schools.

In this study of 116 high-poverty schools, we explored teaching and coaching in grades K–3. We developed and validated observation protocols for both coaching and teaching. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were computed to identify and confirm factors that explained the protocol data. Three coaching factors were identified in both analyses: (1) collaboration with teachers, (2) coaching for differentiation, and (3) leadership support for coaching. Five teaching factors were identified in the exploratory factor analysis: (1) collaboration, (2) small-group management, (3) effective reading instruction, (4) read-alouds, and (5) assessment. In the confirmatory factor analysis the final teaching factors included (1) small-group work, (2) effective instruction, (3) read-alouds, and (4) management. Structural equation modeling indicated that each coaching factor was a significant predictor of at least one instructional factor, but there were differences by grade level. Implications of these findings for future research into causal relationships between coaching and enhanced instruction are discussed.

A Stage-Sequential Model of Reading Transitions: Evidence from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study.

This study uses latent transition analysis to examine reading development across the kindergarten and 1st-grade year. Data include poverty status and dichotomous measures of reading at 4 time points for a large sample of children within the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study. In each of 4 waves of the study, 5 latent classes were represented in different proportions: low alphabet knowledge, early phonological processing, advanced phonological processing, early word reading, and early reading comprehension. Transition probabilities were calculated for the full sample and for children living above and below poverty. The findings indicate that children living below poverty are less likely to experience successful reading transitions than their above-poverty peers. However, children in the below-poverty group who began kindergarten with at least early phonological processing experienced transition probabilities similar to their above-poverty peers. Researchers should target and test preschool interventions for their potential efficacy to mediate the effects of poverty on early reading.

Closing the Gap between Research and Practice: Case Study of School-Wide Literacy Reform.

This case study of one elementary school describes an ongoing effort to close the gaps between literacy research and practice in order to promote the successful literacy transitions of all students. Jefferson Elementary Schools reading program is a research-driven, school-wide program emphasizing prevention-based instruction, early identification, intensive intervention, and ongoing staff development. For emergent and beginning readers, these efforts are coordinated through the consistent use of instructional diets to guide teachers in curriculum decisions and their allocation of classroom literacy time. We identify assessment-based decision making, curricular coordination, small group instruction, efficient management, ongoing data analysis, knowledgeable leadership, and persistence as essential ingredients in this effort.

The role of informal reading inventories in assessing word recognition

In the controversy concerning high-stakes testingin reading, there is one point on which few dis-agree: Such tests provide little or no useful infor-mation to aid teachers in understanding the needsof individual children. In a recent policy brief,Afflerbach (2005) summarized major problemswith high-stakes testing of reading achievementand proposed specific recommendations for im-proving reading assessment. Among them was theadvice to rely on informal assessments to deter-mine developmental trends and identify specific in-structional needs. But which assessments? For more than half a century, reading educatorshave regarded the informal reading inventory as thecomprehensive assessment instrument of choice.Through a combination of graded word lists andpassages, flexibly administered, a teacher can gar-ner valuable information about a child’s independ-ent, instructional, and frustration reading levels;listening level; decoding strategies; sight-word ac-quisition; and reading rate. After administration, ateacher can conduct a specific miscue analysis, in-ferring information about readers’knowledge andstrategies based on their oral reading errors (see,for example, Burns & Roe, 2002; Johns, 2005;Leslie & Caldwell, 2005; Silvaroli & Wheelock,2004; Woods & Moe, 2003). Given these advantages, it is little wonder thatinformal reading inventories (IRIs) have enjoyed astrong appeal. Researchers have long suspected,however, that IRIs often yield results of question-able value. Paris and Carpenter (2003) reached arelatively positive judgment concerning IRIs buthighlighted some specific limitations: the use ofIRI data to track progress over time, problems withassessing comprehension, and the time required toadminister such assessments individually. Theseconcerns are not new. More than two decades ear-lier, researchers had already identified a host ofpsychometric issues that haunt IRIs and that re-main largely unresolved (McKenna, 1983; Pikulski& Shanahan, 1982). These include their reliability,readability of passages, question types employed,design of graded word lists, and others.

Planning and Evaluating Change at Scale: Lessons from Reading First.

The evaluation of Reading First, the U.S. Department of Education’s multibillion-dollar K–3 initiative, although flawed, nevertheless offers instructive guidance for gauging the impact of future initiatives. After providing an overview of the program, its evaluation, and the historical context of federal initiatives, the authors outline limitations in applying scientific principles at scale. They argue for more nuanced approaches, including meta-analyses across projects, the use of improved statistical approaches, and the incorporation of formative designs. They conclude with four recommendations for evaluating future initiatives. Such evaluations should (a) account for fidelity systematically, (b) include outcome measures that gauge school climate and administrative support, (c) include multiple designs and aggregate the results, and (d) account for the length of implementation.

Literacy Achievement during Kindergarten: Examining Key Contributors in an At-Risk Sample

This study investigated the contributions of initial literacy, oral language, and social adjustment to literacy achievement at the end of the kindergarten year. Data were collected across the kindergarten year from 48 children attending a school serving primarily children from low-income households with researchbased curriculum and intervention programs. Data were used to create latent variables to represent initial literacy, oral language, and social adjustment as predictor variables and a variable representing word reading and spelling as an outcome variable. Multiple regression indicated that only initial literacy contributed significantly to the outcome. Path analysis also indicated the significance of initial literacy while supporting the shared contribution of oral language to the literacy outcome. Discriminant function analysis indicated that individuals with higher scores on the literacy outcome had high factor loadings on both initial literacy and oral language. Social adjustment did not contribute significant variance to the literacy outcome in any of the analyses. This study has implications for both policy and practice, documenting the importance of initial literacy skills, even from the beginning of kindergarten, to kindergarten literacy outcome and highlighting the correlation between the effects of initial literacy and oral language on reading and spelling.

Matching second graders to text: The utility of a group‐administered comprehension measure

Abstract This is a study of the utility of Lexile scores for predicting adequate oral reading accuracy and oral reading rate in a tradebook. A Lexile score is a quantitative measure of readability that can be applied to texts and also a metric for describing reading achievement through the use of standardized reading comprehension measures. Participants included 47 second‐grade readers who took a group‐administered reading comprehension test, yielding individual Lexile scores. Trade book titles were randomly selected to correspond to their Lexile scores. After a controlled story introduction, each participant read a single text orally, and researchers calculated oral reading accuracy and rate. Results indicated that 93% of the participants read their Lexile‐identified trade book with oral reading accuracy > 90% but only 57% with reading rate >70 words per minute. Implications for using Lexile scores as part of a school‐level assessment plan are discussed.

How Well Does Assessment Inform Our Reading Instruction

To what extent is the instruction we provide informed by the results of assessments? The authors contrast what they believe has long been the norm for assessments with a promising trend spurred by recent U.S. federal initiatives such as Reading First. They see great potential for peaceful coexistence between policymakers and teachers when assessments are chosen and used to plan effective instruction.

The Promise of a Literacy Reform Effort in the Upper Elementary Grades

We compared year-long gains in fluency and comprehension in grades 3–5 in 3 treatment and 4 comparison schools. Treatment schools implemented a comprehensive school reform (CSR) program called Bookworms. The program employed challenging text and emphasized high text volume, aggressive vocabulary and knowledge building, and contextualized strategy instruction. Comparison schools used a traditional guided reading approach that matched children to instructional-level texts. We established feasibility of the CSR treatment through document review. Achievement levels were initially comparable in fluency and comprehension. Repeated-measures MANOVAs revealed that for reading fluency, the treatment group grew significantly more than the control group in grades 3 and 5 but not in grade 4. For comprehension, the treatment group exhibited significantly more growth at all 3 grades. Implications of the study are discussed.