May 2004 — Exclusive Series: SBR

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IES Funded Projects

University of Texas Health Center

Scaling Up a Language and Literacy Development Program at the PreK Level.
Principal investigator: Susan Landry
Online: http://ped1.med.uth.tmc.edu/circle/index.htm
Providing effective professional development to teachers in a way that improves their knowledge and skills but is convenient for the working teacher is a challenge. This study will examine the effectiveness of an online early literacy professional development model for early childhood teachers. This project promises to contribute to our knowledge of technologically supported teacher professional development.

University of Texas Health Science Center

Scaling Up an Assessment-Driven Intervention Using the Internet and Handheld Computers.
Principal investigator: Barbara Foorman
Online: www.tea.state.tx.us/technology/pilots/pilots_tpri.html
Teachers are challenged to provide instruction that meets the individual needs of their students. But how can they accurately and efficiently assess and monitor each student's learning? This research team investigates the effectiveness of an intervention that uses the Internet and handheld computers to help teachers link results from reading inventories to instructional practice. This intervention is designed to help teachers make connections between assessment and instruction that will produce significant improvements in student achievement.

Southern Methodist University

Scaling Up Effective Intervention for Preventing Reading Difficulties in Young Children.
Principal investigator: Patricia Mathes
Online: www.smu.edu/
www.texasreading.org/utcrla/projects/scale_up.asp
Perhaps the greatest tragedy in education today is that we are not exploiting what is known about reducing the incidence of reading failure. Success or failure in learning to read in the early grades essentially determines a child's educational trajectory. Research has repeatedly demonstrated that early literacy intervention can interrupt this cycle of failure. This research team will study the relative effectiveness of approaches to teaching reading when intervention teachers are provided with differing models of ongoing professional development that take advantage of using sophisticated computer-based systems for delivery of content and high-quality coaching.

University of California at Berkeley

A Longitudinal Study of the Effectiveness of a PreK Multisensory Literacy Curriculum, Teacher Experience and Professional Development.
Principal investigator: Anne Cunningham
Online: www.berkeley.edu/
www.leapfrogschoolhouse.com/News/jan_2004_D'E.asp
In the last 15 years, significant progress has been made in identifying the developmental skills that prepare young children to read, as well as in identifying those children who are more at risk for reading difficulties.