Announcements
January 2010
Reading Institute paper published in Reading and Writing Quarterly
Reading and Writing Quarterly recently published a manuscript from the Preventing Reading Difficulties: A Three-Tiered Intervention Model (3-Tier Research) project within MCPER’s Reading Institute. In the paper, First-Grade Student Retention Within a 3-Tier Reading Framework, authors used a response to intervention (RTI) framework to examine the grade-level retention of students in first grade (students who did not advance to second grade). Data suggest that student behavior, oral reading rates, and other individual school variables (as identified by principals) are possible factors contributing to the retention of students.
MCPER to provide teacher training on End-of-Course Success assessment
MCPER is partnering with the College of Education’s Institute for Public School Initiatives (IPSI) and the Texas Education Agency (TEA) to develop and provide professional development for Texas high school teachers on the upcoming English I, II, and III End-of-Course Success (EOCS) assessment. Required by Senate Bill 1301, the EOCS will measure students’ academic performance in core high school courses and will become part of the graduation requirements, beginning with the freshman class of 2011–2012.
Reading Institute paper to be published in Journal of Education Psychology
The Journal of Educational Psychology recently accepted for publication a manuscript from the MCPER Reading Institute entitled Reading Achievement Across Three Language Groups: Growth Estimates for Overall Reading and Reading Sub-skills Using the Early Childhood Longitudinal Survey. MCPER Associate Director Greg Roberts, Senior Program Coordinator Saro Mohammed, and Executive Director Sharon Vaughn authored the paper.
MCPER awarded two new grants
MCPER has been awarded two new grants, one from The Meadows Foundation and one from the Zero to Five Bachman Early Childhood Initiative Funders Collaborative (of which The Meadows Foundation is a member).
The Meadows Foundation grant is to support the collaborative work of the Institute for Public School Initiatives and the Mathematics Institute within MCPER in the development of intervention materials for students in the middle grades. These materials will support the state’s efforts to prepare all students for algebra coursework.
The second new project will focus on developing an evaluation plan for the first 5 years of the Bachman Early Childhood Initiative. The initiative, in the Bachman Lake neighborhood of Dallas, consists of four preschool (ages 0–5) programs aimed at educating parents and students to improve parent-child interactions around literacy, school readiness, and early vocabulary development.