The effects of a multistrategy reading comprehension intervention on the reading skills of university athletes with reading deficits

A large number of entering college and university students are unable to derive meaning from print at age-expected levels. The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of Collaborative Strategic Reading (CSR; Klingner, Vaughn, Dimino, Schumm, & Bryant, 2001) in improving the reading comprehension skills of underprepared college students. Sixteen (8 experimental and 8 control) first-time male college student athletes entering their freshman year at a research-intensive university in the southeastern United States participated in the study. An experimental design was implemented to address the following research question: What effects does a multistrategy reading comprehension intervention (i.e., CSR) have on the reading comprehension skills of academically underprepared students entering a postsecondary setting? Results showed there were statistically significant findings in favor of the experimental group for an informal dependent measure and non-significant results for a standardized measure. Study implications, limitations, and areas of future research are discussed

4 Advanced Comprehension Strategies to use with Adolescent Readers

Reading comprehension involves an intricate interaction between the reader and attention to the text. Teachers should employ reading strategies to increase comprehension skills required by adolescent students to address the increase in use of informational text and text complexity as stipulated in the newly adopted Common Core State Standards (CCSS). Four advanced reading comprehension strategies that teachers can use to help their students navigate the increase in higher level comprehension skills stipulated by the CCSS are presented here. Also, presented are a justification for why to use the strategy, information on how to use the strategy, research that supports the strategy, an example, and helpful websites to reference for templates and further information. The last strategy of the four can be amended and used as an evaluation tool for any strategy

Factors that Impact Successful Reading: Student-Related, School-Rated, and Text Related

Guest Colum

The Effects of Continuous Improvement Practices Using State Value-Added Data for Reading Educator Program Enhancement

Louisiana’s value-added evaluation of teacher preparation programs has provided a salient impetus for program improvement; however, due to the nature of the assessment, teacher preparation programs need to use additional sources of data to identify actionable responses to the value-added results. This paper describes one teacher preparation program’s approach to continuous program improvement in reading education and describes some of the limitations and benefits of value-added assessment results for that purpose

Project LION: Learning in Our Neighborhood A Community Partnership

Project LION: (Learning in Your Own Neighborhood) is a community partnership working with high-need, low-income middle school students within their neighborhoods to improve academic outcomes by providing programming that focuses on school engagement, academic performance, enrichment, and personal and social skills while enhancing opportunities for teacher candidates to work with diverse populations of students

It Takes a Village: Education Majors Mentoring Title I Students in Southeast Louisiana

This presentation shares the results of a mentoring program between a predominately White university’s education majors and students at a Title I school. The mentoring program was developed to show that culturally mismatching Title I students with university student as mentors can strengthen the knowledge of the learners, while also, honing information directed towards reading comprehension, building high cognitive vocabulary, and honing essay development

Project LION - Learning In Our Neighborhood: A Community Partnership

Project LION (Learning In Our Neighborhood) was a community partnership between a local University, a Charitable Foundation, the City, and the Parish (County) School System that provided affordable after-school academic and enrichment activities for students who are at risk in grades 4 through 8. The multiple-year foundation grant provided program development and fee waivers that allowed a broad participation among low-income students with low educational attainment levels. The program goal was to improve middle school student outcomes by providing programming that focuses on school engagement, academic performance, and social-emotional skills while enhancing real-world opportunities for preservice teacher candidates to work with diverse populations, as well as build after-school program sustainability

Project ROAR: Rediscovering Opportunities and Attitudes for Reading

Project ROAR advances the opportunities for and attitude towards adolescent literacy through the use of Kindle e-Readers in book clubs, 4th-6th grade, students attending a high poverty school. Book Clubs take place on the school campus facilitated by middle school preservice teacher candidates from the local University. Program start up procedures and outcome data will be shared