Reading and Literacy
At a Glance | Services | Significant Work | Products
Examples of Significant Work
Open Court Reading: Imagine It! Randomized Controlled Trial: SEDL is conducting a national, large-scale randomized controlled trial assessing the effectiveness of McGraw-Hill Education’s Imagine It! elementary reading-language arts program, the next generation of the Open Court Reading series. The rigorous study, which involves some 5,000 students in 60 schools across 15 districts, will use a multisite cluster randomized trial design to examine whether Imagine It! affects reading outcomes for K–5 students and whether outcomes vary significantly across students, schools, and districts.
Louisiana Striving Readers Randomized Controlled Trial: SEDL is conducting a 4-year randomized controlled trial of the Voyager Passport Reading Journeys curriculum for struggling adolescent readers (those reading 2 or more years below grade level) as part of the Louisiana Department of Education's Louisiana Striving Readers project evaluation. The study will evaluate whether students using the Passport Reading Journeys curriculum show greater advances in reading outcomes than students using other programs and under what conditions.
Georgetown County Public School System: SEDL is providing the Georgetown County Public School System in South Carolina with professional development on content-area literacy strategies.
Past Work
Lancaster and Georgetown County Public School Systems: Professional Learning Communities: SEDL assisted the Lancaster and Georgetown County Public School Systems in South Carolina with implementing the Professional Teaching and Learning Cycle (PTLC) to develop professional learning communities among teachers. The goals were to improve classroom instruction with a focus on literacy and to assist school and district leaders as they developed processes that support teachers engaged in professional learning teams. SEDL staff also conducted an internal evaluation of the project.
Bright Futures Early Reading First Project: SEDL worked with the Madison Parish Public Schools and the Delta Community Action Association-Tallulah Head Start on the Bright Futures Early Reading First project to develop, test, and refine strategies for creating family-friendly preschools that support language and literacy development. The project involved 250 preschoolers from low-income families in Tallulah, Louisiana. SEDL staff worked to increase parental involvement in children's language development and provided training on research-based literacy instruction for young children. In addition, SEDL researchers conducted a quasi-experimental study to evaluate the project's effectiveness. Significant gains were found for children’s receptive vocabulary, letter recognition, and print awareness skills, and instructors showed significant increases in their literacy and language knowledge.
New Mexico Rural Partnership for Technology: In a subcontract with the Magdalena Municipal School District in New Mexico, SEDL worked with four rural school districts to help elementary language arts teachers use technology to improve students' literacy skills and knowledge of traditional Navajo culture. Staff also used technology to link the schools, provided technical assistance and professional development to help teachers integrate technology into literacy instruction, and modeled parental-involvement activities to support the use of technology in students' homes.
Bernalillo School District: SEDL worked with a Bernalillo, New Mexico, middle school to help them implement the Professional Teaching and Learning Cycle (PTLC) to incorporate literacy strategies into instruction in mathematics, reading, science, and social studies. The PTLC is an intensive, job-embedded approach to strengthening teacher quality. SEDL staff worked with faculty and administrators to help them align curriculum, instruction, assessments, and state standards with the goal of increasing student achievement.
National Institute for Literacy (NIFL) K–3 Literary Resources Dissemination Evaluation: SEDL conducted an internal evaluation of the NIFL literacy resources being distributed nationally to teachers and families of K–3 students, with a focus on students from families with low literacy skills. The multiyear internal evaluation assessed both the perceived usefulness, relevance, and quality of the materials provided and the distribution channels used.
Louisiana Recovery School District (2007–2008): To support the Louisiana Recovery School District, established to turn around underperforming schools in New Orleans, SEDL developed and held training sessions on literacy and provided on-site assistance. In addition, SEDL researchers conducted an evaluation of the training and assistance initiatives and documented the outcomes.
Reading First Program (2003–2007): SEDL supported the U.S. Department of Education’s Reading First program, which puts proven methods of early reading instruction in classrooms, by developing and maintaining the Reading First Awards Database and publishing the program’s newsletter, Reading First Notebook.
Reading Assessment Database (1996–1999): SEDL developed this online database, which enables teachers to search for preK–3 reading assessments that test the 14 reading skills outlined in the Cognitive Foundations of Learning to Read: A Framework, as part of the Reading Coherence Initiative. This initiative was, in turn, part of the Program for the Improvement of Teaching and Learning, funded under SEDL’s 1996–1999 Regional Educational Laboratory contract.
Regional Educational Laboratory (1996–1999, 2000–2006): SEDL’s REL contracts included working intensively with 60 sites across the Southwest to assess student reading abilities and improve students’ reading comprehension. We also modeled instructional strategies and provided resources for educators.
Bilingual Education Multifunctional Resource Center (1986–1996): SEDL operated this regional Multifunctional Resource Center, which provided training, technical assistance, and materials to help implement and improve programs for students with limited English proficiency. In 1996, the Multifunctional Resource Center was incorporated into the broader Southeast Comprehensive Assistance Center (CAC), which provided support for reading instruction and English language learners—work SEDL continues today through the Southeast and Texas comprehensive centers.
Teaching Reading to Bilingual Children Longitudinal Research Study (1979): This study tracked more than 300 bilingual children in more than 20 schools in five Texas school districts from kindergarten through the third or fourth grade. At the time, the study was one of the nation’s most comprehensive and extensive studies of bilingual students.
Follow Through: Language Development Approach Program (1969–1995): SEDL’s Follow Through program provided comprehensive instructional support to improve the academic success of younger children with limited English proficiency.
Get free resources for your school! Participate in national reading study.
What Does It Mean to Teach Reading Explicitly?and
Adolescent Literacy: How to Access and
Comprehend Text
two professional development sessions led by Ramona Chauvin and Kathleen Theodore
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