Authors: Carreker, Suzanne H.¹; Neuhaus, Graham F.²; Swank, Paul R.³; Johnson, Paul⁴; Monfils, Mary Jo⁴; Montemayor, Mary Lou⁴

Source: Reading Psychology, Volume 28, Number 2, March 2007 , pp. 187-212(26)

Publisher: Routledge, part of the Taylor & Francis Group

Abstract:

A longitudinal investigation determined the growth of reading comprehension from third to fifth grades in a cohort of students who received Language Enrichment (LE), an Orton-Gillingham-based literacy program, during first and second grades. The LE instruction was provided by regular education teachers who received comprehensive training in linguistically informed content pertaining to reading subskills. All students were traditionally instructed in kindergarten, third, fourth, and fifth grades. Hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) confirmed that mono- and bilingual students had significantly advantaged individual growth in reading comprehension as measured on the state-mandated Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS) when their teachers had more experience implementing LE over students whose teachers had less experience implementing LE, or students whose teachers had no LE training. Findings showed a fan-shaped spread in achievement from third to fifth grades for all students in the cohort. The significance of the spread was confirmed by reliable covariance between the initial reading level and the growth in reading across grade levels. This fan-shaped growth pattern is often referred to as a Matthew effect in reading comprehension (Stanovich, 1986). These results provide evidence that the Matthew effect may be associated with specific teaching pedagogies, especially early direct implementation of multisensory linguistically informed language arts instruction. LE instruction emphasizes phonemic awareness, symbol-sound correspondences, morphology, and vocabulary to develop phonological decoding strategies, word recognition accuracy, and comprehension of words in text.

Document Type: Research article

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02702710601186456

Affiliations: 1: Neuhaus Education Center, Houston, Texas, USA 2: University of Houston-Downtown, Houston, Texas, USA 3: University of Texas Houston Health Science Center Medical School, Houston, Texas, USA 4: Brownsville Independent School District, Brownsville, Texas, USA

Publication date: 2007-03-01

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