The effects of age and sublexical automaticity on reading outcomes for students with reading disabilities

For students with reading disabilities, reading fluency has proven difficult to remediate. The current study examined age‐related effects on measures of word and text‐reading outcomes, within the context of a phonologically based remedial reading program. The contribution of speeded‐reading of sublexical sound–spelling patterns to fluency outcomes was also examined. The youngest group of participants showed better outcomes on measures of word and pseudoword reading. All age groups made significant and meaningful improvements on measures of reading fluency and reading comprehension. Participants' mastery of speeded, sublexical sound–spelling reading contributed variance to fluency outcomes beyond pre‐intervention fluency scores. Practice with sublexical spelling patterns may be one important component of programs directed at remediating accuracy and fluency deficits for students with reading disabilities. What is already known about this topic

• Reading fluency has proven difficult to remediate for students with reading disabilities.
• Training with sublexical sound–spelling patterns has increased recognition of the trained patterns, but transfer has been limited.
• Young children with reading difficulties appear to have an advantage at closing the reading achievement gap; however, there are some inconsistencies in the literature.

What this paper adds

• Automaticity with sublexical patterns made a unique contribution to fluency outcomes in this sample of students with reading disabilities.
• In the context of the reading program examined, all age groups made significant and meaningful standard score gains on reading fluency.
• Young children did not score higher than the two older groups on measures of oral reading fluency or reading comprehension; bringing into question conclusions drawn from prevention versus intervention studies.

Implications for theory and practice

• Findings lend support to models of reading acquisition that emphasize multilayered, sublexical spelling–sound knowledge as important to reading fluency, beyond that of sight‐word reading efficiency.
• Including speeded practice of a broad range of sublexical sound–spelling patterns and training these to mastery deserves further study as one potential approach to improving fluency interventions for students with reading disabilities.
• We suggest that this sublexical training may mimic reading practice in terms of building orthographic representations that support fluent reading.

     

The effects of integrating service learning into computer science: an inter-institutional longitudinal study

This study is a follow-up to one published in computer science education in 2010 that reported preliminary results showing a positive impact of service learning on student attitudes associated with success and retention in computer science. That paper described how service learning was incorporated into a computer science course in the context of the Students & Technology in Academia, Research, and Service (STARS) Alliance, an NSF-supported broadening participation in computing initiative that aims to diversify the computer science pipeline through innovative pedagogy and inter-institutional partnerships. The current paper describes how the STARS Alliance has expanded to diverse institutions, all using service learning as a vehicle for broadening participation in computing and enhancing attitudes and behaviors associated with student success. Results supported the STARS model of service learning for enhancing computing efficacy and computing commitment and for providing diverse students with many personal and professional development benefits.     

Developmental Relations Between Vocabulary Knowledge and Reading Comprehension: A Latent Change Score Modeling Study

The present study followed a sample of first‐grade (N = 316, M_age = 7.05 at first test) through fourth‐grade students to evaluate dynamic developmental relations between vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension. Using latent change score modeling, competing models were fit to the repeated measurements of vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension to test for the presence of leading and lagging influences. Univariate models indicated growth in vocabulary knowledge, and reading comprehension was determined by two parts: constant yearly change and change proportional to the previous level of the variable. Bivariate models indicated previous levels of vocabulary knowledge acted as leading indicators of reading comprehension growth, but the reverse relation was not found. Implications for theories of developmental relations between vocabulary and reading comprehension are discussed.     

Changing Teacher–Child Dyadic Interactions to Improve Preschool Children's Externalizing Behaviors

A randomized controlled trial was used to examine the impact of an attachment‐based, teacher–child, dyadic intervention (Banking Time) to improve children's externalizing behavior. Participants included 183 teachers and 470 preschool children (3–4 years of age). Classrooms were randomly assigned to Banking Time, child time, or business as usual (BAU). Sparse evidence was found for main effects on child behavior. Teachers in Banking Time demonstrated lower negativity and fewer positive interactions with children compared to BAU teachers at post assessment. The impacts of Banking Time and child time on reductions of parent‐ and teacher‐reported externalizing behavior were greater when teachers evidenced higher‐quality, classroom‐level, teacher–child interactions at baseline. An opposite moderating effect was found for children's positive engagement with teachers.     

Relational Aggression and Friendship During Early Childhood: I Won't Be Your Friend!

Associations between relational aggression and mutual, dyadic friendships during early childhood were assessed in the context of a year-long, short-term longitudinal study. Children's mutual friendships were determined via sociometric ratings and their relationally aggressive behavior among peers was assessed via naturalistic, free play observations. Generally, children who were more relationally aggressive had more mutual friends, although this relation differed by gender and time of assessment. Future work should include measures of friendship quality and investigate the role of relational aggression within friendship dyads.     

Mindset × Context: Schools,Classrooms, and the Unequal Translation of Expectations into Math Achievement

When do adolescents' dreams of promising journeys through high school translate into academic success? This monograph reports the results of a collaborative effort among sociologists and psychologists to systematically examine the role of schools and classrooms in disrupting or facilitating the link between adolescents' expectations for success in math and their subsequent progress in the early high school math curriculum. Our primary focus was on gendered patterns of socioeconomic inequality in math and how they are tethered to the school's peer culture and to students' perceptions of gender stereotyping in the classroom. To do this, this monograph advances Mindset × Context Theory. This orients research on educational equity to the reciprocal influence between students' psychological motivations and their school-based opportunities to enact those motivations. Mindset × Context Theory predicts that a student's mindset will be more strongly linked to developmental outcomes among groups of students who are at risk for poor outcomes, but only in a school or classroom context where there is sufficient need and support for the mindset. Our application of this theory centers on expectations for success in high school math as a foundational belief for students' math progress early in high school. We examine how this mindset varies across interpersonal and cultural dynamics in schools and classrooms. Following this perspective, we ask:

• 1. Which gender and socioeconomic identity groups showed the weakest or strongest links between expectations for success in math and progress through the math curriculum?
• 2. How did the school's peer culture shape the links between student expectations for success in math and math progress across gender and socioeconomic identity groups?
• 3. How did perceptions of classroom gender stereotyping shape the links between student expectations for success in math and math progress across gender and socioeconomic identity groups?

We used nationally representative data from about 10,000 U.S. public school 9th graders in the National Study of Learning Mindsets (NSLM) collected in 2015–2016—the most recent, national, longitudinal study of adolescents' mindsets in U.S. public schools. The sample was representative with respect to a large number of observable characteristics, such as gender, race, ethnicity, English Language Learners (ELLs), free or reduced price lunch, poverty, food stamps, neighborhood income and labor market participation, and school curricular opportunities. This allowed for generalization to the U.S. public school population and for the systematic investigation of school- and classroom-level contextual factors. The NSLM's complete sampling of students within schools also allowed for a comparison of students from different gender and socioeconomic groups with the same expectations in the same educational contexts. To analyze these data, we used the Bayesian Causal Forest (BCF) algorithm, a best-in-class machine-learning method for discovering complex, replicable interaction effects. Chapter IV examined the interplay of expectations, gender, and socioeconomic status (SES; operationalized with maternal educational attainment). Adolescents' expectations for success in math were meaningful predictors of their early math progress, even when controlling for other psychological factors, prior achievement in math, and racial and ethnic identities. Boys from low-SES families were the most vulnerable identity group. They were over three times more likely to not make adequate progress in math from 9th to 10th grade relative to girls from high-SES families. Boys from low-SES families also benefited the most from their expectations for success in math. Overall, these results were consistent with Mindset × Context Theory's predictions. Chapters V and VI examined the moderating role of school-level and classroom-level factors in the patterns reported in Chapter IV. Expectations were least predictive of math progress in the highest-achieving schools and schools with the most academically oriented peer norms, that is, schools with the most formal and informal resources. School resources appeared to compensate for lower levels of expectations. Conversely, expectations most strongly predicted math progress in the low/medium-achieving schools with less academically oriented peers, especially for boys from low-SES families. This chapter aligns with aspects of Mindset × Context Theory. A context that was not already optimally supporting student success was where outcomes for vulnerable students depended the most on student expectations. Finally, perceptions of classroom stereotyping mattered. Perceptions of gender stereotyping predicted less progress in math, but expectations for success in math more strongly predicted progress in classrooms with high perceived stereotyping. Gender stereotyping interactions emerged for all sociodemographic groups except for boys from high-SES families. The findings across these three analytical chapters demonstrate the value of integrating psychological and sociological perspectives to capture multiple levels of schooling. It also drew on the contextual variability afforded by representative sampling and explored the interplay of lab-tested psychological processes (expectations) with field-developed levers of policy intervention (school contexts). This monograph also leverages developmental and ecological insights to identify which groups of students might profit from different efforts to improve educational equity, such as interventions to increase expectations for success in math, or school programs that improve the school or classroom cultures.