Nancy A. Madden

In this project, researchers will evaluate the efficacy of Lightning Squad, a small-group tutoring intervention for grade school that combines technology and cooperative learning to support struggling readers. In the elementary grades, children without strong reading skills by middle school are less likely to succeed in school and in careers. Many studies have found positive effects of one-to-one tutoring by certified teachers on the reading performance of students who struggle with reading.

Intervention programs that target literacy skills have proven successful in boosting at-risk children's academic achievement. Yet the gains for these children, while important, are modest and often fall short of closing the achievement gap that emerges early in development. Emerging research evidence suggests that social-emotional understanding and self-regulation skills contribute in important ways to academic success in the early grades. In the present study, the research team will deve...

Students who enter high school with poor literacy skills face long odds against graduating and going on to postsecondary education or satisfying careers. The Alliance for Excellent Education reports that roughly 6 million secondary students read well below grade level. High school provides a last chance for many at-risk students, who must quickly improve their reading skills to be able to succeed in their secondary-level courses. Although the poor reading skills of students in high-povert...

In this study, the researchers proposed to develop and pilot test a professional development program to help teachers improve students' writing methods. The goal was to ensure that teachers could transfer what they learned from the professional development to the classroom. The proposed professional development included training that includes how to use multimedia content embedded in classroom instruction, teacher's learning communities, well-structured manuals and materials, cooperative learnin