The Interventions
New instructional programs were not designed for this evaluation. Either parts or all of four existing and widely used remedial reading instructional programs were employed. The programs are classified as either word level or word level plus comprehension. Word level interventions include methods that focus on improving word-level reading skills so that they no longer limit children's ability to comprehend text. Such methods devote the majority of their instructional time to establishing phonemic awareness, phonemic decoding skills, and word and passage reading fluency. Methods in this classification sometimes include activities to check comprehension (such as asking questions and discussing the meaning of what is read), but this instruction is incidental to the primary focus on improving word-level reading skills. The bulk of instructional and practice time in methods included within this classification is focused on building children's ability to read text accurately and fluently. The second intervention classification—referred to as word level plus comprehension—includes methods that more evenly balance instructional time between activities to build word-level skills and activities devoted to building vocabulary and reading comprehension strategies. These interventions include extended activities that are designed to increase comprehension and word knowledge (vocabulary), and these activities would take roughly the same amount of instructional time as the activities designed to increase word reading accuracy and fluency.
- Spell Read Phonological Auditory Training (P.A.T.) provides systematic and explicit fluency-oriented instruction in phonemic awareness and phonics, along with every-day experiences in reading and writing for meaning. The phonemic activities include a wide variety of specific tasks focused on specific skill mastery and include, for example, building syllables from single sounds, blending consonant and vowel sounds, and analyzing or breaking syllables into their individual sounds. Each lesson also includes reading and writing activities intended to help students apply their phonically based reading skills to authentic reading and writing tasks. The Spell Read intervention had originally been one of the two "word-level plus comprehension" interventions, but after the time-by-activity analysis, we determined that it was more appropriately classified as a "word-level" intervention. Because the word-level instructional content in Spell Read is more structured than the instruction designed to building reading comprehension, the relatively short instructional sessions in this study led to a different balance of word-level and comprehension instruction than was anticipated.
- Corrective Reading uses scripted lessons that are designed to improve the efficiency of instruction and to maximize opportunities for students to respond and receive feedback. The lessons involve explicit and systematic instructional sequences, including a series of quick tasks that are intended to focus students' attention on critical elements for successful word identification (phonics and phonemic analysis), as well as exercises intended to build rate and fluency through oral reading of stories that have been constructed to counter word-guessing habits. Although the Corrective Reading program does have instructional procedures that focus on comprehension, they were originally designated as a "word-level intervention," and the developer was asked not to include these elements in this study.
- Wilson Reading uses direct, multi-sensory, structured teaching based on the Orton-Gillingham methodology. The program is based on 10 principles of instruction, some of which involve teaching fluent identification of letter sounds; presenting the structure of language in a systematic, cumulative manner; presenting concepts in the context of controlled as well as noncontrolled text; and teaching and reinforcing concepts with visual-auditory-kinesthetic-tactile methods. Similar to Corrective Reading, the Wilson Program has instructional procedures that focus on comprehension and vocabulary, but since Wilson Reading was originally designated as a "word-level" intervention, the developer was asked not to include these in this study.
- Failure Free Reading uses a combination of computer-based lessons, workbook exercises, and teacher-led instruction to teach sight vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension. The program is designed to have students spend approximately one-third of each instructional session working within each of these formats, so that they are not taught simultaneously as a group. Unlike the other three interventions in this study, Failure Free does not emphasize phonemic decoding strategies. Rather, the intervention depends upon building the student's vocabulary of "sight words" through a program involving multiple exposures and text that is engineered to support learning of new words. Students read material that is designed to be of interest to their age level while also challenging their current independent and instructional reading level. Lessons are based on story text that is controlled for syntax and semantic content.
The interventions provided instruction to students in the treatment group from November 2003 through May 2004. During this time students received, on average, about 90 hours of instruction, which was delivered five days a week to groups of three students in sessions that were approximately 55 minutes long. Instruction was provided by teachers who were recruited from participating schools on the basis of experience and characteristics and skills relevant to teaching struggling readers. They received, on average, nearly 70 hours of training and professional development support during the intervention year. According to an examination of videotaped teaching sessions, instruction was judged to be faithful to each intervention model. The program providers themselves also rated the teachers as generally above average in both their teaching skill and fidelity to program requirements.