March 2010

From the National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance (NCEE)

The What Works Clearinghouse Introduces New Topic Area — Students with Learning Disabilities

The What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) is now conducting reviews of research on interventions that focus on students who have learning disabilities. This new topic area aims to help educators make important decisions about curriculums, supplemental products, and classroom methods.

Students with learning disabilities often need different instructional approaches than other children. With appropriate teaching, these students can learn and succeed in school. However, it is often difficult to identify research-based interventions—whether those are programs, products, or practices—that have shown to be effective specifically for these students. The WWC will evaluate research on curricula and instructional strategies that are intended to improve achievement for students with learning disabilities in grades K–12 and provide educators with insight on these important questions:

• Which interventions improve achievement in reading, writing, math, science, or social studies? Which promote student progress?
• Are some interventions especially effective for certain subgroups of students with learning disabilities—students of different ages, for example, or students with particular learning disabilities, students of specific racial/ethnic groups, or English language learners?

Visit http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc/ to see the status of reviews of the research on interventions in this new topic area.