Professional development for teachers has historically been fairly didactic in nature (Garet et al., 2001; Rose & Church, 1998), which is believed to limit effectiveness and translation to teacher practice change (Fixsen, Naoom, Blase, Friedman, & Wallace, 2005). One well-established program with a more active, collaborative training…

"Un Buen Comienzo" [A Good Start] was a professional development program implemented with prekindergarten and kindergarten teachers in Chilean public schools serving low-income families. In a randomized trial, the program showed moderate to large impacts on classroom quality but no impacts on targeted child outcomes. To unpack these…

The purpose of the present study was to examine the effects of a program that offered sustained strategic reading instruction on reading abilities of third and fourth graders. The study was conducted among 1,469 children from 40 schools in the Netherlands. Schools were randomly assigned to either the experimental or control group. Multilevel…

In Belize, the percentage of untrained teachers (i.e. teachers with the equivalent of a high school education or less) is one of the highest in the region of Latin America and the Caribbean. In response to growing student cohorts, the increased demand for more classroom teachers has led to significant decrease in the proportion of trained teachers…

The Teacher Effectiveness Enhancement Programme (TEEP) is a CPD programme that aims to improve teachers' classroom practice. TEEP training is offered as a whole-school approach by the Schools, Students and Teachers Network (SSAT). All staff in a school received three days of training over a period of two terms. A smaller cohort of teachers, chosen…

This paper presents research that explores similarities and differences across six randomized controlled trials of learning communities in community colleges that were conducted by MDRC and the National Center for Postsecondary Research. Five of these studies track students' progress in the program semester and two follow-up semesters, and one…

Previously, we adapted the Home Situations Questionnaire to measure behavioral non-compliance in everyday settings in children with pervasive developmental disorders. In this study, we further revised this instrument for use in autism spectrum disorder and examined its psychometric properties (referred to as the Home Situations…

Not all children begin kindergarten ready to learn. Young children who exhibit dysregulated or disruptive behavior in the classroom have fewer opportunities to learn and consequently achieve lower levels of academic skills (Arnold et al., 2006; Raver, Garner, & Smith-Donald, 2007). A growing body of literature has examined how children's…

This study examines changes in parent support and child emergent literacy skills over time as children moved from Head Start into kindergarten. It compares the transactional parent-child influences in families randomly assigned in Head Start to receive an enriched home visiting program that emphasized parents as teachers relative to a control…

The Summer Active Reading Programme aimed to improve reading skills and particularly comprehension by raising children's engagement in, and enjoyment of, reading at the transition from primary school to secondary school. The programme was delivered by Booktrust, an independent charity that aims to change lives through engaging people with reading.…

The ESEA Blueprint for Reform states that teachers need "effective, ongoing, job-embedded, professional development that is targeted to student and school needs… [and] aligned with evidence of improvements in student learning." Unfortunately, the professional development approaches advocated, though sensible and compelling in theory,…

Most school principals believe recess has a positive impact on the development of students' social skills and academic achievement. Research also suggests that physical activity and play during recess may be linked to improvements in both academic and prosocial behaviors (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2010). Recess, however, has been…

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of an early numeracy preventative Tier 2 intervention on the mathematics performance of first-grade students with mathematics difficulties. Researchers used a pretest-posttest control group design with randomized assignment of 139 students to the Tier 2 treatment condition and 65 students to…