Teacher Quality – Reading and Writing

Publications Emerging From Research Funded through the National Center for Education Research as of September 30, 2009

This document contains a list of publications (as of September 30, 2009) that have resulted from the more than 400 research grants funded through IES/NCER since 2002.

The publications, intended for both the scientific community as well the general public, are on topics spanning from basic translational research to the evaluation of state education policies. The list will be updated regularly to include new articles as they are published, so please check our website periodically for updated material.

The document would be a lot more valuable with abstracts and links included

For example, here is one section of the report, with abstracts and/or links to full text added for several articles:



Teacher Quality – Reading and Writing

FY 2003

Institution: Haskins Laboratories
Principal Investigator: Susan Brady
Project Title: Mastering Reading Instruction: A Professional Development Project for First Grade Teachers
Grant: R305M030099
Brady, S., Gillis, M., Smith, T., Lavalette, M., Liss-Bronstein, L., Lowe, E., North, W., Russo, E., and Wilder, T.D. (2009). First Grade Teachers' Knowledge of Phonological Awareness and Code Concepts: Examining Gains From an Intensive Form of Professional Development. Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 22(4): 425-455.

The study examined the efficacy of an intensive form of professional development (PD) for building the knowledge of first-grade teachers in the areas of phonological awareness and phonics. The PD featured frequent in-class support from highly knowledgeable mentors for one school year, in addition to an introductory two-day summer institute and monthly workshops. Pre- and post-assessment of participants on a Teacher Knowledge Survey (TKS) indicated weak knowledge of phonological awareness and phonics concepts prior to PD and large, significant gains in each area by year-end. In addition, to investigate factors potentially associated with teachers’ responses to training, a Teacher Attitude Survey (TAS) was administered before and after the PD. The TAS measured teachers’ attitudes regarding PD, external and internal motivation to participate, intentions to actively engage in learning and implementing new instructional methods, sense of self-efficacy as reading instructors, and premises about reading instruction (e.g., about whole language). Attitudes on a subset of these factors, teachers’ initial knowledge scores on the TKS, and years of teaching experience (estimated by age) accounted for significant portions of the variance in performance on the TKS after training.

http://www.springerlink.com/content/jw768g75314484u5/fulltext.pdf

Institution: Instructional Research Group
Principal Investigator: Gersten, Russell
Project Title: Teacher Quality Study: An Investigation of the Impact of Teacher Study Groups as a Means to Enhance the Quality of Reading Instruction for First Graders in High Poverty Schools in Two States
Grant: R305M030052

Dimino, J., and Taylor, M.J. (in press). Learning How to Improve Vocabulary Instruction through Teacher Study Groups. Baltimore: Paul H. Brookes.
Gersten, R., Dimino, J., and Jayanthi, M. (2007). Towards the Development of a Nuanced Classroom Observational System for Studying Comprehension and Vocabulary Instruction. In B. Taylor and J. Ysseldyke (Eds.), Educational Interventions for Struggling Readers (pp. 381-425). New York: Teachers College Press.

http://www.sree.org/conferences/2009/pages/abstracts/052_development.doc


Institution: University of Michigan
Principal Investigator: Joanne Carlisle
Project Title: Identifying Key Components of Effective Professional Development in Reading for First-Grade Teachers and Their Students
Grant: R305M030090

Carlisle, J.F., Cortina, K.S., and Katz, L.A. (in press). First-Grade Teachers Response to Three Models of Professional Development in Reading. Reading and Writing Quarterly.

FY 2004

Institution: Florida State University
Principal Investigator: Douglas Harris
Project Title: Assessing Teacher Effectiveness: How Can We Predict Who Will Be a High Quality Teacher?
Grant: R305M040121

Harris, D., and Rutledge, S. (forthcoming).Models and Predictors of Teacher Effectiveness: A Review of the Evidence With Lessons From (and For) Other Occupations. Teachers College Record.
Rutledge, S., and Harris, D. (2008). Certify, Blink, Hire: An Examination of the Process and Tools of Teacher Selection. Leadership and Policy in Schools, 7(3): 237-263.
While much has been written about the process of employee selection in other occupations, there has been little discussion on the process and tools of teacher selection and why it occurs as it does. To understand this question, we conduct an extensive literature review in which we compare teacher hiring with hiring in other occupations. We also present findings from a study of school principals and district administrators in a midsized Florida school district. Our results suggest that the screening and selection process in teaching is not much different from occupations that have similar levels of job complexity. A theory emerges from the review and analysis that explains the process and reliance on certain tools in teacher hiring. The theory focuses especially on the costs of various tools and processes, the types and quality of information that come from them, and the distinctive features of teaching as an occupation and schools as organizations.
Harris, D. (2008). The Policy Uses and Policy Validity of Value-Added and Other Teacher Quality Measures. In D.H. Gitomer (Ed.), Measurement Issues and the Assessment of Teacher Quality. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.
http://www.teacherqualityresearch.org/policy.pdf

Harris, D., and Sass, T. (2007). Teacher Training, Teacher Quality, and Student Achievement. National Center for the Analysis of Longitudinal Data in Education Research (CALDER). Working Paper #3. Washington, DC: Urban Institute.

http://www.caldercenter.org/PDF/1001059_Teacher_Training.pdf

Institution: Purdue University
Principal Investigator: Douglas Powell
Project Title: Professional Development in Early Reading (Classroom Links to Early Literacy)
Grant: R305M040167

Diamond, K.E., Gerde, H.K., and Powell, D.R. (2008). Development in Early Literacy Skills During the Pre-Kindergarten Year in Head Start: Relations Between Growth in Children’s Writing and Understanding of Letters. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 23: 467-478.
Powell, D.R., Diamond, K.E., Bojczyk, K.E., and Gerde, H.K. (2008). Head Start Teachers’ Perspectives on Early Literacy. Journal of Literacy Research, 40: 422-460.
Gerde, H.K., and Powell, D.R. (in press). Teacher Education, Book-Reading Practices, and Children’s Language Growth Across One Year of Head Start. Early Education and Development.

Institution: RAND
Principal Investigator: Richard Buddin
Project Title: Teacher Licensure Tests and Student Achievement
Grant: R305M040186

Buddin, R., and Zamaro, G. Teacher Quality, Teacher Licensure Tests, and Student Achievement (WR-555-IES). Santa Monica, CA: RAND Education Working Paper.
Le, Vi-Nhuan, and Buddin, R. (2005). Examining the Validity Evidence for California Teacher Licensure Exams (WR 334-EDU). Santa Monica, CA: RAND Education.


FY 2005

Institution: Florida State University
Principal Investigator: Alysia Roehrig
Project Title: Identifying the Conditions Under Which Large Scale Professional Development Policy Initiatives Are Related to Teacher Knowledge, Instructional Practices, and Student Reading Outcomes
Grant: R305M050122
Roehrig, A.D., Turner, J.E., Grove, C.M., Schneider, N., and Liu, Z. (in press). Degree of Alignment Between Beginning Teachers' Practices and Beliefs About Effective Classroom Practices. The Teacher Educator .
Roehrig, A.D., Duggar, S.W., Moats, L., Glover, M., and Mincey, B. (2008). When Teachers Work to Use Progress Monitoring Data to Inform Literacy Instruction: Identifying Potential Supports and Challenges. Remedial and Special Educatio, 29: 364-382.
Roehrig, A.D., Bohnb, C.M., Turner, J.E., and Pressley, M. (2008). Mentoring Beginning Primary Teachers for Exemplary Teaching Practices. Teaching and Teacher Education, 24: 684-702.

http://www.fcrr.org/science/pdf/Roehrig/Roehrig_Mentoring.pdf


Institution: University of Michigan
Principal Investigator: Joanne Carlisle
Project Title: Assesssment of Pedagogical Knowledge of Teachers of Reading
Grant: R305M050087

Carlisle, J.F., Cortina, K.S., and Katz, L.A. (in press). First-Grade Teachers’ Response to Three Models of Professional Development in Reading. Reading and Writing Quarterly.

Institution: University of Texas, San Antonio
Principal Investigator: Misty Sailors
Project Title: Teaching Teachers to Teach Critical Reading Strategies (CREST).through an Intensive Professional Development
Grant: R305M050021
Sailors, M. (2007). Supporting Teachers Through an Intensive Professional Development Model. In Supporting Student Success. Corpus Christi, TX: CEDER Yearbook.
Sailors, M. (in press). Improving Comprehension Instruction through Quality Professional Development. In S.E. Israel and G.G. Duffy (Eds.), Handbook of Research on Reading Comprehension. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

FY 2008

Institution: National Bureau of Economic Research
Principal Investigator: Jesse Rothstein
Project Title: Value-Added Models and the Measurement of Teacher Quality: Tracking or Causal Effects?
Grant: R305A080560

Rothstein, Jesse (2008). Teacher Quality in Educational Production: Tracking, Decay, and Student Achievement. National Bureau of Economic Reasearch Working Paper 14442.

http://www.princeton.edu/~jrothst/workingpapers/rothstein_VAM.pdf


Institution: University of Pittsburgh
Principal Investigators: Linda Kucan and Annemarie Sullivan Palincsar
Project Title: The Iterative Design of Modules to Support Reading Comprehension Instruction
Grant: R305A080005

Kucan, L., Palincsar, A.S., Khasnabis, D., and Chang, C. (in press). The Video Viewing Task: a Source of Information for Assessing and Addressing Teacher Understanding of Text-Based Discussion. Teaching and Teacher Education.