Investing Equity Funding in Early Literacy

Background
The author of this study cited three purposes:

• to determine the effectiveness of Reading Recovery as an appropriate early literacy intervention for children in schools receiving equity funding
• to see if Reading Recovery closes the literacy gap for poor minority children
• to determine whether the intervention is a worthwhile expenditure

Two groups of children from 15 schools in three New Jersey school districts received a full Reading Recovery program. The sample included 43 low SES African American students and 52 low SES Hispanic students. The children’s achievement was measured in fall and spring by two tasks on the Observation Survey of Early Literacy Achievement—the Text Reading Level and Hearing and Recording Sounds in Words.

Findings
Both African American and Hispanic students began Reading Recovery lessons with below-grade level performance (Stanine 3 on Hearing and Recording Sounds in Words and Stanine 1 on Text Reading). At the end of Grade 1, both groups scored well within the average range on both tasks at Stanine 7.

Comments
The author concluded that Reading Recovery does demonstrate an investment that reduces the achievement gap of disadvantaged urban children.

This abstract first appeared in Schmitt, M. C., Askew, B. J., Fountas, I. C., Lyons, C. A., & Pinnell, G. S. (2005). Changing Futures: The Influence of Reading Recovery in the United States. Worthington, OH: Reading Recovery Council of North America.