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Students may lack the motivation to read for many reasons, including inadequate access to interesting texts, limited encouragement to read for pleasure from adults, instructional practices that do not foster engagement in learning, or a history of reading failure. This article focuses on students with reading disabilities who may have a long-standing dislike of reading born of repeated negative experiences with learning to read. Motivating these students to read for pleasure may seem like an unattainable goal. However, past difficulties in reading do not necessarily mean that children will dislike reading forever. In conjunction with appropriate academic interventions, student interest in reading might be improved by motivational interventions aligned with a theoretical framework discussed in this article: (a) choosing interesting texts to read, (b) stimulating knowledge-based interest, and (c) enhancing task-based interest.

This study examined the print exposure of teacher candidates (N = 195) in relation to their GPAs, achievement in reading and writing on the SAT, and their self-ratings of their own early (K to Grade 5) reading experiences. Participants came from undergraduate and Masters programs in varied certification areas and from two different universities. Print exposure measures included author recognition tests for both fiction and nonfiction; a questionnaire about participants’ current voluntary reading habits for books, magazines, newspapers, and digital print media; and favorite authors/books questions. Exploratory factor analysis suggested four factors underlying the different print exposure measures: (1) fiction book reading volume; (2) current magazine and newspaper reading; (3) nonfiction book reading volume and (4) current book reading habits for enjoyment. Only fiction and nonfiction book reading volume related positively to participants’ achievement, in writing as well as reading, and to their early reading experience ratings. A subgroup of participants who had taken a specific reading methods course involving structured language content, and who had positive early reading experience self-ratings, had higher performance in the course than did participants with mixed or negative self-ratings, although the two groups did not differ in overall GPA. Findings support the view that different measures of print exposure tap somewhat different aspects of print exposure, with differing relationships to varied indicators of achievement. Results also support concerns about the reading volume and print exposure of some teacher candidates. © 2020, Springer Nature B.V.

Numerous research studies (e.g., Anderson, Kutash, & Duchnowski, 2001; Lane, Carter, Pierson, & Glaeser, 2006; Volpe, Dupaul, Jitendra, & Tresco, 2009; Wei, Blackorby, & Schiller, 2011) have shown that students with disabilities generally exhibit lower reading scores than their peers without disabilities. However, questions remain about the possibility of longitudinal differences among high-incidence disability classifications (e.g., speech/language impairments, SLI; emotional disturbances, ED; learning disabilities, LD; and attention deficit disorders, ADD). This study investigated growth patterns in reading achievement among middle school students from 5th to 8th grade with different high incidence disability classifications on one state's high-stakes assessment. After a repeated measures analysis of variance and post hoc testing, results reveal that students identified as LD and SLI evidenced more growth in reading than those classified as either ADD or ED. In light of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 legislation, findings about the various growth patterns are discussed with respect to policy, measurement, and practical implications. © 2016 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

In areas of emerging research, such as supporting teachers' classroom management, replication of research is critical to ensuring that recommendations for the field are based on sound science and appropriate for the contexts to which they are being applied. This article describes a replication of research on efficient professional development supports for teachers' classroom managements in a new context: high school classrooms. Data did not support a functional relation between teachers' use of specific praise and the targeted professional development and self-management in the high school setting. Results of this study highlight the critical importance of replication in education research. Based on our findings and our experience conducting this study, we suggest several possible adaptations may be necessary for successful replication at the high school level.

Classrooms are increasingly more diverse, and student success can be enhanced through family engagement, especially for culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students with disabilities. Too often teachers are stymied by how to engage CLD families of children with disabilities. Common practices of parent involvement are ineffective and fail to appreciate families as members of the educational team. Family engagement seeks to establish and maintain authentic family-school partnerships based on mutual respect and shared agency for student academic and social success. This column provides specific family engagement strategies that teachers and schools can implement in an effort to provide reciprocal collaboration.

General education teachers are challenged with meeting the unique instructional needs of every learner in their classrooms, which increasingly include English learners (ELs) and students with learning disabilities (LD). This article uses vignettes to demonstrate how a middle school content teacher uses five strategies: building prior knowledge, building vocabulary, explicit instruction, visual representation, and opportunities to respond to support his students. Each strategy is evidence based for ELs and for students who have an identified LD. Research supports that ELs and students with LD benefit from specific instructional strategies that enhance the accessibility of course content and potentially improve learning outcomes. © 2019, © 2019 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

Research suggests that English learners (ELs) with learning disabilities (LD) may benefit from culturally responsive evidence-based instructional approaches. ELs with LD often present with learning challenges that influence language acquisition and literacy development. One way to address the distinctive proclivities of these students is to consider the importance of culturally responsive evidence-based instruction that can elevate student understanding and academic achievement. This article explores the integration of two theoretical frameworks: culturally responsive practices and high-leverage practices. It then outlines the importance of teacher introspection as an instructional foundation and identifies several strategies for ELs with LD by centering instruction around linguistic assets and cultural values in combination with effective instructional practices. The article concludes with a call to action for teachers to tailor instruction based on students' cultural and language assets, in combination with effective instructional practices to enhance student learning.

Secondary school administrators increasingly include students with disabilities in general education classrooms with coteaching models. Theoretically, coteaching enables two educators to attend to the learning needs of students with disabilities while exposing them to grade-level content area instruction. However, our study on teachers’ perceptions of coteaching found that teachers often viewed their schools’ leadership decisions as adversely affecting their ability coteach effectively. The purpose of this article is to provide administrators with an overview of common coteaching models, summarize findings from our study on teachers’ perceptions of how their schools’ leadership influenced their coteaching practices, and provide a set of guiding questions to consider when seeking to support coteaching. © 2018 SAGE Publications.

As the world continues to ponder issues of equity and diversity, U.S. public schools face an expanding demographic divide between teachers and students. While diverse groups of public school students show an increase in population, the teaching workforce in the U.S. remains overwhelmingly White. The purpose of this systematic review is to examine how preservice teachers (PST) are being prepared to be culturally responsive. A total of 26 studies published between 2006 and 2020 were reviewed. The results indicate that PSTs’ learning experiences are varied and tend to be stand-alone approaches focused on changing the attitudes and beliefs of PSTs. Findings also bring to light the vagueness of terminology used in the research to define cultural groups of students, the conspicuous absence of studies related to LGBTQ+ populations, and the lack of study replications. Implications for future research are discussed.

BACKGROUND: In the 21st century, information technology (IT) literacy is crucial for all students, and may better prepare students with disabilities for transition to postsecondary employment or education. OBJECTIVE: In this study, the potential of IT literacy embedded into an online transition curriculum is explored in the context of secondary special education. The curriculum aligns with Common Core State Standards in English Language Arts that are relevant to reading comprehension, writing, as well as searching for and analyzing sources of information online. METHODS: A quasi-experimental pretest-posttest design was utilized in six high schools. RESULTS: Findings show that intervention group students improved in IT literacy; whereas, comparison group students did not make similar gains. CONCLUSION: Implications for embedding transition services into specific courses and curricula for secondary students with Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) are discussed. © 2017-IOS Press and the authors. All rights reserved.

In this study, the literature in disability and higher education was examined, with a specific focus on assessment instruments. Published articles (n = 203) on development of new or refinement of existing instruments were reviewed for traits measured and psychometric rigor reported. Findings showed instruments are intended for professionals and students, and of the student instruments, broad categories are academic, nonacademic, and specific to a disability diagnosis. Not all instruments are limited to students with disabilities; many of the reviewed instruments can be utilized in higher-education settings on all students, faculty, and staff, regardless of disability. The implications of the findings undergird the urgency to prioritize disability as a facet of diversity within higher-education scholarship, and furthermore aid this prioritization by providing a catalogue of robust instruments to researchers and practitioners.

This study reports practices implemented in over 2,000 minutes by 16 middle school special education and general education co-teaching pairs in English language arts classes. We report the extent to which teachers integrated literacy activities that support reading comprehension, the co-teaching models used, and the frequency with which each teacher led instruction. We also report the types of grouping structures teachers used and the extent to which teachers interacted with students with disabilities. Finally, we report the types of text used. Observations revealed that more than half of time spent on literacy activities involved reading aloud or silently with no co-occurring literacy instruction that supports reading comprehension. Students with disabilities spent a majority of their time in whole-class instruction or working independently with little teacher interaction. Special education teachers spent most of their time supporting whole-class instruction led by the content-area teacher. Implications and directions for future research are provided.