1. Charlie Greenwood, Elizabeth Spencer, Howard Goldstein, & Judy Carta Center for Response to Intervention in Early Childhood Division of Early Childhood October 30, 2012 Using Programmatic Research to Develop Feasible, Effective Language and Early Literacy Interventions http://www.crtiec.org

2. CRTIEC  IES Research and Development Center funded in 2008  Objectives  Conduct a focused program of research to develop and evaluate intensive interventions for preschool language and early literacy skills that supplement core instruction  Develop and validate an assessment system aligned with these interventions for universal screening and progress monitoring  Carry out supplementary research responsive to the needs of early childhood education and special education practitioners and policy makers.  Provide outreach and leadership  Annual Preschool RTI Summit  Website and Resources (http://www.critec.org)http://www.critec.org

3. 3 The Forest Friends

4. Acknowledgments  In addition to the authors, this work has been coordinated by: Gabriela Guerrero, along with Jane Atwater, Tracy Bradfield, Annie Hommel, Naomi Schneider, Sean Noe, Alisha Wackerle-Hollman, and a host of dedicated research assistants, students, and postdocs at University of Kansas, University of Minnesota, the Ohio State University, and the Dynamic Measurement Group.  We want to acknowledge the partnership of the many early education programs that collaborated with us on this important study.

5. Big Idea!  Studies Should Build on Each Other!  Research is a process where one conducts several studies programmatically to nail down an effect and reveal the extensions and limitations of an intervention (Robinson, 2004)

6. Today’s Topic: Programmatic Intervention Development Research  Overview (Greenwood)  Tier 2 Intervention Design Planning Phase: Goldstein/Spencer  Iterative Testing and Development Phase: Goldstein/Spencer  Efficacy and Effectiveness Phase: Greenwood/Goldstein  Implications/Discussion (Carta)

7. Challenges Young Children Face?  Many children enter kindergarten with limited oral language skills that place them at risk for later reading difficulties (Dickinson & Snow, 1997)  These children become struggling readers because they lack the necessary language and early literacy experiences needed to learn these skills prior to kindergarten.

8. What Should We Teach in Preschool?  Adequate early literacy experience before kindergarten enables children to acquire knowledge of two related domains of information needed to learn to read.  First, children need sources of information that will directly support their understanding of the meaning of print in school. 1. These are: vocabulary knowledge, oral language skills, language comprehension, and conceptual knowledge leading to reading comprehension (Biemiller, 2006).Biemiller, 2006  Second, children need familiarity with the alphabet, the ability to translate print into sounds and sounds into print (Treiman, Tincoff, & Richmond-Welty, 1997), and print awareness (Badian, 2000)Treiman, Tincoff, & Richmond-Welty, 1997Badian, 2000

9. Challenges Preschools Face?  The field continues struggling to improve instructional quality and outcomes for all children (Justice, Hamre, & Pianta, 2008; Greenwood, Carta, Atwater et al., 2012)  The field is just beginning to consider intentional instruction and differentiating instruction for individual children (NAEYC, DEC, & NHSA, 2012)  There is a lack of evidence-based Tier 2 and 3 interventions and aligned measurement tools for screening and progress monitoring (Greenwood, Bradfield et al., 2011)

10. Is There a Solution?: RTI and Multi-Tiered Support Systems  Universally screen frequently to identify children not making expected progress  Provide these children more intensive supplementary (Tier 2) or alternative (Tier 3) experiences  Monitor progress and adapt instructional support as needed  Improve the quality of Tier 1, core instruction in the language and early literacy

11. How is CRTIEC Approaching It?  Developing evidence-based practice through programmatic research?  Interventions developed teach skills with evidence that they are precursors of later learning to read  Interventions are delivered through practices containing effective components  Efficacy of the intervention is confirmed by testing in rigorously designed studies  Measures are developed with evidence of sensitivity, validity, accuracy, and reliability

12. IES Programmatic Research Goal 1Goal 2Goal 3Goal 4Goal 5 ExplorationDevelopment/ Innovation Efficacy/ Replication Scale UpMeasurement Explore the association between (a) education outcomes and alterable factors and (b) conditions that may mediate or moderate these relations Develop new interventions based on a theoretical framework through a process of test, evaluate, improve and retest (i.e., iterative development Evaluate fully developed interventions in authentic educational settings Evaluations to determine whether or not fully developed interventions are effective when they are implemented under conditions that would be typical if a school district or other education delivery setting were to implement them as routine practice Research to develop and validate (a) new measures and to (b) adapt and improve original measures for broader use in educational settings

13. Tier 2 Intervention: Design and Planning Phase

14. Tier 2 Embedded Storybook Interventions  As part of an RTI model, there is a need for high-quality interventions to improve early language and literacy skills for preschool children who are falling behind.  Overview of design and development work on interventions feasible for high fidelity implementation in preschool classrooms.  How findings from early efficacy studies have informed our development.

15. To effectively implement response to intervention in early childhood…

16. …how should we design Tier 2 interventions?

17. We need interventions that work in classrooms…

18. …and that don’t place additional demands on teachers.

19. Children learn best when we teach explicitly…

20. … and when we give children opportunities to respond.

21. So we designed an intervention.

22. Story Friends Program

23. Small groups of children participate in ‘listening centers.’

24. Prerecorded storybooks and explicit embedded lessons are delivered under headphones.

25. Multiple listens provide repeated exposures to instruction and many opportunities to respond. MONDAY TUESDAY WEDNESDAY

27. enormous, different brave, grin soaked, gorgeous reckless, ignore unusual, greet ill, discover leap, pause speedy, unique ridiculous, tumble

28. Narrator’s Script with Embedded Instruction

29. The Forest Friends are thrilled! They are excited to go to the carnival. Thrilled. Say thrilled. (2) Thrilled means excited. Tell me, what word means excited? (2) Thrilled! Good work! When are you thrilled? (2) What about… when you get a present! …Or your friends come over to play! I bet that makes you feel excited. Now, lift the flap. Look! These boys are at a birthday party. They are excited. They are thrilled! Tell me, what does thrilled mean? (3) Excited! That’s right.

30. Marquez Monkeys Around The friends all tried to help Ellie Elephant. Why did they help Ellie? (3) Because she couldn’t get out by herself. She was stuck! The friends were worried, so they worked together to get Ellie out.

31. Measures of instructional content are administered periodically.

32. Tier 2 Intervention: Iterative Testing and Development Phase

33. Timeline  Year 1, 2008-2009: intervention development  Year 2, 2009-2010: pilot study  Year 3, 2010-2011: early efficacy study with single case design, implemented by research staff  Year 4: 2011-2012: early efficacy study, group design with embedded single case design, implemented by research staff  Year 5: 2012-2013: efficacy trial with randomized cluster design, implemented by classroom staff

34. 2010-2011 Year 3 VC Early Efficacy Study

35. Participants  9 preschool children in 3 classrooms were identified with limited oral language skills in fall.  Multiple gating procedures for identification that included a teacher survey, Picture Naming IGDI 2.0, norm-referenced tests.

36. Characteristics of Participants PPVT-IV: M = 84.3, Range 78 – 96; CELF-P2: M = 86.4, Range 73 - 94

37. Method  Single-case repeated acquisition design  Intervention was 9 books with embedded vocabulary and comprehension lessons.  Implemented by research staff  Measures:  Mastery monitoring probes at pretest and posttest for each book  2 outcomes: Vocabulary and Comprehension

38. Mastery Monitoring Items and Scoring  Taught Vocabulary  Maximum score at pretest and posttest was 4  Untaught Vocabulary  Maximum score at pretest and posttest was 2  2 points possible per word  "Tell me, what does enormous mean?“ "Really big" 2 points “means a big building” 1 points “I don’t know” 0 points

39. Mastery Monitoring Items and Scoring  Comprehension  Maximum score at pretest and posttest was 6.  Three 2-point comprehension questions "At the end of the story, Ellie is happy. Why is Ellie happy?“ “Because she made new friends” 2 points “Because she likes playing” 1 point “Her big” 0 points

41. Year 3 Results: Vocabulary

42.  Average number of words learned (per child) = 8.11, Range 3 - 13  Average number of children who learned each word = 4.06, Range 0 – 8  Lowest “unusual” - no children learned  Highest “ill” – 8 children learned

43. Year 3 Results: Comprehension

44.  Criterion for treatment effect:  Pretest-posttest difference of at least 2  Treatment effects for most participants for many books (Range: 0 - 6 books).  Average gain score per book was 1.1 points (SD = 1.66, Range = -4 - 4)

45. We learned a lot…

46. …but there was still work to be done.

47. Revisions for Year 4  Replaced 5 words, rewrote 1 story, revised 7 embedded lessons.  Words that were replaced were the lowest performing words (e.g., unusual).  Lessons that were revised were for lower performing words and were based on observations from the facilitators.  EXAMPLE: picture for ‘ridiculous’ was changed from an illustration in the story to a photo of a ridiculous dog. (next slide)

49. Revisions for Year 4  Inclusion of simple unit review books  Repeat of lessons from a set of 3 books  Development of Unit Tests  Measure of vocabulary learning in 3 books plus a review book  Designed to be administered ~ once per month  Refinements to training materials, staff manuals, fidelity procedures, scoring reliability  Development of the Assessment of Story Comprehension

50. Year 4 Study  Randomized group design with embedded single case design  3 classrooms with 6 children in each, children randomly assigned to treatment or delayed treatment.  Intervention implemented by research staff

51. Year 4 Participants  N = 18; 11 girls, 7 boys  African American  Recruited from public pre-K settings  Identified as having limited oral language skills PPVT-IVCELF-P MRangeM Treatment83.4477-9089.1179-98 Comparison83.4478-8983.8967-96 No significant difference between groups on these measures.

52. Year 4 Measurement  Group Design  Unit Test of vocabulary words taught in 3 books  Assessment of Story Comprehension  Embedded Single Case Design  Mastery Monitoring Probes administered at pretest and posttest for each book.

53. Year 4 Results: Vocabulary

54.  ANOVA of gain scores for each Unit Test  Significant differences favoring the treatment group at each time point  Average gain of 4.44 – 6.33 points per Unit Test  Effect sizes between 1.37 – 2.84 Year 4 Results: Vocabulary

55. Word Level Data from Year 4  Average number of words learned (per child) = 10, Range 3-17  Average number of children who learned each word = 4.94, Range 4-8.  Lowest “enormous”, “brave”, “soaked”, comfort” “speedy” “ridiculous - 3 children learned  Highest “ill” – 8 children learned

56. Year 4 Results: Comprehension Assessment of Story Comprehension Treatment M (SD) Comparison M (SD) Effect Size (d) Pre-intervention5.22 (3.70)4.89 (4.51).08 Post Unit 16.89 (2.21)6.33 (4.69).15 Post Unit 28.11 (3.55)4.56 (3.13)1.06 Post Unit 39.78 (4.21)6.44 (4.19).80

57. Year 4 Results: Comprehension

58. Tier 2 Intervention: Efficacy and Effectiveness Phase

59. Efficacy and Effectiveness Phase  Kansas cross-site replication of the Tier 2 Ohio Vocabulary/Comprehension intervention  Can others using the same intervention replicate similar results with another group of children identified with weak skills?  Ohio produces original intervention and findings  Kansas seeks to replicate

60. Participants: 2010-11 Replication Sample(s) StateClassroomsChildrenNon-White Non- English Home Language Individual Education Program Ohio 39800 Kansas 39853 Total6181653 Note. Both samples were predominately non-White. The KS participants included dual language learners and students with IEPs

61. Student Risk Status at Start StateMeasureMRange OhioVocabulary IGDI (Max = 15)7.2 of 155-11 Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT) (M = 100, SD = 15) 84.378-96 Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals (CELF) (M = 100, SD = 15) 86.473-94 KansasVocabulary IGDI (Max = 15)7.3 of 155-13 Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT) (M = 100, SD = 15) 86.973-107 Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals (CELF) (M = 100, SD = 15) 72.650-102 Note. IGDI = Individual Growth and Development Indicator Lower Language

62. Design and Measurement  Repeated Acquisition Design across 9 storybooks  Vocabulary and Comprehension Mastery Monitoring  Before instruction in a storybook 1. Pre-test on Next Book’s Words  After instruction in the same storybook 1. Post-test of Mastery of this Book’s Words

63. Tier 2 Vocabulary and Comprehension Storybooks with Embedded Instruction Intervention

64. Organization of Replicaiton Results  Mean Results Across Storybooks  Mean acquisition of words taught and comprehension before and after the listening intervention across storybooks  Cumulative Word Mastery View  Students with the Best and Worst response to intervention  Overall Effect Size

66. Mean Cumulative Mastery of All Vocabulary Taught Mastery Goal

67. Least and Most Responsive Student

68. Overall Effect Sizes  Ohio Standard Mean Difference (SMD) 1 1. Vocabulary, d = 1.71 2. Comprehension, d = 0.59  Kansas Standard Mean Difference (SMD) 1. Vocabulary, d = 1.52 2. Comprehension, d = 0.57 Note. [d = ((X after – X before )/SD before )] Note. 1 Spencer et al. (in press)

69. Evidence Produced  The Vocabulary and Comprehension Tier 2 intervention was fully developed, implementable with fidelity  Efficacy was demonstrated in Kansas in replication by a different team in different schools, serving children with weak skills including some dual language learners and students with IEPs  A range of student response to the intervention was observed  Future work needs to focus on  achieving larger student effects  demonstrating similar findings with implementation by preschool personnel in larger samples

70. Year 5 Story Friends Efficacy Trial  2012-2013 school year, 24 classrooms in OH, 8 in KS  Cluster randomized design: classrooms randomly assigned to Treatment and Comparison  Treatment: Story Friends Program  Comparison: Story Friends books with no embedded interventions  Implemented by educational staff  Research staff provides assistance to teachers and administers assessments

71. Implications New evidence-based interventions are not developed in a single stand alone study! Instead, intervention development requires an iterative process that includes planning, piloting, evaluation, improvement and re- testing prior to testing at large scale.

72. Programmatic research: What did we learn along the way?  Pilot: Intervention was feasible.  Efficacy studies with single-case design in OH: Intervention produced weekly vocabulary gains across multiple children.  Replication of single case design studies in KS: Intervention resulted in the same effect (weekly vocabulary gains) in another location

73.  Efficacy group design with researchers as implementers: Children in intervention group did better than controls on standardized measures.  Efficacy group design with teachers as implementers: Children in intervention group did better than controls on standardized measures.  Next step: An independent evaluation of effectiveness showing that the intervention works.  At each step we learn something that we move forward to the next.

74. Value of Replication Studies  Replication helps us test whether the intervention is effective when implemented by different researchers; external validity of the intervention  Replication helps us see if intervention can systematically be changed and whether effects still hold up: How much can you vary an intervention and still see positive outcomes?  Replication is an important step prior to large scale up.  But replication studies are still fairly rare

75. Implications: Importance of Programmatic Research This type of programmatic research is important for at least three big reasons: It makes it more likely that only our strongest interventions will be going forward for large efficacy and effectiveness trials. It minimizes the risk of weak interventions being tested in large scale studies.

76.  It reinforces the idea that educational researchers should be aiming to nail down an intervention’s effect and extend the effect to different learning environments and student characteristics.