Students from dual language immersion (DLI) classrooms are required to learn the language through content. However, some students have not yet developed these abilities by the time they start fourth grade. Thus, to fully comprehend content such as science, students need stronger reading and writing abilities in the second language (L2). To help stakeholders have a better understanding on how to effectively help students throughout this process, this action research studied the effectiveness of integrating literacy with science and mobile assisted language learning (MALL). Findings showed that the integrations of literacy, science and MALL were effective with statistically significant results in science and reading. These findings also yielded pedagogical implications about the importance of considering students' language background and gender, as well as the use of MALL when teaching and planning the curriculum for DLI classrooms.

Increasing students' reading comprehension involves the use of targeted strategies and effective instruction. Previous research has shown that instruction in individual skills such as vocabulary acquisition, reading fluency, writing, and story mapping help increases students' reading comprehension. However, few studies have explored combining these skills and their cumulative effects, if any, on reading comprehension. The purpose of this quasi-experimental secondary analysis study was to examine the effects of adding a reading comprehension instruction package (RCIP), which includes vocabulary acquisition, reading fluency, and writing, to instruction in story mapping alone. Constructivist theory was used as the theoretical framework for this study. Purposeful sampling was used to recruit 8 students with low reading achievement as indicated by their performances on the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test. The single-case, multiple-probe design across subjects was used to intermittently collect data, which were the correct responses per 3 minutes using the Curriculum Based Measure-Reading Maze. The data were visually analyzed by looking at data points and trend lines directionality using the percentage nonoverlapping data along with the Cohen's d effect size. Although this study showed mixed results and were not statistically significant, it could still contribute to positive social change. The findings have a small to medium effect size impact on students' reading comprehension; 3 out of 4 students who completed the study surpassed their expected goal. The results from this study may provide teachers with tools for improving the foundational reading skills of struggling readers, thus enabling their students to succeed in school and become productive members of society.

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The purpose of this study was to increase knowledge about how teachers view the importance of reading lessons in year one. The study also examined how teachers practically work with reading homework and how these teachers felt that it benefited the students' reading development. The study was conducted using semi-structured qualitative interviews with eight teachers working in primary school. All teachers who participated in the study are certifiedteachers to teach Swedish in primary school. The study is based on the socio-cultural perspective and pragmatism. Which means that students learn best in connection between theory and practice and where language is in focus. The results showed that the teachers who participated agreed that the ultimate purpose of the reading homework is to increase the students' reading fluency with the help of mass training. The teachers consider the reading homework necessary in year one. Repetitive reading is presented as an important aspect in students' early reading learning by both research and teachers. Reasons why teachers choose to work with reading homework differ somewhat. But the time aspect in school is something that teachers are critical of. The result shows that the teachers mean a certain reading must take place at home. Because of this the reading homework is considered a good aid by the teachers.

This study explores the effects of different methods employed by language teachers, namely assisted repeated reading (Taguchi, Gorsuch, Takayasu-Maass, & Snipp, 2012) and morphological and syntactic explanation (Tong, Deacon, & Cain, 2013), to improve language learners' reading fluency and reading comprehension, respectively. Volunteers from students enrolled in Japanese 301 through 322 classes at Brigham Young University (BYU) participated in this study. The participants (a) submitted a background questionnaire and consent form, (b) attended a one-hour session in the testing lab, and (c) attended a second one-hour session in the testing lab. Each testing session consisted of the participants making a pre- and post- reading recording and taking reading comprehension tests for two separate reading scripts. Each participant submitted a total of eight reading recordings and eight sets of answers to five reading comprehension questions. The reading texts were chosen from 3-kyu (3rd level of 5, which was deemed to be intermediate by the researcher) of the Japanese Language Proficiency test (JLPT), with a minor modification. Each recording and answer sheet submission was then graded and recorded. The differences between the pre- and post-test scores were then examined to determine the effectiveness of each treatment employed. The treatments included were: (a) assisted repeated reading, (b) assisted repeated reading followed by morphological and syntactic explanation, (c) morphological and syntactic explanation, and (d) morphological and syntactic explanation followed by assisted repeated reading. The analysis of the resultant data revealed that although there was a statistically significant increase in scores for each of the methods and there were differences in the scores between the different methods, there was not a significant difference between the methods. However, one of the important implications that can be drawn from this study is that a short fluency-building exercise of 2-5 minutes can yield significant gains in the language learners, in both reading fluency and in reading comprehension.

Many children in low-income areas are failing in schools, frequently due to substandard reading skills. Research has shown that early intervention can help alleviate this problem. However, most early intervention strategies are very expensive and labor intensive for school personnel. Furthermore, it is often not clear what programs will work with a certain student population due to their widely diverse backgrounds. In low-income schools, parents are often an ignored resource. Many teachers complain about lack of parent involvement, and yet most do nothing to solicit it. Using parents to help provide beginning reading practice for their children could be a way to involve families in the school and help children gain vital reading skills. This study investigated the effects of parent training in a fluency reading method called “Paired Reading” among low-income first grade students. A one-hour training sessions was offered at two different times to the parents of four first grade classes in an urban elementary school. Thirty-one participated. The children of these parents constituted the experimental group. This group was pretested and posttested to assess reading fluency, sight word recognition and reading attitudes. Forty-one students at a neighboring elementary school acted as the control group for this study. Qualitative interviews were also conducted on experimental group parents and teachers. The results indicated significant gains in reading fluency, sight word recognition and attitudes about reading. Also, there was a significant relationship between the minutes a child spent practicing Paired Reading with the parent and the amount of improvement the child made. Interview data suggested that parents welcomed this type of training session and enjoyed doing the activities with their children. Unfortunately, the interview data also indicated that teachers were negative about the efficacy of parent training sessions and had no immediate plans to implement such classes.

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