The Impact of Two Professional Development Interventions on Early Reading Instruction and Achievement

The report describes the effectiveness of two specific professional development strategies in improving the knowledge and practice of 2nd grade teachers in high-poverty schools and the reading achievement of their students. Both the 8-day content-focused institutes series (treatment A) and the institute series plus in-school coaching (treatment B) produced positive impacts on teachers’ knowledge of scientifically based reading instruction and on one of the three instructional practices promoted by the professional development. However, neither intervention resulted in significantly higher student test scores at the end of the one-year implementation period. The institute series plus in-school coaching did not produce a significantly greater impact on teacher practice than the institute series alone.