Early Literacy and Math

Literacy tutoring is one of the most effective strategies for improving student literacy achievement. However, it can be difficult to scale and one approach to increase access is to provide virtual tutoring. While evidence demonstrating the effectiveness of in-person tutoring is strong, evidence for virtual tutoring is limited. YPL is partnering with MDRC and Reading Partners, a national organization that uses volunteer tutors to provide literacy tutoring to elementary students, to evaluate the effects of two delivery models of their tutoring program. Our evaluation assesses the impact of an i...

Many states (including Michigan) have instituted laws requiring support or retention for students who do not meet grade-level expectations in reading at the end of third grade. The Youth Policy Lab received funding from the American Education Research Association to look at the effects of North Carolina’s Read to Achieve law. The analysis looked at medium term academic outcomes and focused on effects for English Language Learners, a growing population in North Carolina and elsewhere in the U.S.

When early high-quality math instruction is aligned across grades, it can have a positive effect on children’s math skills, attitudes toward math, and working memory. However, evidence-based pre-K learning trajectories and instructional practices are not typically integrated into the curriculum for the early elementary grades. This lack of integration can have negative results: Children may encounter the same content more than once from pre-K to kindergarten through third grade. Conversely, the math instruction they receive may not cover the areas or progression of learning that research says ...

High-quality early learning programs boost children's kindergarten readiness and effects can last into adulthood. However, defining and measuring quality is difficult and expensive. Classroom video observations are a classic method used by education researchers to understand how the instructional environment relates to student learning. Although videos provide rich context on what occurs in the classroom, they require a significant amount of human labor and time to accurately code, which can lead to delays in acquiring information. Moreover, early education researchers have found that construc...

The Youth Policy Lab partnered with colleagues at the University of Connecticut and Michigan State University to conduct a meta-analysis of Early Science Interventions over the past twenty years. This research was designed to provide information about the features of science interventions that are most effective at improving teacher and student learning for young students.

High 5s is a kindergarten small-group math enrichment program, developed at the University of Michigan with the help of MDRC and leading early childhood math experts Doug Clements and Julie Sarama.. A rigorous evaluation of the out-of-classroom model showed positive impacts of the program on student outcomes, and feasibility research of the in-classroom model suggests that it can be implemented in a variety of settings and is well-received by school staff. The kindergarten program is available for district use now. The team is looking for opportunities to extend the curriculum to include grade...