at Austin. His research focuses on evidence-based reading interventions for students with learning disabilities, professional development for special educators, developing curriculum-based measurement, and conducting secondary data analysis.

To address the needs of a diverse group of students with reading difficulties, a majority of researchers over the last decade have designed and implemented multicomponent reading interventions (MCRIs) that provide instruction in multiple areas of reading yielding mixed results. The current study evaluates whether students’ baseline word reading skills predict their response to a MCRI. Data from a randomized controlled trial for third- and fourth-grade students with reading difficulties ( N = 128) were analyzed. Results demonstrate that baseline word reading was a significant predictor of students’ end-of-year reading comprehension performance. Treatment group students who had lower baseline word reading compared with those students with comparatively higher word reading scores performed significantly lower on posttest reading comprehension. Findings denote the importance of word reading instruction for upper elementary students who are below-average word readers and also indicate the need for tailoring reading intervention to align with individual reader needs.

Students who report high levels of intrinsic motivation (IM) perform better on academic tasks compared with students who report low levels of IM. However, there is a paucity of data on IM for several disability categories (e.g., intellectual disability). The focus of this study was to use a nationally representative sample of students with disabilities to understand whether teachers’ perceptions of students’ academic IM varied by disability categories. Correlation and regression models were used to determine factors that influenced teachers’ perceptions of academic IM for students with disabilities. Controlling for external factors, such as parental expectation of their child’s academic career and teachers’ pedagogical competence, attenuated gaps in teacher perception of student IM between students with intellectual disability and learning disability. Including student classroom collaboration variables such as frequency of participation in peer work and classroom discussion to the model reduced disparities in teacher-perceived academic IM between students with autism and learning disabilities.

No abstract

This review examined the effects of self-questioning (SQ) strategy instruction on reading comprehension outcomes for students with learning disabilities and struggling readers in Grades K-12. Our literature search, encompassing the past 53 years (1965–2018) of research, found 10 studies that fit our inclusion criteria. Reviewed studies included eight group design and two single-case design studies. Overall, the effects of SQ strategy instruction on students’ reading comprehension outcomes were mixed. No clear trends of the effects of SQ strategy intervention were associated with participants’ grade level and type of instruction (explicit or nonexplicit instruction). Effects of the total number of hours of SQ strategy instruction on students’ reading outcomes varied slightly with medium to large effects for students receiving two or more total hours of strategy instruction.