Improving the Reading Achievement of Language Minority and Disadvantaged Youth At Risk of Academic Failure
Bibliographic record
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Variability in individuals' response to intervention can contribute to smaller intervention effects. Integration of quantitative and qualitative findings can be instrumental in elucidating person-level and broader contextual issues related to differential intervention efficacy and inform overall intervention utility. In order to assess ecological factors implicated in differential response to intervention, three studies were conducted that together comprised a comprehensive program evaluation of the Vocabulary Learning Project, a manualized reading intervention targeting the vocabulary and reading comprehension skills of academically at-risk language-minority and economically disadvantaged high-school aged youth. METHODS: A sequential embedded quasi-experimental mixed methods research design consisting of three distinct yet interrelated phases was used. Across the three research phases, mixed analyses of variance, hierarchical linear regression and multi-case study analyses were conducted to assess intervention effects, factors predictive of outcome gains and contextual factors differentiating outcomes, respectively. RESULTS: Findings from the first two studies indicated that the intervention was differentially effective based on multiple factors at various contextual levels. At the person-level context, pre-intervention language comprehension skills, pre-intervention motivation to read, achievement orientation, academic self-concept and sense of future aspirations were implicated factors. At the intervention program level, investment in positive program outcomes, tutoring group climate and participant resourcefulness were identified factors. Within the peer and family social context, reliance on peers and nature of parental support were differentiating factors. At the broader school, community and cultural context, school perceptions, school and community engagement, as well as youths’ sense of cultural identity were factors that differentiated program effects. Findings from the third, integrative study resulted in the identification of a unifying meta-theme of motivation as a key factor underlying the differential responses to the VLP intervention. CONCLUSIONS: Consideration of the multiple contexts navigated by culturally and linguistically diverse youth is critical for maximizing intervention effects. IMPACT: This study provides multiple insights about opportunities worthy of consideration in optimally designing instructional interventions targeting marginalized youth populations in the Canadian context, and suggests a useful methodological approach for evaluating such programs.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.003 | 0.006 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".