What did the implementation using SSR for reading instruction look like?
Sandra: Students entering the program at the lowest level of instruction were randomly assigned to one of the two conditions: control or intervention. Random assignment is important to experimental research so that differing student characteristics (in our case, age, gender, prior education, and work status), do not disproportionally affect the results in either condition. Random assignment distributes students with these characteristics between the two conditions. Whichever condition the students were placed in at intake they stayed with for the entire year. From their perspective, their instruction didn’t change; a given student had either SSR [intervention] or skills-based instruction [control] all year. The teachers, however, changed; the other teacher/research associate, Dominique, taught the SSR group in the fall and winter quarters while I was teaching the control group, using our skills-based approach to reading. For the spring and summer quarters, we switched. This prevented f
