Are Reading Interventions Effective for At-Risk Readers with ADHD? A Meta-Analysis.

OBJECTIVE: Utilizing a multi-level meta-analytic approach, this review is the first to systematically quantify the efficacy of reading interventions for school-aged children with ADHD and identify potential factors that may increase the success of reading-related interventions for these children. METHOD: 18 studies (15 peer-reviewed articles, 3 dissertations) published from 1986 to 2020 (N = 564) were meta-analyzed. RESULTS: Findings revealed reading interventions are highly effective for improving reading skills based on both study-developed/curriculum-based measures (g = 1.91) and standardized/norm-referenced achievement tests (g = 1.11) in high-quality studies of children with rigorously-diagnosed ADHD. Reading interventions that include at least 30 hours of intervention targeting decoding/phonemic awareness meet all benchmarks to be considered a Level 1 (Well-Established) Evidence-Based Practice with Strong Research Support for children with ADHD based on clinical and special education criteria. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings collectively indicate that reading interventions should be the first-line treatment for reading difficulties among at-risk readers with ADHD.

Does preschool children's self-regulation moderate the impacts of instructional activities? Evidence from a randomized intervention study.

There is strong evidence linking children's self-regulation with their academic and behavioral outcomes. These relations have led to the development of interventions aimed at improving academic outcomes by promoting self-regulation, based in part on the idea that self-regulation promotes the development of academic skills. Although a considerable number of studies have examined the degree to which interventions designed to improve aspects of self-regulation have a positive impact on academic outcomes, only a few studies have examined the degree to which children's self-regulation moderates the effects of academic interventions. The goal of this study was to examine whether self-regulation, indexed by a direct assessment of executive function and teacher-rated attention, moderated the uptake of early literacy interventions for 184 children (average age = 58 months, SD = 3.38; 66% Black/African American, 28% White; 59% male) at risk for reading difficulties who participated in a randomized controlled trial examining the efficacy of Tier 2 interventions in preschool. Multilevel models were used to examine the degree to which children's self-regulation moderated the impacts of the interventions. The results of this study provided little evidence that self-regulation moderated the impacts of the interventions and call into question the likelihood of a causal relation between self-regulation and academic achievement.

Examining the Relations between Preschooler's Externalizing Behaviors and Academic Performance Using an S-1 Bifactor Model.

Externalizing behaviors are associated with poor academic outcomes in community-based samples of children as young as preschool-age. However, there remains debate as to which specific externalizing dimensions link externalizing behaviors to early academic skills. Recently, research has supported the use of S-1 bifactor models to examine the hierarchical structure of externalizing behaviors and the unique relations between externalizing factors and academic impairment in samples of school-age children. The primary goals of this study were to extend the age range at which S-1 bifactor models are applied to externalizing behaviors and to determine if factors derived from an S-1 bifactor model had differing relations to early academic skills. In this study, the early academic skills of 1,356 preschool-age children (mean age = 49.98 months; SD = 8.08) were assessed, and preschool and childcare teachers rated children's externalizing behaviors. Results indicated that an S-1 bifactor model with a Hyperactive-Impulsive reference factor yielded the best-fitting model for preschool-age children's externalizing behaviors. Structural models revealed that both the Hyperactive-Impulsive reference factor and the Inattention factor uniquely predicted preschool children's early academic skills. The degree to which the results applied across the primary groups in the sample (i.e., White versus Black/African American children, girls versus boys) was examined for measurement and structural models.