Early Years and School Readiness:
Evaluating a Scientifically-based Language Development Instructional Program

Our study focused on the research priorities of school readiness in literacy through the development and implementation of an innovative early childhood language learning program – the Phonemic and Phonics Instructional Program (PPIP). We evaluated this program to demonstrate its capacity to improve early learning. The primary research question was to determine whether a scientifically based language development instructional program would yield higher scores on school readiness measurement instruments in the specific knowledge areas of identifying letters of the alphabet, attaching sounds to letters and rhyming words for children aged 3 + years entering an elementary school program.

The evaluation assessed the impact of the PPIP on six outcome measures that predict future literacy competence, Name Assessment (NA), Upper Case Letter Identification (UCLI), Lower Case Letter Identification (LCLI), Lower Case Sound Identification (LCSI), Rhyming Words (RW) and Matching First Sounds (MFS). The results showed a significant pre-post interaction effect depending on whether a child was a member of the instruction or control group for five of the six outcome measures; namely, UCLI, LCLI, LCSI, RW and MFS. The instruction group scored higher than the control group on all five of the abovementioned measures. We should note that the control group also showed significant gains from the pre-test to post-test for NA, UCLI, and LCLI.  Overall, the results suggest that the instructional program had a significant, positive impact in improving the pre-reading literacy skills of pre-Kindergarten children in a short period of time, compared to no instruction. This was especially true for LCSI, RW and MFS.

The findings of this evaluation lead us to conclude that the PPIP has the potential to improve school readiness by producing higher scores on school readiness measures in the knowledge areas of identifying letters of the alphabet and attaching sounds to letters and words for children aged 3+ years who are about to enter an elementary school program. Further, the program is easy to deliver and can be implemented by an instructor with little or no formal instructional training.

Given this, the program should be made available to all child care centres in Canada and to any other pre-school programs that serve children in the targeted age group.

Final Report

Aknowledgements
The Upper Canada Leger Centre for Education and Training gratefully acknowledges the Canadian Council on Learning (CCL) for their support in funding this initiative.

For further information please contact:
Claude Lauzon
Robert Coughlin