An effective strategy in Costa Rica: The potential prevention of academic difficulties through quality, research-based practice

This dissertation is composed of three articles on early literacy development that describe research conducted in Costa Rica. They underscore the importance of the prevention of academic difficulties through quality preschool and elementary education. The first paper demonstrates that there is a direct relationship between future repetition in first grade and lack of emergent literacy skills and reading difficulties and provides surprising results from teacher interviews, which indicate that teachers make children repeat based on reading difficulties and/or perceived lack of family support, this second factor indicating subjectivity in the decision of who should repeat. The second paper describes current educational practice and student achievement at the preschool level, concluding that developmentally appropriate work on emergent literacy skills is not being done, that the general focus is on socialization and not on developmentally appropriate instruction, and that in general Costa Rican preschool and early elementary children are attaining relatively low levels of early literacy achievement.{09}Finally, the third paper describes and evaluates different early literacy interventions for preschool children and concludes that overall, children's print skills improved when they participated in tutoring or a combination of interventions (tutoring, family workshops, and classroom activities) while their oral language skills did not, which may mean that these interventions would not be enough long-term to prevent repetition and dropout. When student attendance was taken into account, attendance at tutoring sessions improved print outcomes substantially while attendance at a combination of interventions improved oral language outcomes substantially. Providing high-quality materials to teachers did not have any impact on student outcomes, indicating that professional development is needed to ensure the impact of high-quality materials. Low-income Costa Rican children may need more intensive interventions of longer duration, like professional development for preschool and elementary school teachers that ensures that this population receives high-quality instruction.; Ongoing research is testing methods of taking such research-based practice to scale, in this case by implementing a more intensive intervention---professional development for teachers---that should potentially result in quality preschool and early primary education and improved outcomes for low-income Costa Rican children.