The impact of balanced literacy on third-grade students' achievement in reading

The purpose of this quasi-experimental study was to examine the impact of a Balanced Literacy Program on students' achievement in reading. First, it was hypothesized that there would be no significant difference in reading achievement of students in the balanced literacy instruction and students in the basal instruction. Secondly, it was hypothesized that there would be no significant difference in post-vocabulary scores of students in the balanced literacy instruction and students in the basal instruction. It was also hypothesized that there would be no significant difference in post-comprehension scores of students in the balanced literacy instruction and students in the basal instruction.; The results of this study showed no significant difference in pre-posttest scores of students in the balanced literacy instruction and students in the basal instruction. The subjects were administered the Iowa Test of Basic Skills (ITBS) prior to and after the fifteen-week implementation period. The effectiveness of the program was measured by comparing the posttest scores of the experimental and control groups. Data analysis revealed marginal gains made by both the experimental and control group, indicating that the Balanced Literacy Program had made no significant impact on the third graders' achievement in reading. In addition, multiple comparisons of pre-posttest scores between classes in the control group and classes in the experimental group were made. A statistically significant difference was found between one class in the experimental group and one class in the control group. The experimental group's class obtained a higher mean score on the vocabulary posttest than the control group's class. In other words, the experimental group's class outperformed the control group's class on the vocabulary section of the ITBS. No other differences were found between the classes.; The results of this study suggested that the Balanced Literacy Program should be implemented over a longer period of time, to ensure that students receive ample time to practice using the reading strategies being taught. An extension on the length of the study also ensures teachers with better opportunities of understanding the concept of Balanced Literacy and effectively implementing it. On the other hand, results of this study may suggest that basal reading instruction will yield similar reading achievement when compared to the Balanced Literacy Program.