About the Project
The BrightStart! project involved a collaboration with the Nemours Children’s Health System, Columbus’ Ready4Success initiative, and local early childhood programs to examine the efficacy of the Nemours® BrightStart! program (NBS!). This five-year randomized controlled trial was funded by the Institute of Education Sciences.
NBS! is a small-group, emergent literacy intervention that provides extra support for preschoolers who are at risk for later reading difficulties. Developed by a team at the Nemours Children’s Health System, NBS! was initially used in a community partnership with preschool programs in Jacksonville, Florida. Research conducted during this partnership showed that the intervention improved preschoolers’ emergent literacy skills. It is now commercially available to early childhood programs and educators.
In this research project, Crane researchers studied the commercially available version of NBS! as used in Columbus-area early childhood classrooms. The team partnered with Ready4Success who used an emergent literacy screener to identify eligible preschool children in each classroom. Some of these children were randomly selected to experience the NBS! lessons across their preschool year. For half of the selected children, the lessons were provided by their classroom teacher. For the other half, the lessons were provided by a Ready4Success member (“community aide”) who visited the classroom to deliver intervention. We measured all participating children’s literacy skills at the beginning and end of the preschool year and followed children as they matriculate through elementary school. Ultimately, this project determined whether NBS!, when carried out by teachers and community aides in typical early childhood classrooms, benefitted children’s early literacy learning and helped close reading achievement gaps.
To learn more about NBS!, visit the website or see the complete program here.
A new paper has come out of the Nemours BrightStart! (NBS!) project that describes the patterns and predictors of intervention dosage in the preschool setting.
KEY TAKEAWAYS:
1. The number of intervention lessons experienced by children in schools was influenced by teacher and classroom factors (e.g. teachers’ self-efficacy, small-group size) much more so than child factors (e.g. attendance, social and behavioral skills).
2. Teachers who viewed the intervention lessons as more acceptable tended to provide more lessons. Likewise, teachers who were more self-efficacious (i.e., confident in their instructional and decision-making abilities) tended to provide more lessons.
3. The number of intervention lessons that children experienced was largely driven by when their instructors stopped offering lessons altogether. This therefore suggests the importance of monitoring whether intervention is ongoing and supports attending to ecological factors that may lead instructors to prematurely stop implementation.
Publications
This work has resulted in multiple peer-reviewed publications. To learn more, check out the published papers.
Hudson, A., Bailet, L. L., Piasta, S. B., Logan, J. A., Lewis, K., & Zettler-Greeley, C. M. (2023). Latent Profile Moderation: Examining the Differential Impact of a Small-Group Emergent Literacy Intervention. Journal of Education for Students Placed at Risk (JESPAR), 1-33.https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C36&q=Latent+profile+moderation%3A+Examining+the+differential+impact+of+a+small-group+emergent+literacy+intervention&btnG=
(Zettler-Greeley, C.M., Piasta, S.B., Lewis, K., Bailet, L.L., 2Thomas, L.J.G., & Dowdy, S. (in press). Keys for successful delivery of small-group instruction in the preschool classroom: Lessons from an emergent literacy program. Young Children.)
Piasta, S.B., 1Hudson, A., 2Sayers, R., Logan, J.A.R., Zettler-Greeley, C.M., Lewis, K., & Bailet, L. (in press). Small-group emergent literacy intervention dosage in preschool: Patterns and predictors. Journal of Early Intervention. Advance online publication. https://eric.ed.gov/?q=Keys+for+successful+delivery+of+small-group+instruction+in+the+preschool+classroom%3a+Lessons+from+an+emergent+literacy+program&id=ED627292
Lewis, K., Logan, J.A.R., 2Thomas, L.J.G., Schneider, N., Zettler-Greeley, C.M., Bailet, L.L., & Piasta, S.B. (2023). Behavior management and engagement during small-group instruction as predictors of preschoolers’ literacy skill outcomes. Early Education and Development, 34(8), 1872-1895. https://eric.ed.gov/?q=Behavior+management+and+engagement+during+small-group+instruction+as+predictors+of+preschoolers%e2%80%99+literacy+skill+outcomes&id=EJ1401137
2Thomas, L.J.G., Piasta, S.B., Bailet, L.L., Zettler-Greeley, C.M., & Lewis, K. (2023). Promoting meaning-focused skills: Creating a foundation for comprehension in early childhood classrooms. The Reading Teacher, 76(4), 421-428. https://eric.ed.gov/?q=Promoting+meaning-focused+skills%3a+Creating+a+foundation+for+comprehension+in+early+childhood+classrooms&id=EJ1363095
Meet the Project Staff
Cindy Zettler-Greeley, PhD
Nemours® Partner
Laura Bailet, PhD
Nemours® Partner
Read more about Dr. Bailet here.
Kandia Lewis, PhD
Nemours® Partner
Read more about Dr. Lewis here.
Additional Team Members
We would also like to recognize the work of our team’s former doctoral students, Leiah Groom and Robin Sayers, project coordinator Dr. Naomi Schneider, and field assessors Caleb Stinson and Marilyn Rogers.
Thank You
Many thanks to Shelby Dowdy and the Ready4Success team!