The impact of comprehensive reading instruction on the academic and social behavior of students with emotional and behavioral disorders

The reading difficulties of children with emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD) have been well documented. In addition, it has been noted that reading difficulties are frequently correlated with antisocial behavior. Unfortunately, there is little empirical evidence regarding the effectiveness of comprehensive reading interventions with this population of children. This study examined the effectiveness of a modified version of the Open Court Reading curriculum (Adams et al.,2000) combined with Peer-Assisted Learning Strategies (PALS) with 2 groups of children with EBD. Results show moderate gains in reading achievement for individuals in each group in the areas of nonsense word fluency, sound naming, blending, and segmenting. However, improvement in standardized scores was not observed. In addition, an impact on observed problem behavior was not observed. Findings suggest that this combined approach may be promising in improving the reading achievement of students with EBD. Limitations and direction for future research are discussed.