Jeanette McCollum	Tweety Yates Felner	Susan Fowler	Michaelene Ostrosky	Amy Santos Gilbertz

 

Developing Early Language and Literacy in Danville (DELL-D)

(DELL-D Website: http://www.dell-d.uiuc.edu/)

Professor Jeanette McCollum received a $4.06 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education to boost literacy skills and kindergarten readiness for 4-5 year olds.  She will be assisted by four other professors in the Department of Special Education:  Tweety Felner, Susan Fowler, Michaelene Ostrosky and Amy Santos Gilbertz.

The ultimate goal of the Early Reading First Program, is to improve the school readiness of our nation's young children, particularly those from low-income families, by providing support for early childhood education programs serving preschool-age children so they may become centers of educational excellence. 

The Early Reading First Program brings a unique and bold approach to improving preschool programs for our nation's at-risk children, including children with disabilities and limited English proficiency.  Early Reading First provides funding and support to turn preschool programs into centers of excellence by improving instruction and classroom environments through scientific research-based practices in language, cognition and early reading skills.

The Early Language Literacy - Danville portion represents a collaboration among Danville District 118, Danville Area Community College, the East Central Illinois Community Action Program (ECICAP), the Early Childhood and Parenting Collaborative (ECAP) in the Department of Special Education at the University of Illinois, and 4 early childhood centers (school district pre-K, Head Start, community agency child, community college child care).  Twelve classrooms will implement the TROPHIES Pre-K Curriculum to develop skills in oral language, phonological awareness, concepts about print, alphabetic knowledge, and pre-writing skills, organized and sequenced within 5 units that teach important core content.  Trained Literacy Coaches will assist teachers to integrate TRPOHIES into the border-based early childhood curriculum in their classrooms.  Children will be screened using both a broad developmental screen and emergent literacy screens.  Progress will be monitored monthly using curriculum-based assessment and also bi-monthly with the IGDIs.  A tiered approach to monitoring and differentiated instruction will be used to provide more intensive instruction to identified children.  Families will participate in many types of events designed to increase their ability to enhance their children's emergent literacy and concept development, provided by a Family Liaison.  The grant will be managed by ECAP faculty from the University of Illinois.  ECAP's 5 participating faculty partners, including the two Co-Principal Investigators, will serve as Component Facilitator (CFs) for designated aspects of the project design and will be actively involved in personnel development, technical assistance, and project governance.  Professional development will include regularly scheduled initial and semi-annual Teacher Institutes, weekly in-class coaching, and monthly Coach Team meetings with Literacy Coaches in each center.  The comprehensive evaluation plan includes quasi-experimental research on child outcomes, with follow-up into Kindergarten and 1st grade.