Accelerated Reader and its impact on special education students at Middletown High School

Reading is an important skill and is essential to for competitive skills in the market place and for every day life. This study looks at the use of the Accelerated Reader program in small group special education and inclusion classes to determine if the program helped improve the reading skills of students. The data does not conclude that there is a direct positive correlation saying that the more books read and the more AR tests taken the higher the score on the reading DSTP. However the achievement gap between general education and special education students did narrow from a 50 to an 18 point mean difference. There is evidence that the amount of reading increased for the students in the small group special education classes where the AR program was fully implemented, while reading remained mostly limited to the curriculum materials in the inclusion class with the addition of the 4 AR book reports. The AR program should be continued as a supplemental program in the special education classes and the same methods used in those classes should be expanded to at risk students in other classes. However the program should be part of an overall multi-faceted reading program to address the needs of all students.