EEAAAAA

What Is an Early Grade Reading Program?

Ministries of education around the world have recently increased efforts to improve early grade
reading instruction. Many of these efforts are supported by donor-funded programs. In order to
improve reading skills, these programs typically target four levels of reading instruction:
classroom learning, teachers, the institutional systems, and the community.

1. Classroom Learning

Early grade reading programs work to ensure that the classroom provides a safe environment for
children, one that makes them want to learn language, reading, and writing skills. First, language
is at the heart of reading, and the choice of the language that children first learn to read in is
important. In multilingual environments, children come to the classroom with different levels of
familiarity with the different local languages. But regardless of the language, children must
develop their vocabulary and ability to express themselves by speaking (or orally) and to
understand others’ speech (or listening comprehension). Children need an abundance of quality
reading materials to read to support the development of these skills.

For languages that use alphabetic writing systems like English or Filipino, early reading begins
with the development of:

 Concepts of print—the awareness that books and texts carry meaning and represent
language.
 Sounding out words—the awareness of the distinctive speech sounds in the language as
well as learning the relationships between those sounds and letters in order to decode or
recognize words.

For languages that do not use alphabetic writing systems, such as Chinese, Khmer, and Hindi,
early reading skills still involve mapping sounds to symbols. Children learning to read in these
languages must also learn the concept of print, sounding out words or phonological awareness,
and how to the decode symbols of the writing system.
EGRAs can be modified to address the unique characteristics of different writing systems. In
Nepali, for example, the assessment measures children’s ability to identify matras. Matras are
units of two letters that are combined with a symbol (such as an accent or other mark) to change
the sound of the vowel. Two or more matras form a word.

Learn More About Early Reading Skills

2. Teachers

Early grade reading programs also focus on helping teachers use effective and inclusive teaching
techniques to help all children learn and to monitor the children’s progress. Programs help
teachers refine their teaching skills by ensuring that courses on teaching reading and writing are
included in the teacher’s pre-service or in-service training. Such training can include teaching
and learning materials, such as teacher’s guides with structured lesson plans.

Recognizing that teacher professional development is an ongoing process, many programs also
support teachers through regular classroom visits by coaches or mentors. Teachers are
encouraged to support and learn from one another by meeting together regularly in “teacher
circles” to focus on improving their teaching.

3. Institutional Systems

Teachers and classrooms do not operate in a void. Effective early grade reading programs also
may focus on changing institutional education systems by supporting policies and procedures
that affect reading instruction. These include policies and procedures related to the language(s)
of instruction; teacher training, certification, assignment, and supervision; curriculum standards
and benchmarks; national assessments (including in some cases, EGRA); book provisioning;
budgeting and expenditure; and monitoring and accountability, among other things. Programs
also support the administrators at various levels, including the school leadership, to implement
these policies and procedures effectively.
4. Community

Finally, early grade reading programs recognize that the family and community play a vital role
in supporting children’s literacy. They often include initiatives aimed at promoting a general
“culture of reading” (where reading is widely practiced and valued), increasing children’s access
to opportunities to read outside of school, raising community awareness about the literacy
progress and needs of children, and encouraging family involvement in the achievement of
literacy goals.

An Early Grade Reading Assessment (EGRA) is a test students take that can measure their skill
at both pre-reading and reading subtasks. Usually, EGRAs are given to students in Kindergarten
through primary school. EGRAs test children’s skill at different subtasks they need to learn, such
as letter names and letter sounds, to be able to read fluently. The test is typically administered by
a teacher one-on-one with a student, out loud. Watch the videos below to see EGRA in action in
Nepal.

Why Do We Use an EGRA?

EGRAs can be used for many things. Typical reading tests are done on paper, which means
students must be able to read and write at least a little bit to take them. This makes it hard to
measure children’s reading early in the learning process, before they have mastered those basic
skills. An EGRA, because it is administered out loud by the teacher, solves that problem.

An EGRA can determine an individual student’s skill in the reading subtasks, of course, but
when many students are tested together, EGRA results can be used to assess the impact of a
reading program or even to measure a country’s progress toward providing a quality basic
education in reading.

How Do We Assess Reading with an EGRA?

For an EGRA, individual students are assessed on different reading skill subtasks. An example of
a subtask is a test of letter sounds, or a child’s ability to identify a letter’s sound.

Can an EGRA Be Used with Different Languages?

EGRA is designed to be flexible; it can be used in different contexts. An EGRA should always
be adapted to the local language and context. Learning to read requires similar basic skills in any
language, but the importance of those different skills depends on the language.Interested in
administering an EGRA? The EGRA Toolkit serves as a guide for countries using EGRA. The
toolkit covers local adaptation of the instrument (the assessment), fieldwork, and how to analyze
the results of a completed EGRA.

This toolkit is intended for use by ministry or department of education staff, donor staff,
practitioners, and professionals in the field of education development. The document seeks to
summarize a large body of research in an accessible manner. The procedures described in this
toolkit are to be used in all USAID-funded administrations of EGRA, and can be used in other
EGRA administrations as well.

MELQO MODEL Framework

Measuring Early Learning Quality and Outcomes (MELQO) Measure of
Development and Early Learning (MODEL) module is a measurement framework
and tool designed to assess school readiness. The MODEL module was developed
as part of the MELQO initiative, a collaboration between multilateral organizations
and research institutions including UNESCO, the World Bank, the Center for
Universal Education at the Brookings Institution, and UNICEF with a goal of
promoting feasible, adaptable, accurate, and useful measurement of children’s
development and learning at the start of primary school. The MODEL module
focuses on age-appropriate and culturally-relevant skills and competencies that
reflect normative development within three basic domains of early learning and
school readiness. It is one of two modules under the MELQO initiative; the other is
the Measure of Early Learning Environments (MELE) module, designed to
measure the quality of pre-primary learning environments. Together, these tools
help assess progress towards the UN Sustainable Development Goal 4.2 to
improve the quality, feasibility, and accessibility of early childhood education.
MELQO stands for Measuring Early Learning Quality and

Outcomes. It’s an initiative that began in 2014, focusing on early

childhood development (ECD). One of its key components is the

Measure of Development and Early Learning (MODEL) module, which

serves as a measurement framework and tool designed to assess school

readiness1. The MELQO initiative involves collaboration between

multilateral organizations, research institutions, and educational

stakeholders, including UNESCO, UNICEF, the Brookings Institution,

and the World Bank2. If you’d like more detailed information, feel free

to explore the resources provided!

working memory
 Working memory is defined as the ability to store
and mentally manipulate memory contents
(Baddeley and Hitch, 1974; Davidson et al., 2006).
 Working memory is positively related to general
intellectual functioning, mathematics and reading
comprehension (Monette et al., 2011; Passolunghi
et al., 2007; Swanson and Jerman, 2007; Lesaux et
al., 2007). Issues with working memory are
 associated with difficulty following multistep
directions, forgetfulness and inattention (Bignell
and Cain, 2007; Engle et al., 1991; Gathercole et
al., 2006). Verbal working memory is a weak but
significant predictor of attentional ability in
everyday activities, such as remembering long
sentences and phone numbers (Groth-Marnat and
Baker, 2003). Working memory is similarly
important for learning, and may be closely related
to inhibitory control. In young children (2 to 6
years old), measures of working memory and
inhibitory control are strongly related to one
another and can be assessed using the same
tasks (Wiebe et al., 2008).

inhibitory control
 Inhibitory control refers to the ability to suppress
the processing of irrelevant yet dominant stimuli
or responses (Nigg, 2000).
 Inhibitory control, along with flexible switching,
has been identified as one of the first executive
function skills to emerge, developing quickly
during the pre-school years (Diamond and Doar,
1989; Diamond et al., 2002). Inhibitory control
skills help children suppress inappropriate
behaviours and thoughts that may distract them
from instruction (Alexander et al., 1993; Blair,
2002; Sa?ez et al. 2012). Further, these skills are
essential for cognition, educational attainment
and social functioning (Blair, 2002; Espy et al.,
 2004). Measured prior to kindergarten, inhibitory
control predicts mathematics skills in
kindergarten; when measured in kindergarten, it
predicts mathematics and early literacy skills in
primary school (Blair and Razza, 2007).

self-regulation
Self-regulation refers to the ability to control emotions
and social behaviour in the interest of engagement
and participation in both social interactions and
independent work. It encompasses the regulation of
one’s own emotions both in social contexts and non-
social contexts (such as delayed gratification). This
construct is also strongly related to executive
function, specifically inhibitory control (Liew, 2012).

social cognition
Social cognition captures children’s abilities to think
about and comprehend social relationships with
others, recognize the feelings of others, and, if
required, take actions that are meant to make others
feel better. Social cognition encompasses empathy –
children’s abilities to read others’ emotions and
respond appropriately – as well as prosocial behaviour
that includes helping others who may be in distress.
Understanding the feelings of oneself and others
includes the ability to (1) comprehend basic emotions
(e.g. happiness, sadness and anger) and how these
emotions are expressed, as well as their antecedents,
causes and consequences; (2) recognize that emotions
are complex (e.g. two individuals can feel two
different emotions in response to the same event); and
(3) distinguish rules for how to display basic and more
complex emotions (e.g. shame or guilt). Accurate
interpretation of the feelings of others provides
important information about social situations and what
constitutes appropriate responses.

social competence
Social competence, or how well children develop and
maintain relationships with peers and adults, is a
construct that includes the ability to coexist and
interact with others in a competent manner –
essentially getting along with other children and
adults, and being part of a social group. Social
competence is an important developmental skill that
children start learning from the moment they are born
and which forms the foundation for a social human
being.

emotional well-being
Emotional well-being refers to aspects of optimal
mental health that, if not evident in a child at this
early stage, could predict more serious mental health
problems, such as anxiety – a potential sign of post-
traumatic stress disorder (PTSD); sadness, a potential
precursor of depression; or the inability to control
aggressive impulses – a precursor of oppositional and
conduct disorders.
