Three paraprofessionals had 5 years

Three paraprofessionals had 5 years of experience as paraprofessionals, one had 3 years of experience, and one was at the end of her 1st year. One of the paraprofessionals with 5 years of experience had 7 additional years of experience as a teacher. They all had taught Corrective Reading: Decoding during their entire paraprofessional experience. One paraprofessional had a bachelor’s degree in elementary education, two had attended some college without completing a degree, and two had completed high school. All of the paraprofessionals received their initial training in Corrective Reading: Decoding from the school district either individually with a literacy facilitator or in a large group setting at the beginning of the school year (about 5 hours of training). This training included an overview of direct instruction reading curricula, modeling of signals, letter–sound pronunciations, and specific training in each curriculum. The specific program training included the rationale for the curriculum, overview of the curriculum components, and training in conducting placement testing. For Corrective Reading: Decoding, no instructional practice was provided in the initial training.