Academic screening in middle school: Exploring bivariate and intraindividual relations in reading and math...

Area of Science:

• Educational Psychology
• Developmental Psychology
• Quantitative Psychology

Background:

• Early adolescence is critical for academic growth, yet research on reading and math development in multitiered systems of support often focuses on elementary students.
• Understanding transactional relations between reading and math skills is crucial for targeted interventions during this developmental stage.

Purpose of the Study:

• To examine the transactional development of reading and math skills in sixth and seventh graders.
• To compare the effectiveness of various longitudinal structural equation modeling (SEM) approaches for analyzing academic development.

Main Methods:

• Utilized triannual academic screening data from 1,693 sixth and seventh-grade students.
• Employed Bayesian longitudinal structural equation modeling (SEM), testing five different models.
• Analyzed stable between-person differences and within-person transactional relations between reading and math skills.

Main Results:

• Found strong correlations between stable between-person differences in math and reading skills across all models (r = .70–.77).
• Observed inconsistent results regarding correlated growth processes at the between-person level and within-person transactional relationships.
• Equivocal support was found for four of the five longitudinal SEMs tested.

Conclusions:

• Stable individual differences in math and reading are robust, but their developmental trajectories and interrelations in early adolescence require nuanced modeling.
• Methodological challenges exist in detecting within-person instructional response using triannual screening data.
• Findings highlight the need for advanced statistical approaches to understand academic development in middle school students.