Validation of an Instrument for Assessing Elementary-Grade Educators' Knowledge to Teach Reading

Teacher knowledge predicts both instructional practice and student outcomes. Most previous surveys of teacher reading-related knowledge have focused on knowledge essential for word reading development; few surveys have provided a picture of educator knowledge to teach both word reading and language comprehension. This article describes the development and validation of the Teacher Understanding of Literacy Constructs and Evidence-Based Instructional Practices (TULIP) survey, which assesses teacher knowledge in the domains of (a) phonological awareness, (b) phonics, decoding, and encoding, (c) reading fluency, (d) oral language, and (e) reading comprehension. The TULIP survey was created using an iterative development process involving a systematic review of research, expert review of items, field testing, and a pilot study. A validation study of TULIP was conducted with a sample of 313 in-service elementary-grade teachers of reading. Confirmatory factor analyses revealed that both the one-factor and five-factor models had acceptable fit statistics. The overall TULIP scale had good reliability, and subscales that represented knowledge within separate literacy domains had acceptable reliability. Teachers answered around 50% of items correctly, on average. Knowledge overall and within each literacy domain was significantly related to education level, such that teachers with more education had higher scores.