As student populations are becoming more diverse in ability and ethnicity across American classrooms, teachers are faced with instructional challenges in meeting their students’ learning needs. Challenges are heightened for general and special education teachers who teach students with learning disabilities (LD) and have a culturally and linguistically diverse background. This article analyzes three main domains of culturally responsive reading instruction for students with LD: (a) instructional delivery, (b) environmental support, and (c) curriculum context. Specific strategies and teaching tools are described in each domain to assist teachers in making their daily reading instruction more culturally responsive and relevant to the needs of their students.

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Students with emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD) in secondary school settings often have deficient reading skills. Secondary school teachers who serve this population of students may need additional training, support, and resources to maximize the effectiveness of the time they spend teaching reading. This article focuses on two instructional practices for improving the reading comprehension of secondary grade students with EBD: explicit vocabulary instruction and main idea identification. Also included are suggestions for how to incorporate behavioral strategies and assessment of comprehension into effective reading instruction.

Schools continue to experience difficulty meeting the needs of young children who are formally identified as having an emotional and/or behavioural disorder (EBD). Although schools are mandated to use evidence‐based practices to improve student outcomes, such practices must first be identified before they can be employed. Systematic reviews of intervention studies are commonly performed to identify evidence‐based practices, make recommendations for service delivery, and identify areas for future research that are needed to inform practice. At this time, researchers have yet to perform a systematic review of intervention studies involving young children identified with EBD – early childhood (EC) – grade 2. The purpose of this study was to identify and describe published school‐based intervention research for this student population. Studies meeting selection criteria were evaluated according to the relevant What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) Design standards to identify studies with strong internal validity that reported positive effects. Twenty‐nine manuscripts reporting 30 intervention studies were identified. Findings suggest that practitioners must primarily rely on their professional judgement and values guided by principles embedded in their training when planning instruction and support for young children with EBD due to the absence of high‐quality intervention research. Additional rigorous evaluations are needed so that practice is better informed by science. Recommendations for practice, areas for future research, and study limitations are discussed.

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