Sample A: Cover Page of Thesis, Project, or Dissertation Proposal

informational video on the importance of storybook reading for children‘s academic
development (Idaho Literacy Project, 1991). Whereas the video shown to teachers in
classroom assigned to the intervention group (Whitehurst, 1992) demonstrated dialogic
reading techniques, this video included no specific storybook reading techniques. Rather,
this video spoke generally regarding the role of storybook reading in children‘s academic
success. A brief discussion of social-emotional curriculum development and perusal of
the emotion-laden storybooks (without the book guides and prompts on individual pages
but still including any book guides included in the books) followed, during which time
the researcher answered teachers‘ questions. Finally, teachers were instructed to read the
emotion-laden storybooks as usual with 2 groups, each including a maximum of 5
participating children, three times per week and to complete a brief log for each book
reading (see Appendix M). In the ‗Notes/comments about today‘s book‘ section of the
log, teachers were instructed to document their own observations about the storybook
itself. In the ‗Notes/comments about today‘s book reading‘ section of the log, teachers
were instructed to document any environmental (e.g., fire drill, distractions caused by
non-participating children in the room) or child factors (e.g., temper tantrum,
distractibility) that occurred during that storybook reading.
Because the Stony Brook Emergent Literacy Curriculum dictates that at least two
adults per classroom must be involved in dialogic reading (Whitehurst, 1994), all head
teachers, assistant teachers, and teaching assistants (employed in full-time classrooms
only) were included in teacher training meetings. In order to avoid contagion of teachers
assigned to the book reading control group and to minimize teachers‘ suspicions of
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