About

Texas School Ready (TSR) is a comprehensive, research-based professional development program for early education teachers that ensures at-risk children receive targeted instruction in critical school readiness skills. Thousands of pre-K centers in Texas have implemented the program since 2003. As TSR has grown, researchers at the Children’s Learning Institute at the University of Texas Health Science Center have been collecting incredible amounts of data to track changes in teachers’ instructional practices and advancements in their students’ school readiness skills. The results of this research speak to the innovation and effectiveness of TSR. Although previously focused solely on pre-K classrooms, TSR Comprehensive is a birth-to-five model that offers opportunities for Lead Agents to provide services to early childhood partners serving preschoolers, as well as infants and toddlers based on the community’s needs. Some early childhood partners, particularly those based in high-need, at-risk communities, may benefit from coordinated, site-wide TSR Comprehensive service delivery to support high-quality caregiving across age groups.

Amarillo College serves as one of the lead agencies for Texas School Ready.  These lead agencies partner with child care, Head Start teachers, and ISD teachers in their local communities to provide comprehensive services, including training, materials, and coaching. Teachers enrolled in TSR participate in a comprehensive teacher training program designed to help children be better prepared for kindergarten and beyond.  Multiple research studies have confirmed that Texas School Ready positively impacts teacher instructional practices in the classroom, regardless of setting (public school pre-k, Head Start, and private child care classrooms). Teachers participating in TSR Comprehensive are more responsive to the individual needs of the children in their classrooms. They show increases in their use of language-building strategies, including the quality of book reading, general conversations with children, and the use of oral language instruction to build these skills. Even greater gains have been found in emergent literacy instructional practices. Teachers also show better responsive teaching practices, organization of their centers, and the use of lesson plans. For more information, go to the Texas School Ready website.