Purpose and objectives
The project background

The proposed action research project (euroREAD) is based on the work of three previous projects:

• The OECD study "Failure at school: Patterns and responses".
• The SocraTESS ODL project: "Teaching Children to Read" and
• The IEA Reading Literacy Study.

Below is given an outline of project background.

OECD study : "Failure at school : Patterns and responses"
The data of the OECD study : "Failure at school : Patterns and responses" show among other things that a significant proportion of young people that dropout of school have very low reading skills. This means that by the dissemination of high qualitative reading strategies it is possible to avoid problems and save money in the later phases of the biography of the students.

The OECD countries face a common challenge in educational authorities improving the strategies for tackling this operation, as well as the collaboration of the problem in order to do so they need to consider four key issues:

1. Early recognition required to create appropriate frameworks.
2. Combating failure on a wide front.
3. Flexible approaches to students needs.
4. Learning from experience from others.

These four issues are the core competence of the strategies and policy of the SocraTESS ODL network project.

Description of the SocraTESS ODL project
The SocraTESS ODL project is a European collaboration centred around in-service training of teachers from basic schooling (primary and lower secondary) based on an open and distance learning environment (ODL). The collaboration uses as its starting point work with educational integration. The collaboration comprises 13 partners from 11 countries.

The basis for the SocraTESS ODL project is the international reading survey (IEA,1994). Focus, in the SocraTESS ODL project, is therefore placed on reading and the early development of reading skills.

The hypothesis of the SocraTESS ODL project is that in order to achieve the greatest possible effect, the in-service training of teachers must be coupled with the day-to-day pedagogical practice. If teachers are to see the utility value of a paradigm change, they must be able to convert new knowledge into practice.

The purpose of the SocraTESS ODL project is - in the light of the ODL initiatives under SOCRATES: Using ODL activities and information and communications technology as a tool, to link up the latest knowledge in the field of reading pedagogy in the partner countries and thereby to develop innovative methods and materials for the benefit of teaching pupils with special educational needs (i.e. OECD: Salamanca Statement, 1994).

The euroREAD project
The euroREAD project is a European collaboration centred around an analysis of the data collected from 11 countries in the SocraTESS ODL network project. The collaboration will comprise 6 partners from 4 countries.

As said in the OECD survey bad reading skills are an important factor in the case of children dropping out of school. Of course changes in the education system are necessary to prevent these dropouts. The changes come from e.g. central government or the school board, but in the end it is always the teacher who has to change his way of teaching. It is then very important, as pointed out in the SocraTESS ODL network project, to increase the teachers ability to cope with new knowledge about reading and then to convert it into practice, in short to increase the teachers ability to change.

The SocraTESS ODL project has gathered considerable data on the subject - how to increase the teachers ability to convert new knowledge into practice. If these data are treated in a different way and if complementary information is added, it will be possible to examine why some teachers react positively to a international reading survey and why some react negatively or do not react at all. This is exactly the aim of the euroREAD project.

Teachers in different countries do not react the same way to new knowledge. In some countries it is easy to change the way teachers teaches, because they in some way or the other have the ability to change, and then again in other countries it is much harder to change the teachers teaching methods. The euroREAD project deals with this problem. The idea of the project is to find some common factors in all countries that enlarges the teachers ability to change in a positive direction. By analysing some of the data collected in the SocraTESS ODL network project in a new way it is possible to find these common factors. After the analyse it will be possible to say why the teachers in some countries do not have the ability to change, and in regards of the OECD survey this can contribute to prevent dropouts.

Some examples of factors could be:

• High degree of cooperation between colleges, Centralised reading plans, work organisation.

It should be noticed that the common factors found in the euroREAD project are found on the background of the international reading survey (IEA 1994). The common factors found are therefore able to say something about how teachers are going to react regarding new information on reading strategies, but not necessarily regarding maths strategies. The "ability to change" project is therefore also a model project, that shows how to find the relevant common factors from international comparative studies in education.

Purpose of the euroREAD project
The purpose of the project is:

• To see how teachers in different countries react to international comparative studies in education.
• To describe and find some common factors that determine why some teachers are open to change and why some are not.
• Creating a model on which it is possible to build a larger study, regarding teachers' ability to adopt changes.
• Development of guidelines regarding what factors that will increase the teachers ability to change.