Principal Investigator
Marc Hernandez – University of Chicago
Project Description
SEEDS of Learning (SEEDS) is an evidence-based professional development (PD) program that prepares early childhood educators to help children develop the social-emotional, language, and emergent literacy skills they need to be kindergarten-ready. This clustered RCT examined the impact of the SEEDS PD program on students’ oral language, literacy, and social-emotional outcomes in an early learning organization in San Francisco from 2017 to 2019. Centers were stratified based on whether they were full- or part-time and then randomly assigned to receive the program or serve as a comparison control group. Understanding that new programs require learning time to reach full implementation, the study was designed to test differences in impacts in study year one (SEEDS Implementation Year 1) and study year two (SEEDS Implementation Year 2), where SEEDS Implementation Year 2 reflected a more mature implementation of the program.
Research Questions
- What is the impact of the SEEDS PD program on students’ oral language, literacy, and social-emotional outcomes?
Key Findings
Findings suggest that the impact of SEEDS strengthened over time, with the second year and more mature program conditions showing more improvements in children’s outcomes than one year of implementation. While the new program had modest but statistically significant effects on letter names, rhyming, alliteration, and letter sounds, the second year and mature program conditions demonstrated consistently strong gains in these skills, particularly for letter sounds and alliteration. Picture naming showed a significant improvement only in the mature program contrast, while executive functioning did not exhibit meaningful changes across any condition. These findings suggest that full implementation and extended experience with the SEEDS program yield greater benefits.
Study Citation
Hernandez, M., Kabourek, S., Owusu, I., & Ilamaran, A. (2025). SEEDS of early learning: A randomized controlled trial of an early literacy teacher professional development program. EdWorkingPaper. Annenberg Institute for School Reform at Brown University. https://doi.org/10.26300/nar4-0k53
The Key Findings above were reproduced from the published report and do not necessarily reflect interpretation of Overdeck Family Foundation staff.
