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«Back to all edWebinarsThe Overlooked Metrics Impacting Literacy Outcomes: Reading Efficiency and Underdeveloped Visual Skills
Tuesday, August 11, 2026 @ 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm EDT
Presented by Dr. Alexandra Spichtig, Former Educator, Current CEO and Co-Founder, Stanford Taylor Foundation; and John Ferrara, M.Ed., Former Educator, Current Chief Research Officer, Stanford Taylor Foundation
Sponsored by Stanford Taylor Foundation
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Two critical, but often-missed factors sit underneath students’ reading struggles: inefficient reading habits and underdeveloped visual skills. These factors are more common than most educators realize. Roughly 70% of students reading at below-proficient levels read inefficiently. And signs of underdeveloped visual skills appear in about half of low-performing elementary readers and a quarter of middle schoolers. Most assessments tell educators that a student is struggling, not how efficiently they read or whether the student’s visual skills are ready to handle the demands of reading. Neither inefficient reading nor underdeveloped visual skills are disabilities; they can be developed through targeted visual skill and reading efficiency instruction.
The goal of this edWebinar is to help educators recognize the role visual skills and reading efficiency play in reading development and achievement and to provide practical, research-informed strategies for identifying and supporting students who may be affected by inefficient reading and underdeveloped visual skills.
Key Topics:
- What are visual skills and reading efficiency, and why are they important?
- What research shows about the relationships among visual skills, reading efficiency, and reading achievement
- How to screen for students with underdeveloped visual skills and inefficient reading habits
- How to implement targeted visual skill development and reading efficiency practice
By the end of the session, attendees will be able to:
- Explain the research connecting visual skills development, reading efficiency, and reading achievement
- Identify indicators of underdeveloped visual skills and inefficient reading habits
- Screen for underdeveloped visual skills and inefficient reading
- Apply practical strategies and tools to support visual skills and reading efficiency development within existing literacy instruction
Attendees will leave with a new understanding of how reading inefficiency and underdeveloped visual skills may be contributing to reading difficulties, and information regarding how to identify affected students and support students in need of targeted instruction. This edWebinar will be of interest to elementary and middle school leaders, district leaders, curriculum directors, and those involved in literacy intervention.
About the Presenters
Dr. Alexandra Spichtig, CEO and Co-founder of the Stanford Taylor Foundation, is a researcher and literacy assessment and instruction expert specializing in eye movements, visual skills, and reading efficiency. Her landmark study on the 50-year decline of silent reading efficiency was published in Reading Research Quarterly, and her broader work—including peer-reviewed articles, book chapters, and international presentations (ILA, SSSR, ECEM, AERA, LRA)—has advanced scientific understanding of how visual skills, visual processing, and reading efficiency influence literacy development. As former Chief Research Officer at Reading Plus, she co-authored patented instructional methodologies and led the design of one of the first widely adopted web-based adaptive assessments measuring comprehension-based silent reading rate. She began her career as an elementary school teacher. Her expertise bridges literacy pedagogy, classroom experience, vision science, learning engineering, scalable digital assessment, and visual and reading efficiency instruction.
John Ferrara, M.Ed., is the Stanford Taylor Foundation’s Chief Research Officer. He holds a master’s degree in education and a certificate of advanced study in education leadership and policy studies. He specializes in data systems, assessment design, and visual skills research, leading all aspects of the research lifecycle from study design through dissemination. He played a central role in designing Vermont’s first statewide K–12 education data warehouse and implementing the state’s assessment and accountability systems. At Reading Plus, he refined adaptive assessments, established reading efficiency norms, and led efficacy studies for large-scale literacy programs. His research on reading efficiency, eye movements, and visual skills has been published in peer-reviewed journals and presented at the Society for Scientific Studies of Reading, the Literacy Research Association, the National Science Foundation, and the European Conference on Eye Movements.
Learn more about earning a CE certificate and our accessibility features.
Join the Empowering Struggling Readers community to network with educators, participate in online discussions, receive invitations to upcoming edWebinars, and view recordings of previous programs to earn CE certificates.
The Stanford Taylor Foundation (STF) is an educational research nonprofit dedicated to understanding and improving reading efficiency and the visual skills that underpin it. STF’s mission is to perform research in this area, share findings broadly, and develop evidence-based educational tools that support students, teachers, and district leaders. STF’s team has decades of experience in reading research, instructional design, and the development of assessments and instructional products, with extensive published research and conference presentations.
