Prospective Teachers’ Use of Complementary Structures
Dr. Yvonne J. John, Dr. Stephen Joseph, Ms. Avril E. Sampson

Abstract
Children in schools of Trinidad and Tobago are not developing the reading skills needed to achieve basic literacy (Ministry of Education, Trinidad and Tobago National Test, 2013). This study examined the effects of differentiated reading instruction training on prospective teachers’ ability to meet students’ needs. Thirty-one prospective teachers placed in primary schools of Trinidad and Tobago participated in a two-week,field-teaching practicefocusing on reading comprehension.The study used a convergent, mixed-method, research design aimed at triangulating quantitative and qualitative data obtained from a single group pretest/posttest quasi-experiment, survey responses, and reflections from the sample group of prospective teachers. Findings of the study revealed that the ability of prospective teachers to meet students’ needs in reading greatly improved with differentiated instruction training in complementary reading structures.

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