Young Children Suffer Steep Drop in Literacy following Pandemic Closures

Young students are having difficulty learning to read as schools have returned to in-person learning after two years of pandemic disruptions.

Studies of literacy in young children have shown that some young students are still suffering from learning loss, even after most U.S. schools have returned to in-person instruction.

A February briefing by Amplify, a Brooklyn-based company that produces school curriculum for grades K-12, found that students in kindergarten through second grade are at higher risk for difficulties learning to read than older students.

The set of kindergarteners “on track...