What beginning reading programs have been proven to help students in grades K-1 to succeed? To find out, this review summarizes evidence on four types of programs designed to improve beginning reading achievement: (1) Reading Curricula (Curr), such as "Open Court Reading," "Reading Street," and other standard and alternative textbooks; (2) Instructional Technology (IT), such as "Waterford," "Lexia Learning Systems," and "Writing to Read"; (3) Instructional Process Programs (IP), such as cooperative learning and phonological awareness training; and (4) Combined Curriculum and Instructional Process Programs (Curr & IP), such as "Success for All" and "Direct Instruction." Overall, 63 experimental-control comparisons met the inclusion criteria, of which 19 used random assignment to treatments. Effect sizes (experimental-control differences as a proportion of a standard deviation) were averaged across studies, weighting by sample size. [For the full report, "Effective Beginning Reading Programs: A Best-Evidence Synthesis," see ED527638.]