Abstract
Early reading and literacy success is a primary indicator of a child’s success in later school years and in adulthood as well (Double et al., 2019). In order to ensure that all children are given the opportunity to gain early literacy skills, differentiated instruction is encouraged in general education classrooms (Powell et al., 2020). Thus, teachers are being put under the pressure of changing their current instruction styles to those that contain more differentiation. More times than not, teachers are not given adequate support and resources needed to implement their chosen style of differentiated instruction. This project used research-based resources, including the California Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and Vygotsky’s (1978) theory, Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) to develop a handbook for small group instruction.