This study examined the effectiveness of a nine-week summer emergent literacy program implemented in a Young Men's Christian Association (YMCA) summer program that serves families from low socioeconomic backgrounds. Participants were four- and five-year-old children attending a YMCA summer camp. After being placed in appropriate respective skill-level groups, children received one-hour, daily emergent literacy instruction from their camp counselors, who were trained as novice reading teachers. The teachers used emergent literacy activities to support letter-naming fluency and growth in letter-sound correspondence recognition in addition to mastery of read-aloud texts. The 28 participants experienced positive growth on both dependent measures (letter-naming fluency and letter-sound fluency), indicating the efficiency of the intervention as a tool for improving school readiness for children from low-income families. Additionally, the results suggest that beginning reading teachers may be able to conduct eff...