Over 45% Relative Improvement in Students Reaching Proficiency

• August 18, 2010 by Melissa Agocs

 

Since the 2006-2007 school year, the St. Mary Parish Public School System has been implementing the Fast ForWord products. The district started with seven elementary schools that were in academic assistance, which is a designation for schools that don’t make sufficient progress. After seeing the results on student achievement, the St. Mary Parish Public School System expanded its use and now has a district-wide implementation.

Students started with the Fast ForWord Language products and then progressed through the Fast ForWord Reading products. The Scientific Learning Reading Assistant software was first used in the district during the 2009-2010 school year.

The Louisiana Educational Assessment Program (LEAP) is part of Louisiana’s criterion-referenced state testing program and is administered to students in the fourth and eighth grades.

The LEAP has two components – the results shown in this presentation are from the English Language Arts test. Students receive one of the following five achievement ratings: Advanced, Mastery, Basic, Approaching Basic, or Unsatisfactory.

This graph shows the percentage of fourth graders each year who achieved a performance rating of Basic or Above on their LEAP English Language Arts test. The blue line indicates The St. Mary Parish 4^th graders and the red line indicates the 4^th graders in all of Louisiana for their initial LEAP tests given each spring.

Fast ForWord started being used in the district during the 2006-2007 school year, shown by the yellow shading. Since that school year, as you can see in the graph, fourth graders in the St. Mary Parish Public School System have shown dramatic improvements in their reading achievement as measured by the LEAP ELA.

In 2008, for the first time in a decade, the district exceeded the state average for the percentage of fourth graders reading at or above the Basic level.

During the 2008-2009 and 2009-2010 school years, Fast ForWord was extended to the rest of the district, and the schools began using Reading Assistant. In four years, the percent of fourth graders in the district performing at or above Basic on the initial LEAP ELA test increased impressively from 53% to 78%, starting out far below the state average and then exceeding it.

For more information, please see the Educator Briefing on this study as well as any of our 200+ additional reports on Fast ForWord results. If you have questions about any of our research studies, please contact us.

Categories: Fast ForWord, Reading & Learning, Reading Assistant, Scientific Learning Research

Tags: academic problems, academic proficiency, academic success, accelerated learning, below grade level, child reading development, elementary learning, elementary school learning, improving reading skills, increased test scores, intervention, learning to read, literacy, Louisiana, middle school learning, reading intervention, struggling readers, struggling students, technology in education

Nevada Department of Education: Fast ForWord is a “High-Gain Program”

• July 21, 2010 by Melissa Agocs

The Nevada Senate Bill 185 (SB 185) funded districts to purchase and implement innovative and remedial educational programs, materials, and strategies specific to their academic needs. 

The Nevada Department of Education commissioned the Leadership and Learning Center (LLC) to conduct an in-depth evaluation of the programs that had been purchased with SB 185 grants.  Their 2010 Interim Report includes a review of the performance of Fast ForWord products.

To quote from the Report….“Emphasis was placed on measuring student growth toward academic proficiency and mastery using state and local assessments… The analyses were completed as a result of extensive site visits, phone interviews, and an examination of two-year sets of school cohort achievement data for Criterion-Referenced Tests (CRT) for grades three through eight and High School Proficiency Exams (HSPE) for grades nine through twelve.” 

The Report closely examined CRT results at Goolsby Elementary School (which implemented Fast ForWord across all grade levels).  They concluded that each year of Fast ForWord implementation resulted in an increase in the percentage of grade-level proficient students. To quote the Report, “CRT data indicate a statistically significant increase in Reading and Writing proficiency levels…   CRT data indicate that Reading increased from 67% to 82% proficient, [and] Writing increased significantly from 55% to 82% proficient… from 2006 to 2008.”

This graph summarizes the main conclusions from the Report. The red bars represent programs that were found to have undetermined effects or low gains. Blue bars indicate high-gain programs, in which students made high gains according to the LLC standards. The green bar represents Fast ForWord, which was also found to be a high-gain program. In fact, the Report concludes that Fast ForWord products increased student reading achievement by an average of 22.2 percentage points, which was the largest average impact of all programs reviewed in the Report.

For more information, please see the Educator Briefing on this study as well as any of our 200+ additional reports on Fast ForWord results.  If you have questions about any of our research studies, please contact us.

Categories: Education Funding, Grants, and Stimulus, Fast ForWord, Reading & Learning

Tags: academic proficiency, academic success, accelerated learning, child reading development, elementary learning, elementary school learning, improving reading skills, increased test scores, innovation, learning to read, middle school learning, Nevada, remedial education, SB 185, struggling readers, struggling students, student growth, technology in education, writing

Teaching Children to Read

• July 6, 2010 by Martha Burns, Ph.D

According to the Report of the National Reading Panel: Teaching Children to Read Reports of the Subgroups, the capacity to learn and grow as a reader depends on five essential skills:

Foundational Skills for Beginning Readers:

1) Phonemic Awareness: The insight that every spoken word can be conceived as a sequence of phonemes. Phonemes are the speech sounds that are represented by the letters of an alphabet.

2) Phonemic Decoding: The ability to capture the meaning of unfamiliar words by translating groups of letters back into the sounds that they represent, link them to one's verbal vocabulary, and access their meaning.

Skills Needed to Read for Meaning:

3) Vocabulary: Understanding the words in a passage, including the specific dimensions of their meanings or usage that matter in context.  For example, knowing that “tree” when reading about a “family tree” has a different meaning from “maple tree”

4) Fluency: The ability to read with sufficient ease and accuracy that active attention can be focused on the meaning and message of the text and the text easily retained.

5) Comprehension: Thinking about the meaning of each segment of the text as it is read, building an understanding of the text as a whole, and reflecting on its meaning and message.

Teachers today are fortunate to have access to a wealth of scientifically based research into what works when teaching children to read.  The links that follow are courtesy of the National Institute for Literacy:

Birth to Early Childhood

Children begin building literacy skills long before they go to school.  Even very young children can be prepared to become successful readers later on.  Research has identified certain skills that are important for later literacy development; these skills include knowing the names and sounds of printed letters, manipulating speech sounds, and remembering what has been said for a short time.  Here are some ways to teach younger children these pre-reading skills.

Childhood

From kindergarten through third grade, young readers are actively developing all five of the core reading skills from phonemic awareness to fluency and comprehension.  Research has shown that teaching children to read successfully during this window requires a combination of strategies and instructional approaches.  Teachers must know how children learn to read and be able to tailor instructional approaches to individual children--especially those who are struggling readers.  Here are some instructional approaches for the five essential skills.

Adolescence

While many adolescent readers have mastered phonemic awareness and decoding, they are often still challenged to fully understand what they read.  In middle and high school, it is common for literacy skills to be developed not only in language arts courses, but also in a variety of different content areas.  To prepare students for the literacy challenges of secondary school, language arts and content area teachers need to focus on the last three components of reading: vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension.  Here are some approaches to teaching vocabulary and comprehension skills.

What are some strategies you have used when teaching children to read?  Which have been most successful?  Share your expertise on our Scientific Learning Facebook page!

Categories: Reading & Learning

Tags: child reading development, early learning, elementary learning, elementary school learning, fluency, high school learning, how children learn, improving reading skills, intervention, learning through play, learning to read, literacy, memory, oral language skills, phonemic awareness, phonics, reading comprehension, reading intervention, struggling readers, struggling students, teacher effectiveness, teacher impact, vocabulary

What is the School Improvement Grant?

• June 29, 2010 by Joseph Noble, Ph.D

What is the School Improvement Grant?

“School Improvement Grants…are used to improve student achievement in Title I schools identified for improvement, corrective action, or restructuring so as to enable those schools to make adequate yearly progress (AYP) and exit improvement status.” 
(www.ed.gov/programs/sif/index.html)

How much money is available?  

FY 2009 School Improvement Grant appropriation: $546 million

American Recovery and Reinvestment Act: $3 billion

Total: $3.546 billion

Who is eligible to apply? 

Formula grant to states, which make sub-grants to school districts.

What is the timing of the grant? 

Application available: December 3, 2009

Application deadline (for states): February 8, 2010

Awarding and disbursement of School Improvement Grant funds 

“FY 2009 school improvement funds are available for obligation by SEAs and LEAs through September 30, 2011. In its application for these funds, an SEA may request a waiver of the period of availability to permit the SEA and its LEAs to obligate the funds through September 30, 2013.”   (www.ed.gov/programs/sif/applicant.html, click on “Application” link and go to page i)

Amount of LEA awards

LEA subgrants can range from $50,000 to $2 million. 

(www.ed.gov/programs/sif/faqs.doc  and www.ed.gov/programs/sif/guidance20100120.doc)

School Improvement Grant Requirements

“The secretary would require states to identify three tiers of schools:

• Tier I - The lowest-achieving five percent of Title I schools in improvement, corrective action, or restructuring in a state, or the five lowest-performing Title I schools, whichever number is greater.
• Tier II – Equally low-achieving secondary schools that are eligible for, but do not receive, Title I funds. The secretary proposes targeting some of these extremely low-achieving high schools and their feeder middle schools….
• Tier III – The remaining Title I schools in improvement, corrective action or restructuring that are not Tier I schools in the state.

[Recent legislation has allowed SEAs to use School Improvement Funds to serve “newly eligible” schools: certain low-achieving schools that are not Title I schools in improvement, corrective action, or restructuring.  For more information, go to: www.ed.gov/programs/sif/guidance20100120.doc, pages 11-12.]

In its application to the state, each school district would be required to demonstrate its commitment to raising student achievement by implementing, in each Tier I and Tier II school, one of the following rigorous interventions:

• Turnaround Model – This would include among other actions, replacing the principal and at least 50 percent of the school’s staff, adopting a new governance structure and implementing a new or revised instructional program.
• Restart Model – School districts would close failing schools and reopen them under the management of a charter school operator, a charter management organization or an educational management organization selected through a rigorous review process. A restart school would be required to admit, within the grades it serves, any former student who wishes to attend.
• School Closure – The district would close a failing school and enroll the students who attended that school in other high-achieving schools in the district.
• Transformational Model – Districts would address four specific areas: 1) developing teacher and school leader effectiveness, which includes replacing the principal who led the school prior to commencement of the transformational model, 2) implementing comprehensive instructional reform strategies, 3) extending learning and teacher planning time and creating community-oriented schools, and 4) providing operating flexibility and sustained support.

Districts should choose the strategy that works best for each school. To ensure districts are choosing a variety of strategies, any district with nine or more schools in school improvement will not be allowed to use any single strategy in more than half of its schools.”   (http://www.ed.gov/news/pressreleases/2009/08/08262009.html)

How do Fast ForWord® and Reading Assistant™ products fit with the School Improvement Grant?

Improve student achievement

To date, students in almost 6,000 schools have achieved gains in language or reading skills with the Fast ForWord products. Numerous independent studies as well as detailed research and outcomes data consistently confirm the effectiveness of the products. After using the Fast ForWord and Reading Assistant products, students have shown gains in achievement on a variety of standardized tests and state assessments. For example, Fast ForWord participants in Everett Publics Schools in Everett, Massachusetts, made significant gains in reading achievement following Fast ForWord product use during the 2007-2008 school year. Sixty-six percent of the students improved their MCAS Reading score in 2008 with an average improvement of 4.6 points. Scientific Learning has over 200 school based effectiveness and case reports documenting the substantial gains in achievement made by students after using the Fast ForWord and Reading Assistant products.

Help Title I schools identified for improvement, corrective action, or restructuring so as to enable those schools to make adequate yearly progress (AYP) and exit improvement status  

With a background of over 30 years of neuroscience research and over 10 years of school site studies of effectiveness, Scientific Learning’s products have been shown to be proven intervention strategies for all schools, including those that are the lowest performing. The Fast ForWord Language and Fast ForWord Literacy series, with their cutting edge, neuroscience designed adaptivity and acoustically modified and enhanced sound, have been used successfully by students in low-performing schools in order to improve their cognitive, oral language, and reading skills. And both software series provide intensive support in a short period of time, from 4-16 weeks, depending on the scientifically validated protocol used.

Four Models of turning around schools:  

• Turnaround model: Implementing a new or revised instructional program – Fast ForWord and Reading Assistant fit well as part of a new or revised instructional program to use neuroscience based and proven learning techniques to turn around schools identified for improvement, corrective action, or restructuring.
• ReStart Model: Schools closed and re-starting will need scientifically based and proven educational tools like Fast ForWord and Reading Assistant in order to start anew and provide their struggling students with the cognitive, oral language, and reading skills that they need to succeed in all subject areas.
• School  Closure: Schools assimilating struggling students from closed schools will find that they need intervention products like Fast ForWord and Reading Assistant in order to help these students achieve grade level proficiency and assure that the school achieves or continues to achieve AYP.
• Transformational Model: Implementing comprehensive instructional reform strategies – Fast ForWord and Reading Assistant fit well as part of or as a supplement to any comprehensive instructional reform strategy, and indeed, the effects of the products are comprehensive, affecting student performance in all subject areas. Extending learning...time - Scientific Learning’s software can be implemented easily during extended hours.

Categories: Education Funding, Grants, and Stimulus, Fast ForWord, Reading Assistant, Scientific Learning Research

Tags: academic problems, academic success, achievement gap, ayp, below grade level, cognitive skills, elementary learning, elementary school learning, high school learning, improving reading skills, increased test scores, intervention, Massachusetts, MCAS, oral language skills, response to intervention tier i, response to intervention tier ii, rti tier i, rti tier ii, school leader effectiveness, struggling readers, struggling students, teacher effectiveness, title i

Can Scientific Learning Products Improve School Test Scores?

• June 2, 2010 by Norene Wiesen

When making a buying decision about educational software for a school or district, one of the most important questions to ask is whether the product is effective.  Administrators considering the Fast ForWord® and Reading Assistant™ products want to know: Do they help students learn and succeed?  Do they improve school test scores?  Are they evidence-based?

The answer to all of these questions is yes.  Scientific Learning products have been proven to improve language, reading, and cognitive skills as well as to improve school test scores on state assessments and other standardized tests for schools that follow the prescribed protocols.  Our Scientifically Based Research page is your starting point for exploring the 200+ studies that have evaluated the effectiveness of the programs and that serve as evidence of improved learning outcomes.

On average, students see a 1-2 year improvement in reading level on school test scores in as little as 8-12 weeks.  English language learners, struggling readers, and special education students have all been positively impacted.  So have students performing at grade level and above.

Here are just a few examples:

Dallas Independent School District, TX (View PDF)

• Four year longitudinal study
• Fast ForWord participants significantly improved their reading achievement scores on the TAKS state assessment and maintained their improved reading skills
• Average decrease in the achievement gap for the 544 Fast ForWord participants was 25%

St. Mary Parish Public School System, LA (View PDF)

• After using Fast ForWord products, percent of Centerville, LA, 4th graders scoring proficient on state assessments exceeds state average
• Marked improvement in 4th grade Math, Science, and Social Studies test scores, highlights the impact of Fast Forword products on improving cognitive and foundational skills

Bridges Academy, Winter Springs, FL (View PDF)

• A private school serving students with learning disabilities with a goal of improving reading skills
• Case study on 2nd through 10th graders to evaluate the effects of adding Reading Assistant software to their existing Fast ForWord implementation
• Reading Assistant and Fast ForWord products are used concurrently and students are assessed before and after use
• In an average of three months, the students at the school improve their grade equivalent test scores by an average of one year and three months on the Basic Skills Composite, which combines the Word Identification and Word Attack subtests

The benefits of Scientific Learning products go beyond improving state assessment scores.  Researchers have measured improvements in self-esteem, communication skills such as vocabulary and pronunciation, improvements in listening and understanding, and stronger memory for things like phone numbers and event sequences.  Review our scientifically based research for detailed information.

Categories: English Language Learners, Fast ForWord, Reading & Learning, Reading Assistant, Scientific Learning Research, Special Education

Tags: academic problems, academic success, achievement gap, brain training, child reading development, cognitive skills, elementary learning, elementary school learning, Florida, high school learning, improve test scores, improving reading skills, increased test scores, intervention, language learning, learning disabilities, literacy, Louisiana, math, memory, reading intervention, science, self-esteem, social studies, struggling readers, TAKS, Texas, vocabulary

Announcing Our Spring Webinar Series--Register today!

• April 27, 2010 by Denise Ruvalcaba

It’s almost here!  I’m happy to announce Scientific Learning’s Spring Webinar Series 2010 featuring five must-hear presentations by experienced, committed educators. 

Register for one or all five of the webinars and stimulate your own brain while you absorb ideas and techniques that you can use with your own students.

1) Building Brain Fitness for Struggling Students to Succeed

Presenter: Dr. Deborah Kolonay, Superintendent at Penn Trafford SD
Date & Time: Wednesday, May 12 at 10:00am Pacific

2) Teaching Fluency:  The Neglected Goal of the Reading Program

Presenter: Timothy Rasinski, Ph.D.
Date & Time: Wednesday, May 19 at 11:00am Pacific

3) Moving Students to Proficiency

Presenters: Dr. Mark Keen & Cindy Keever at Westfield Washington SD
Date & Time: Wednesday, May, 25 at 10:30am Pacific

4) Autism:  Support and Interventions

Presenter: Ann Osterling
Date & Time: Thursday, May 27 at 10:00am Pacific

5) Autism:  What is the Latest Research?

Presenter: Ann Osterling
Date & Time: Tuesday, June 15 at 10:00am Pacific

For a fuller description of each session, please visit our webinars page.  And be sure to follow @scilearn on Twitter for updates as the webinar dates approach!

Categories: Brain Fitness, Brain Research, Education Trends, Fast ForWord, Reading & Learning, Reading Assistant, Special Education

Tags: academic problems, academic success, autism, behavior, below grade level, child reading development, cognitive skills, fluency, high school learning, how children learn, increased test scores, Indiana, intervention, learning to read, literacy, Pennsylvania, phonics, reading intervention, struggling readers, technology in education, webinar

Brain Fitness Summit in Utah

• March 30, 2010 by Denise Ruvalcaba

More than 60 people from Utah's state legislature, school districts, and education organizations congregated in Salt Lake City recently to learn about literacy, neuroscience in education, and brain fitness at the March Brain Fitness Summit presented by Scientific Learning.

Dr. Martha Burns gave a presentation about brain plasticity and how boosting the brain's processing efficiency accelerates quality learning.  Guest speakers gave insightful and often emotional presentations about their experiences and how they funded and implemented Fast ForWord® and Reading Assistant™ software.

If you are a Superintendent, District/School Administrator, or Legislator and are interested in attending a Brain Fitness Summit, or if you wish to be placed on the mailing list to receive further information, email our Events team at brainevents@scilearn.com.

 

Categories: Brain Fitness, Education Funding, Grants, and Stimulus, Education Trends, Fast ForWord, Reading & Learning, Reading Assistant

Tags: accelerated learning, early learning, elementary learning, elementary school learning, high school learning, how children learn, innovation, intervention, literacy, processing, processing rate, reading intervention, struggling readers, technology in education

Learn about Scientific Learning Reading Intervention Products at the 2010 ASCD Conference

• February 9, 2010 by Denise Ruvalcaba

Are you a Superintendent, Assistant Superintendent, Director, or District-level Administrator attending the 2010 ASCD conference in San Antonio?  

Visit us March 6 - 8 at Booth #213 to learn about our research-validated Fast ForWord® and Reading Assistant™ reading interventions.  Schools around the United States have increased state assessment scores after implementing Scientific Learning products.  

And when you stop by, don't forget to pick up one of our ever-popular "squishy brains"—a reminder of the importance of brain fitness in learning, and a great conversation piece.

Categories: Brain Fitness, Fast ForWord, Reading & Learning, Reading Assistant

Tags: assessments, education conference, increased test scores, reading intervention, struggling readers