Recently, the What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) produced a systematic review on the effectiveness of Reading Apprenticeship, a professional development program that can be delivered online or in person. The program leads teachers to help their students develop reading comprehension and acquire interest, engagement, and confidence in reading. It also aims to enhance social-emotional learning, as well as academic achievement in math, reading, science and social sciences for middle and high school students. This review focuses on the effects on academic achievement. Five out of the nine studies located from a literature search met the WWC inclusion criteria. The selected studies were randomized control trials involving a total of 22,176 American students in grade 7-9. The most assessed outcomes were reading comprehension (n=5) and literacy achievement (n=3); mathematics achievement was assessed by two studies; science, general academic achievement, social sciences, and vocabulary were assessed only by one study, and life sciences...

Physical activity, defined as bodily movement produced by skeletal muscles that result in energy expenditure (World Health Organization), has been shown to be beneficial to developing cognitive function in children, where cognitive function (CF) refers to basal mental operation, such as perception, memory, and executive function. Physical activity (PA) intervention can be classified into two categories: acute PA, which involves a single short-term bout (between 10 - 40 min), and chronic PA, which entails multiple sessions per week or month for an extended period (e.g., 6 weeks). The underlying mechanisms of these two types of PA are different so the effect of PA interventions (acute vs chronic) on improving CF in children may also be different. Song and colleagues conducted a meta-analysis to investigate the effect of acute and chronic PA interventions on the cognitive function of preschool children. Eligible studies were those that targeted preschool children aged 2-6 years,...

How can the United States bridge math proficiency gaps? Ensuring equitable opportunities for students to receive adequate preparation and access to advanced math is critical to the equation. This is due to the clear benefits of learning advanced math in high school, such as increased options for majoring in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, higher rates of college acceptance, and greater opportunities for college scholarships and financial aid. Despite these benefits, a significant portion of high school students are either not being offered the opportunity to take or are opting out of advanced math courses. A recent report from RAND identified gaps in students’ opportunities to access advanced math and provided recommended support to address these gaps. This report utilized data from nationally representative surveys of teachers and school leaders in kindergarten through grade 12 during the 2021-2022 school year. The findings indicated that fewer advanced math courses were offered...

A high-dosage math tutoring program, modeled after Saga Education in the U.S., was developed in the Netherlands through a collaboration of schools, funders and providers to support students from low-income families. The program was delivered by a tutor to student pairs four times a week for an entire school year. In the sessions tutors reviewed mathematical concepts introduced by the teachers to the whole class, as well as personalized the instruction based on student needs. A recent evaluation assessed the effectiveness of this program in fourth and fifth grade. The study randomly assigned 434 students to the experimental group or to the control group for one school year. Using the national math and reading tests to assess the effectiveness of the program, results showed a significant improvement in math achievement (ES = +0.28) in both grade 4 and 5. No effects were found in reading. The authors’ conclusion affirms that...

Recently, Mathematica reported the results of  an evaluation study  of the Math Corps’ Tutoring Program, an evidence-based math tutoring program delivering personalized support to all students, in particular students who are Black, Latino, and/or in poverty. During two school years (i.e., 2020–2021 and 2021–2022), the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation funded the rapid-cycle evaluations of a cohort of 10 tutoring providers seeking to understand how different tutoring models lead to improved academic outcomes. Mathematica worked with each one of the tutoring providers to identify the most rigorous and feasible study design within a one-to-three-month planning period. Math Corps’ quasi-experimental study used a mixed methods analysis. Their evaluation matched AmeriCorps tutors with schools to support approximately 24 students in grades 4 through 8, in pairs or groups of three, for 90 minutes each week in 30- to 45-minute, in-person sessions. The evaluation encountered some delays in gathering data, affecting both the...

A recent publication in Language Teaching Research compared the effect of a gamified collaborative intervention to non-gamified collaborative learning on students’ English reading outcomes and motivation. The participants were two classes of junior secondary students at a school in northern China. One class (N=52) was assigned to the experiment group receiving gamified instruction, while another class (N=52), the control group, received non-gamified instruction. All students were native speakers of Chinese learning English as a foreign language. Both groups received their assigned program on learning word meaning through morphological analysis for a total of ten 55-minute sessions from the same instructor with the same materials, but only the experimental group was exposed to physical game elements.  Although both gamification and game-based learning share game-design elements, they differ in nature. Game-based learning involves the design of complete games, while gamification only employs game-design elements to make learning more game-like. In this research,...

Although an associate degree has been shown to increase graduates’ earnings and job security, many community college students struggle to graduate. About 66% of community college students are mandated to take remedial classes, and 60% of the remedial courses required are for math. Remedial courses usually do not earn college credit, meaning students take longer to complete their education. A longer pathway increases the chances that students will not finish their degree, leading to lower earning potential for those who dropped out than those who finished their degree. A recent study described the results of a randomized controlled trial (RCT), testing the benefits of a new program assigning students at risk of math challenges to additional support at the same time that they were taking statistics in their first year of community college. Several programs experimenting with this kind of corequisite support have provided students with background knowledge and instruction...

According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) scores, elementary students who struggle with mathematics do not experience the same progress in their performance as those who excel in the subject over time. The gap between the highest and lowest performing students has widened to such an extent that students who struggle with this subject are now trailing further behind than in over a decade. Based on the interventions that have demonstrated success in improving achievement for students who are struggling with mathematics, the What Works Clearinghouse, in conjunction with an expert panel, has developed a guide to summarize six practical recommendations for teachers who teach mathematics to elementary students with low test scores. The six recommendations include providing systematic instruction, teaching mathematical language, applying well-chosen and semi-concrete representations, using number lines, teaching strategies for word problems, and conducting timed activities.   Source (Open Access): Fuchs, L.S., Newman-Gonchar, R.,...

One commonly employed approach for managing difficult and disruptive conduct in school environments is through the implementation of self-management interventions. It refers to a set of techniques that students are taught to use in order to assess and monitor their own behaviors. A recent Campbell Systematic review looked at the impact of self-management interventions delivered at school to improve K-12 student behavior in the classroom. The review included experimental studies that either assigned groups or single students to the intervention or the control group, yielding 75 single-case studies and 4 group studies. The average effect size for single-case studies was +0.69, with higher effects for students in special education and for African American students. The average effect size for group studies was +0.63, but the effect could be influenced by the small number of studies.   Source (Open Access): Smith, T. E., Thompson, A. M., & Maynard, B. R. (2022)....