Walton, Patrick D.; Bowden, Michael E.; Kurtz, Shelly L.; Angus, Mary (2001). Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal, v14 n3-4 p229-64 . Retrieved from: https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ629160
Reviewed: April 2023
This review may not reflect the full body of research evidence for this intervention.
Evidence Tier rating based solely on this study. This intervention may achieve a higher tier when combined with the full body of evidence.
|
Outcome measure |
Comparison | Period | Sample |
Intervention mean |
Comparison mean |
Significant? |
Improvement index |
Evidence tier |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Letter-Sounds |
Rime-based reading program—Walton et al. (2001) vs. Business as usual |
0 Weeks |
Full sample;
|
15.62 |
10.99 |
No |
-- |
|
Outcome measure |
Comparison | Period | Sample |
Intervention mean |
Comparison mean |
Significant? |
Improvement index |
Evidence tier |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Yopp Sound Isolation Test - Final Phoneme Identity |
Rime-based reading program—Walton et al. (2001) vs. Business as usual |
0 Weeks |
Full sample;
|
3.10 |
1.38 |
No |
-- | |
|
Yopp Sound Isolation Test - Initial Phoneme Identity |
Rime-based reading program—Walton et al. (2001) vs. Business as usual |
0 Weeks |
Full sample;
|
3.93 |
2.63 |
No |
-- | |
|
Rhyming oddity |
Rime-based reading program—Walton et al. (2001) vs. Business as usual |
0 Weeks |
Full sample;
|
9.31 |
7.03 |
No |
-- | |
|
Yopp Sound Isolation Test - Total Phoneme Identity |
Rime-based reading program—Walton et al. (2001) vs. Business as usual |
0 Weeks |
Full sample;
|
8.93 |
5.78 |
No |
-- | |
|
Yopp Sound Isolation Test - Medial Phoneme Identity |
Rime-based reading program—Walton et al. (2001) vs. Business as usual |
0 Weeks |
Full sample;
|
2.23 |
1.53 |
No |
-- |
Characteristics of study sample as reported by study author.
The study was conducted in a Shuswap First Nations School on a reserve near a medium sized city in British Columbia, Canada. The intervention was administered in small groups (2-4 students per group) and was delivered in a room adjacent to the classroom.
1. The small group instruction (n=2-4 students at a time) was designed to teach students to read new words using a rhyme based reading strategy and through training in the implicated prereading skills of rhyming, initial phoneme identification, and letter-sound knowledge. Instruction was provided on each topic separately with equal time spent on each. 2. Sessions began with 2-3 minutes of direct instruction given both to the group as a whole and to individual students. 3. Next, students played cooperative games designed to provide experience with the skill taught during direct instruction. They were provided with hand puppets while playing the games to retain interest. --Add-on or stand-alone intervention: The intervention consisted of stand-alone sessions delivered as a supplement to regular classroom instruction. --Number of lessons, frequency, and duration: Students received two intervention sessions each week for ten weeks. Each session lasted 25 minutes. --Home component: There was no home component. --Intervention implementer: The study does not describe implementers of the intervention, except to specify that it was a researcher who was not of First Nations background. --Materials used: The intervention involved use of 12 cooperative games. --Scripted: The intervention did not appear to be scripted. --Formative assessment: The intervention did not appear to include any formative assessments.
Students in the control group received small group sessions (2-4 students per group) that were delivered twice a week and lasted 25 minutes each. During the sessions, the researcher read storybooks selected by the students from the classroom or from among those provided by the researcher.
Reviewed: February 2023
This review may not reflect the full body of research evidence for this intervention.
Evidence Tier rating based solely on this study. This intervention may achieve a higher tier when combined with the full body of evidence.
|
Outcome measure |
Comparison | Period | Sample |
Intervention mean |
Comparison mean |
Significant? |
Improvement index |
Evidence tier |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Phoneme segmentation |
Letter recoding instruction—Walton et al. (2001) vs. Business as usual |
0 Weeks |
Letter recoding vs. typical instruction;
|
17.23 |
8.38 |
No |
-- | |
|
Yopp Sound Isolation Test - Total Phoneme Identity |
Letter recoding instruction—Walton et al. (2001) vs. Business as usual |
0 Weeks |
Letter recoding vs. typical instruction;
|
7.29 |
5.60 |
No |
-- | |
|
Generating rhyme |
Letter recoding instruction—Walton et al. (2001) vs. Business as usual |
0 Weeks |
Letter recoding vs. typical instruction;
|
5.98 |
5.12 |
No |
-- | |
|
Rhyming oddity |
Letter recoding instruction—Walton et al. (2001) vs. Business as usual |
0 Weeks |
Letter recoding vs. typical instruction;
|
5.19 |
5.27 |
No |
-- |
Characteristics of study sample as reported by study author.
Four research assistants delivered the interventions to groups of 2-4 students in spare rooms near the classrooms. Each classroom was assigned a single research assistant, so each research assistant delivered both the Letter Recoding and Rime Analogy interventions. Research assistants provided no instruction to the No Contact group, but did administer the pre- and posttest assessments to all students in a classroom regardless of experimental condition. The schools from which students were selected to participate in the study are in low to high socioeconomic areas of a medium-sized city in British Columbia, Canada.
Students in "Experiment 2" are in kindergarten with an average age of 5 years and 8 months with a SD of 3.64 years. The youngest student is 5 years and 2 months, and the oldest is 6 years and 5 months. Three students with "severe language impairments" were excluded from the study.
(1) Small groups of 2-4 students were pulled out of their classroom by one of four research assistants, twice a week for 11 weeks in approximately 25 minute sessions. (2) The research assistant provides 1-2 minutes of direct instruction in prereading skills and the intervention reading strategy. Letter recoding instruction involved presenting students with written words and demonstrating how to sound out the letters in sequence and then combine the sounds to say the word. (3) Following the direct instruction, children played one of three reading strategy-specific cooperative games, or one of two or three prereading skill-specific cooperative games. The research assistant would model letter recoding skills when students struggled in the games.
Students in the control group (i.e., No Contact received regular classroom instruction and only interacted with the research assistants for pretesting and posttesting.
The research assistants received training in an unreported number of sessions held prior to pretesting, and then weekly during the study. Two of the assistants were certified and experienced teachers, and the other two were education university students selected for high academic standing.
Reviewed: June 2016
This review may not reflect the full body of research evidence for this intervention.
Evidence Tier rating based solely on this study. This intervention may achieve a higher tier when combined with the full body of evidence.
An indicator of the effect of the intervention, the improvement index can be interpreted as the expected change in percentile rank for an average comparison group student if that student had received the intervention.
For more, please see the WWC Glossary entry for improvement index.
An outcome is the knowledge, skills, and attitudes that are attained as a result of an activity. An outcome measures is an instrument, device, or method that provides data on the outcome.
A finding that is included in the effectiveness rating. Excluded findings may include subgroups and subscales.
The sample on which the analysis was conducted.
The group to which the intervention group is compared, which may include a different intervention, business as usual, or no services.
The timing of the post-intervention outcome measure.
The number of students included in the analysis.
The mean score of students in the intervention group.
The mean score of students in the comparison group.
The WWC considers a finding to be statistically significant if the likelihood that the finding is due to chance alone, rather than a real difference, is less than five percent.
The WWC reviews studies for WWC products, Department of Education grant competitions, and IES performance measures.
The name and version of the document used to guide the review of the study.
The version of the WWC design standards used to guide the review of the study.
The result of the WWC assessment of the study. The rating is based on the strength of evidence of the effectiveness of the intervention. Studies are given a rating of Meets WWC Design Standards without Reservations, Meets WWC Design Standards with Reservations, or >Does Not Meet WWC Design Standards.
A related publication that was reviewed alongside the main study of interest.
Study findings for this report.
Based on the direction, magnitude, and statistical significance of the findings within a domain, the WWC characterizes the findings from a study as one of the following: statistically significant positive effects, substantively important positive effects, indeterminate effects, substantively important negative effects, and statistically significant negative effects. For more, please see the WWC Handbook.
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Tier 2 Moderate indicates moderate evidence of effectiveness, and
Tier 3 Promising indicates promising evidence of effectiveness,
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