Johnston, Rhona S.; Watson, Joyce E. (2004). Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal, v17 n4 p327-357 Jun 2004. Retrieved from: https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ736015
Reviewed: February 2024
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Schonell Spelling Test |
Synthetics phonics – Johnston & Watson (2004) vs. Other intervention |
9 Months |
Synthetic phonics vs. accelerated letter training;
|
6.30 |
5.40 |
Yes |
|
|
|
Outcome measure |
Comparison | Period | Sample |
Intervention mean |
Comparison mean |
Significant? |
Improvement index |
Evidence tier |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Letter knowledge |
Synthetics phonics – Johnston & Watson (2004) vs. Other intervention |
0 Months |
Synthetic phonics vs. no-letter training;
|
51.11 |
30.40 |
Yes |
|
|
|
| Show Supplemental Findings | |||||||||
|
Letter knowledge |
Synthetics phonics – Johnston & Watson (2004) vs. Other intervention |
3 Months |
Synthetic phonics vs. no-letter training;
|
61.20 |
49.60 |
No |
-- | ||
|
Outcome measure |
Comparison | Period | Sample |
Intervention mean |
Comparison mean |
Significant? |
Improvement index |
Evidence tier |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Clay Ready to Read Word Test |
Synthetics phonics – Johnston & Watson (2004) vs. Other intervention |
0 Months |
Synthetic phonics vs. no-letter training;
|
25.72 |
8.00 |
Yes |
|
|
|
|
British Ability Scales Word Reading Test |
Synthetics phonics – Johnston & Watson (2004) vs. Other intervention |
0 Months |
Synthetic phonics vs. no-letter training;
|
5.40 |
5.00 |
Yes |
|
|
|
| Show Supplemental Findings | |||||||||
|
Nonword reading |
Synthetics phonics – Johnston & Watson (2004) vs. Business as usual |
9 Months |
Synthetic phonics vs. no-letter training;
|
54.92 |
14.60 |
Yes |
|
||
|
Clay Ready to Read Word Test |
Synthetics phonics – Johnston & Watson (2004) vs. Other intervention |
9 Months |
Synthetic phonics vs. no-letter training;
|
50.14 |
24.80 |
Yes |
|
||
|
Clay Ready to Read Word Test |
Synthetics phonics – Johnston & Watson (2004) vs. Other intervention |
3 Months |
Synthetic phonics vs. no-letter training;
|
43.92 |
22.50 |
Yes |
|
||
|
British Ability Scales Word Reading Test |
Synthetics phonics – Johnston & Watson (2004) vs. Other intervention |
9 Months |
Synthetic phonics vs. no-letter training;
|
6.31 |
5.60 |
Yes |
|
||
|
British Ability Scales Word Reading Test |
Synthetics phonics – Johnston & Watson (2004) vs. Other intervention |
3 Months |
Synthetic phonics vs. no-letter training;
|
5.69 |
5.30 |
Yes |
|
||
Characteristics of study sample as reported by study author.
The interventions took place during the school day, but students were pulled out of their classrooms for the intervention. Each intervention was administered in groups of 4 to 5.
The study takes place in Clackmannanshire and/or Fife, Scotland. Participants consisted of students in four Primary 1 classrooms in 2 schools. Children had an average age of 5 at the time of the pretest, and all spoke English as a first language.
Children in all three conditions participated in their regular classroom reading program. In this program, children were introduced to vocabulary using pictures. After the intervention began, teachers used an analytic phonics program and taught a new letter sound each week. Students were pulled out of their classroom for the interventions, which occurred in two 15-minute sessions each week for ten weeks. Each group was exposed to the same list of words. The synthetic phonics group was the intervention group in all comparisons. SYNTHETIC PHONICS GROUP 1. The interventionist showed children a letter and asked them to repeat its sound. 2. Children were asked to identify the letter corresponding to the sound in several words. 3. Following the interventionist's lead, children sounded each letter of a word and blended the phonemes. 4. Children participated in activities to practice blending phonemes. - The study does not mention a home component. - One of the study's authors implemented all three interventions. - Materials used in the interventions included a word and picture book (all three interventions) and magnetic letters and magnetic boards (synthetic phonics). - The study does not indicate whether the interventions were scripted.. - The study does not indicate that a formative assessment was used.
There are two potential comparison groups, depending on the outcome measure. NO-LETTER TRAINING GROUP 1. The interventionist asked children to identify the picture corresponding to a word that the interventionist speaks. 2. The interventionist showed children the written word corresponding to the picture. 3. Children played games to practice associating pictures with whole words. ACCELERATED LETTER LEARNING GROUP 1. The interventionist showed children pictures and asked them to say the name of the object in each picture. 2. The interventionist showed children the printed word associated with each picture. 3. The interventionist asked children to point to the words that started with a particular letter. 4. The interventionist asked children to repeat the letter sound on its own. 5. This process was repeated, introducing two new letter sounds each week. Although the authors sometimes refer to the No-letter training and Accelerated Letter Learning groups as control groups, students in all conditions were pulled out of their regular classrooms for an intervention.
The interventionist for all conditions was an author of the study. No information is provided on her training.
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.
Reviewed: June 2012
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.
Please see the WWC summary of evidence for Phonological Awareness Training.
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.
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Study findings for this report.
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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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