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What Works Clearinghouse

U.S. Department of Education
Institute of Education Sciences
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Intervention: SuccessMaker®

Overview


Program Description1

The SuccessMaker® program is a set of computer-based courses used to supplement regular classroom reading instruction in grades K–8. Using adaptive lessons tailored to a student’s reading level, SuccessMaker® aims to improve understanding in areas such as phonological awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension, and concepts of print. "Foundations" courses aim to help students develop and maintain reading skills. "Exploreware" courses aim to provide opportunities for exploration, open-ended instruction, and development of analytical skills. The computer analyzes students’ skills development and assigns specific segments of the program, introducing new skills as they become appropriate. As the student progresses through the program, performance is measured by the probability of the student answering the next exercise correctly, which determines the next steps of the lesson.2

Research

Three studies of SuccessMaker® meet What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) evidence standards3 with reservations. The three studies included 450 students, ranging in age from nine to 16 years, who attended elementary, middle, and middle-high schools in Alabama, Illinois, and Virginia.4

Based on these three studies, the WWC considers the extent of evidence for SuccessMaker® to be small for alphabetics, reading fluency, and general literacy achievement, and medium to large for comprehension.5

Effectiveness

SuccessMaker® was found to have no discernible effects on alphabetics and reading fluency, and potentially positive effects on comprehension and general literacy achievement.

  Alphabetics Reading fluency Comprehension General literacy
achievement
Rating of effectiveness No discernible effects No discernible effects Potentially positive effects Potentially positive effects
Improvement index6 Average: +1 percentile point

Range: –8 to +5 percentile points		 +9 percentile points


na		 Average: +11 percentile points

Range: +1 to +15 percentile points		 +11 percentile points


na
na = not applicable
1 The descriptive information for this program was obtained from a publicly available source: the developer’s website (http://www.pearsoned.com, downloaded December 2008). The WWC requests developers to review the program description sections for accuracy from their perspective. Further verification of the accuracy of the descriptive information for this program is beyond the scope of this review.
2 The most current version of the program is called SuccessMaker®. Earlier versions were called SuccessMaker® Enterprise and Computer Curriculum Corporation (CCC) SuccessMaker®. We were unable to obtain documentation on the similarities and differences between these versions from the developer.
3 The studies included in this report were reviewed using WWC Evidence Standards, Version 1.0 (see the WWC Standards).
4 The evidence presented in this report is based on available research. Findings and conclusions may change as new research becomes available.
5 A rating of "medium to large" requires at least two studies and two schools across studies in one domain and a total sample size across studies of at least 350 students or 14 classrooms. Otherwise, the rating is "small."
6 These numbers show the average and range of student-level improvement indices for all findings across the studies.


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