|
|
Overview1
Program Description2
Saxon Math is a textbook series covering grades K–12 based on incremental development and continual review of mathematical concepts to give students time to learn and practice concepts throughout the year. The series is aligned with standards of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) and various states, and can be adapted for special education students in inclusion classrooms, pullout programs, or self-contained resource classrooms. Although content differs by course, the incremental, distributed approach of Saxon Math is the same, with mathematical concepts presented in a series of short “lessons” intended to gradually build understanding and previously-taught concepts practiced and assessed throughout the course. Developed in the early 1980s, Saxon Math included four middle school math textbooks used in the studies included in this intervention report. The series has been redesigned and now offers three textbooks for middle school grades. This report includes studies that investigate the potential impact of Saxon Math texts on math achievement of middle school students but does not include these revised texts.
Research3
One study of Saxon Math meets What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) evidence standards, and four studies meet WWC evidence standards with reservations. The five studies included over 6,500 students from grades 6 to 8 in 52 schools in four states.4
Based on these five studies, the WWC considers the extent of evidence for Saxon Math to be medium to large for math achievement.
Effectiveness
Saxon Math was found to have mixed effects on math achievement.
| Math achievement | |
|---|---|
| Rating of effectiveness | Mixed effects |
| Improvement index5 | Average: +9 percentile points Range: +6 to +16 percentile points |
2 The descriptive information for this program was obtained from publicly available sources: the program’s website (http://saxonpublishers.hmhco.com, downloaded December 2008), and directly from the authors in the case of Resendez and Azin (2006). 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. The literature search reflects documents publicly available by August 2008.
3 The studies 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 These numbers show the average and range of student-level improvement indices for all findings across the studies.