No statistically significant positive
findings
Meets WWC standards with reservations
Rating:
-
Meets WWC standards with reservations
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 Accelerated Reader.
Comprehension outcomes—Statistically significant positive effect found for the domain
Outcome measure
|
Comparison
|
Period
|
Sample
|
Intervention mean
|
Comparison mean
|
Significant?
|
Improvement index
|
Evidence tier
|
Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAC): Reading subtest
|
Accelerated Reader vs.
Business as usual
|
End of year 2
|
Grade 8: Cohort 2;
992 students
|
90.67
|
88.56
|
No
|
--
|
|
Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAC): Reading subtest
|
Accelerated Reader vs.
Business as usual
|
End of year 2
|
Grade 5: Cohort 2;
891 students
|
91.53
|
90.64
|
No
|
--
|
|
Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAC): Reading subtest
|
Accelerated Reader vs.
Business as usual
|
End of year 2
|
Grade 5: Cohort 1;
912 students
|
88.44
|
89.45
|
No
|
--
|
|
Evidence Tier rating based solely on this study. This intervention may achieve a higher tier when combined with the full body of evidence.
Characteristics of study sample as reported by study author.
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7%
English language learners
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Suburban
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- B
- A
- C
- D
- E
- F
- G
- I
- H
- J
- K
- L
- P
- M
- N
- O
- Q
- R
- S
- V
- U
- T
- W
- X
- Z
- Y
- a
- h
- i
- b
- d
- e
- f
- c
- g
- j
- k
- l
- m
- n
- o
- p
- q
- r
- s
- t
- u
- v
- x
- w
- y
Texas
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Race
Asian |
|
3% |
Black |
|
8% |
Native American |
|
0% |
White |
|
71% |
-
Ethnicity
Hispanic |
|
17% |
Not Hispanic or Latino |
|
83% |
Setting
The study took place in 18 elementary and 4 middle/junior high schools from nine districts in Texas. All 11 intervention schools were located in a suburban school district.
Study sample
The intervention group consisted of 11 schools that implemented Accelerated Reader™. Two steps were used to identify comparison schools. The first step was taken to narrow the pool of potential comparison schools. In this step, the researchers used data from the Academic Excellence Indicator System (AEIS), which identifies—for each school in Texas (including the 11 treatment schools in this study)—40 demographically similar schools based on the percentage of African-American students, Hispanic students, white students, economically disadvantaged students, limited English proficient students, and student mobility. In the second step, from the group of 40 potential comparison schools identified for each treatment school, the most similar school not using Accelerated Reader™ was selected according to the schools’ base-year accountability rating (low performing, acceptable, recognized, exemplary) and base-year percentage of economically disadvantaged students. One of the selected comparison schools declined to participate, and another two did not have appropriate grade-level scores for use in the study. These three comparison schools were replaced from the pool of similar schools. The analytic sample consisted of students in grades 5 and 8 who had three consecutive years of data between school years 1998/99 and 2001/02 (cohort 1 students had data from the 1998/99 through 2000/01 school years, and cohort 2 students had data from the 1999/2000 through 2001/02 school years). The cohort 1 grade 5 analysis sample included 442 intervention students from nine schools who received Accelerated Reader™ in the 1999/2000 and 2000/01 school years and 470 nonparticipants from nine matched elementary schools. The cohort 2 grade 5 analysis sample consisted of 437 students from nine schools who received Accelerated Reader™ in the 1999/2000, 2000/01, and 2001/02 school years and 454 nonparticipants from nine matched elementary schools. The cohort 2 grade 8 analysis sample consisted of 482 students in two schools who received Accelerated Reader™ in the 1999/2000, 2000/01, and 2001/02 school years and 510 nonparticipants from two matched middle/junior high schools. Outcomes were measured at the end of the second year of intervention implementation for cohort 1 and at the end of the third year of intervention implementation for cohort 2.
Intervention Group
According to study authors, Accelerated Reader™ was the primary reading curriculum in intervention schools. The study did not provide details on how the intervention was implemented.
Comparison Group
The comparison schools did not implement Accelerated Reader™ during the school years under study. No information is available on the reading curricula used in these schools.
Outcome descriptions
For both pre- and posttests, the authors used the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS), Reading subtest. For a more detailed description of this outcome measure, see Appendix A2.2.
Support for implementation
No information on staff or teacher training was provided in the study.
In the case of multiple manuscripts that report on one study, the WWC selects one manuscript as the primary citation and lists other manuscripts that describe the study as additional sources.
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Nunnery, John A.; Ross, Steven M.; Goldfeder, Elizabeth. (2003). The Effect of School Renaissance on TAAS Scores in the McKinney ISD. Center for Research in Educational Policy (CREP).