Study: 86416

Practice Guide

Review Details

Reviewed: February 2020

At least one finding shows promising evidence of effectiveness

At least one statistically significant positive finding

Meets WWC standards without reservations

For:

Practice Guide (findings for Targeted Math Intervention)

Using:

Rating:

Meets WWC standards without reservations because it is a randomized controlled trial with low attrition.

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.

Findings

Counting and Cardinality outcomes—Statistically significant positive effect found for the domain
Outcome measure	Comparison	Period	Sample	Intervention mean	Comparison mean	Significant?	Improvement index
Number Sense Screener	Targeted Math Intervention vs. Business as usual	0 Days	Aggregated sample: Number-fact Practice Condition + Number-list Practice Condition vs. Comparison; 126 students	30.66	25.74	Yes	24
Show Supplemental Findings
Number Sense Screener	Targeted Math Intervention vs. Business as usual	8 Weeks	Aggregated sample: Number-fact Practice Condition + Number-list Practice Condition vs. Comparison; 126 students	33.52	29.69	Yes	18

Whole Numbers Computation outcomes—Statistically significant positive effect found for the domain
Outcome measure	Comparison	Period	Sample	Intervention mean	Comparison mean	Significant?	Improvement index
Arithmetic Fluency	Targeted Math Intervention vs. Business as usual	0 Days	Aggregated sample: Number-fact Practice Condition + Number-list Practice Condition vs. Comparison; 126 students	7.52	4.55	Yes	28
Woodcock-Johnson III Tests of Achievement (WJ-III) Standard Test Book Form A: Calculation subtest	Targeted Math Intervention vs. Business as usual	0 Days	Aggregated sample: Number-fact Practice Condition + Number-list Practice Condition vs. Comparison; 126 students	5.09	3.21	Yes	24
Show Supplemental Findings
Arithmetic Fluency	Targeted Math Intervention vs. Business as usual	8 Weeks	Aggregated sample: Number-fact Practice Condition + Number-list Practice Condition vs. Comparison; 126 students	8.33	6.29	Yes	19
Woodcock-Johnson III Tests of Achievement (WJ-III) Standard Test Book Form A: Calculation subtest	Targeted Math Intervention vs. Business as usual	8 Weeks	Aggregated sample: Number-fact Practice Condition + Number-list Practice Condition vs. Comparison; 126 students	6.02	5.17	No	--

Evidence Tier rating based solely on this study. This intervention may achieve a higher tier when combined with the full body of evidence.

Sample Characteristics

Characteristics of study sample as reported by study author.

41% English language learners
Female: 51%
Male: 49%

Race
Black		24%
Other or unknown		55%
White		21%

Ethnicity
Hispanic		51%
Not Hispanic or Latino		49%

Study Details

Setting

The study was conducted in four schools from two school districts. The study took place in a medium-size metropolitan area. The authors noted that these schools were selected because they all had a large proportion of students living in poverty (48% to 93% of students eligible for free-or-reduced-price lunch).

Study sample

The analytic sample was 49% male and 51% female. Approximately 24% of students were African American; 51% were Hispanic, and 21% Caucasian. About 41% of students were identified as English learner students because they were enrolled in bilingual classrooms. On average, children in the analysis sample were 66 months old.

Intervention Group

Students in both intervention conditions participated in 24 30-minutes lessons over an 8 week period. The interventions were provided to small groups of students (n = 4). Students participated in instruction that aimed to improve their number-sense skills. Instruction was provided in four areas: number, number relations, and number operations. Students in both intervention conditions received 25 minutes of the same number sense intervention. The last 5 minutes of instruction differed for each group. In the Number-list Practice condition, students spent the last five minutes playing a number line board game based on Ramani & Siegler's (2008) Great Race game. Students in the Number-fact Practice condition practiced basic number fact fluency.

Comparison Group

In three of the four schools that had set aside time for intervention, children in the control condition participated in their school’s typical mathematics intervention. In the fourth school, control students participated in non-academic instruction during the time when the intervention we being delivered.

Support for implementation

Interventionists were provided with scripted lessons. No other support was reported.

A Kindergarten Number-Sense Intervention with Contrasting Practice Conditions for Low-Achieving Children [Number sense intervention with number-fact practice or number-list practice vs. control]