Our Research

Evaluation of Earobics and Building Blocks in English language learners and low SES minority children

Principal Investigator

Overall Project Principal Investigator: Jason Lon Anthony, Ph.D., University of Texas Health Science Center Houston

Purpose of the Project

The purposes of this experimental study are to (a) test the efficacy of fully-developed and widely-used commercial literacy and mathematics programs (Earobics Step 1 http://www.earobics.com/ and Building Blocks https://www.realmath.com/ds_login.html) in separate samples of low SES minority children and low SES English language learners (ELLs) and to (b) compare the efficacy of standard implementation of Earobics Step 1 to theoretically motivated variations in instructional sequencing of this program.

Description of the Project

Earobics Step 1 is a computer-based literacy tutor for children ages 4 to 7 years. Colorful, interactive games with instructional feedback teach phonological awareness (PA), phonological short-term memory (STM), and letter-sound correspondence. Building Blocks is a computer-based mathematics tutor for children in prekindergarten to grade six. Colorful, interactive games with instructional feedback teach spatial and geometric competencies, numeric and quantitative concepts, patterns and functions, classifying, sorting, and sequencing. The programs being evaluated in this project are used by classroom teachers, special educators, speech-language pathologists, and parents to instruct a broad range of children, e.g., typically developing children, children with speech and language disorders, children with learning disabilities, ELLs, and probably children from every ethnic and socioeconomic class represented in US schools.

This study is being implemented in public schools in Houston, Texas. Participants include low SES, Hispanic ELLs and low SES, monolingual African American speakers of English. These populations were selected because they are at high risk for reading problems and academic failure in the US and because no methodologically rigorous efficacy trials of Earobics Step 1 or Building Blocks have been conducted with these growing and sizable populations. Approximately 1,000 kindergarten children will participate in this four year project.

The study design involves random assignment of individuals, control groups, well specified intervention procedures, carefully selected participants, ample measurement of children’s achievement, and statistical analysis that consider potential covariates, moderators, and the nested structure of student data. Experimental conditions consist of three variations of Earobics Step 1 (standard implementation, developmentally sequenced PA instruction, reversed sequenced PA instruction) and one mathematics control condition (Building Blocks). Instructional variations in Earobics Step 1 are based on research and theory that indicate these sequences should yield quicker and broader learning than the commonplace implementation.

Children’s learning of cognitive, literacy, and mathematics skills are being measured at multiple time points during the year of intervention and at annual follow-up assessments through Grade 2. Within a multilevel modeling framework, individual growth curve analysis and ANCOVAs will test for main effects of intervention group and interaction effects with demographic sample on children’s rates of learning short- and medium-term achievement. Group contrasts will examine relative efficacy of variations in Earobics Step 1 and Building Blocks on targeted and nontargeted cognitive skills and achievement.

This project has the potential to inform development of literacy curricula, foster achievement in sizable at-risk populations, and inform schools about the efficacy of these widely used literacy and mathematics tutors.

Sites

This study is being implemented in public schools in Houston, Texas.

Timeline

Approximately 1,000 kindergarten children will participate in this four year project.

For More Information, Contact

Children's Learning Institute
7000 Fannin Suite, 2300
Houston, TX 77030
Phone: (713) 500-3709

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