A study examining results from over 360 students during the 2023-2024 school year reaffirmed the success of the Just Words® program in providing effective intervention support to improve skills for students with decoding, word study, and spelling gaps. This study qualified as an ESSA (Every Student Succeeds Act) Level 3 study. ESSA evidence provides educators with reliable, easy-to-use information on programs and practices that meet the standards of evidence established in ESSA.
This study analyzed results on two measures, the WIST (Word Identification and Spelling Test) and the TOSWRF-2 (Test of Silent Word Reading Fluency, 2nd edition) from students in grades 4-12 across eight schools in four districts.
Researchers found that Just Words® students:
- Outperformed their peers, who did not participate in Just Words,in word identification and spelling, with statistically significant gains and large and mediumeffect sizes across multiple measures of word identification and spelling.
- As measured by the WIST, students’ abilities to read and spell real words improved, in addition to their ability to read pseudowords. This suggests that students can apply the concepts learned in Just Words to tackle previously unseen words.
- Improved performance on the TOSWRF-2, a timed measure of word-reading accuracy, suggests that students were able to improve their fluency by identifying words more quickly and accurately. Fluent reading is associated with improved comprehension.
- Demonstrated significant improvements in literacy skills across the grade levels compared to those receiving business-as-usual (standard) instruction.
- High school students made nearly 2 years’ worth of growth in one calendar year, and middle school (6-8) and upper elementary (4-5) students made at least one year’s growth, despite these populations spending less than 15% of their daily learning time (based on a 6- or 7-hour day) in the program and being historically striving readers who are associated with decelerated learning rates. This rate of growth exceeds what is expected from standard instruction that may not include intervention that Just Words provides.
- Benefited similarly across demographic groups. Diverse populations benefited equally to their peers, effectively narrowing achievement gaps in core literacy skills of word recognition, spelling, and word reading fluency.This narrowing is particularly noteworthy as schools face challenges in decreasing the achievement gap.
- Students classified as English language learners (ELLs) showed gains equal to their peers.
- Students receiving Free/Reduced lunch showed gains equal to their peers.
- Students with IEPs showed gains equal to their peers.
These results confirm that Just Words is an effective intervention for Tier 2 support for students across diverse populations.
In addition, surveys collected during the study indicate high levels of teacher and administrator satisfaction with and strong support for the Just Words program.
Teachers said:
“Just Words helps students read and write better in all their classes, especially in ELA.”
“Students sustained growth + skills that they can implement in other classes and real world.”
Administrators shared:
“The students’ foundational skills in decoding and encoding were significantly improved. The skills were applied to a variety of different settings.”
“We saw an increase in our iReady scores in students enrolled in Just Words. Students were engaged and follow along in their core classes better.”
Prior studies confirm the impact of Just Words.
- Seventh-grade students who received instruction through the Just Words program made larger gains in reading comprehension than their peers who received instruction as usual, resulting in a large reduction in students classified as severely at risk.
- English learners (ELs) in seventh grade who received Just Words instruction made greater gains in reading comprehension than ELLs who received instruction as usual.
- Fourth- and fifth-grade students with word-level deficits who received instruction through the Just Words program made significant gains on word reading fluency and reading accuracy after receiving a semester of Just Words instruction. This allowed many students to close the gap and meet benchmarks.
- ELLs with word-level deficits in fourth and fifth grade who received instruction through the Just Words program made significant gains in word reading fluency and reading accuracy. Prior to receiving Just Words instruction, these students were well below benchmark in oral reading fluency and word reading accuracy. After a semester of Just Words instruction, these scores were at or approaching benchmark.
- The gains in oral reading fluency and word reading accuracy made by ELLs were equivalent to the gains made by their native English-speaking peers.
- Sixth- and seventh-grade students who received three semesters of Just Words instruction experienced an average gain of two grade levels in word recognition and an average gain of 3.4 grade levels in their ability to decode words.
Learn More
Detailed results from these studies may be found in the following document: Just Words Studies of Program Effectiveness.
