Significant Growth in Reading for Seeing Stars Students at Midtown Academy in Pinellas County, Florida
Elementary School Results, Florida, Reading, Response to Intervention, RtI, Seeing Stars, Tier 3
Midtown Academy in Pinellas County, Florida serves a large percentage of students who are at-risk of reading failure. During the 2021-22 school year, Midtown Academy implemented Lindamood-Bell® instruction to address the specific needs of this student population. Thirty-six students received an average of 65.1 hours of Seeing Stars instruction to develop symbol imagery for reading. Instruction was delivered by Midtown Academy teachers who received professional development in the programs developed by Lindamood-Bell’s founders. Student gains were measured with a battery of reading assessments.
RESULTS:
On average, Seeing Stars students achieved significant improvements in reading. They made large standard score changes on nearly all measures. Additionally, the 54-point percentile increase in phonemic awareness and 25-point percentile increase in symbol imagery put these students within the normal range (25th-75th percentile). This growth in the parts of reading led to students’ reading comprehension also moving into the normal range. Their pre- to posttest results were statistically significant on all measures. The results of this study illustrate that Lindamood-Bell instruction in the Seeing Stars program leads to improved reading, which is essential to achieving success with school curricula.
PROFILE:
Number of Students: 36 Average Age: 8.7
Average Hours of Instruction: 65.1
Lindamood-Bell Programs Implemented: Seeing Stars®
Outcome Measures:
• Symbol Imagery Test
• Lindamood Phoneme Sequencing Test-3rd
• Woodcock Reading Mastery Test-3rd (word attack)
• Wide Range Achievement Test-4th (reading and spelling)
• Gray Oral Reading Tests-4th (rate, accuracy, fluency, and comprehension)
