Today, the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) has published independent evaluations of four educational programmes, bringing the total number of complete EEF-funded projects to date to 157.

Lexia Reading Core5 (Addendum)

Lexia Reading Core5 (Lexia) is a computer-based programme that aims to improve pupils’ reading skills. Developed by Lexia Learning Systems LLC., the programme can be used to target struggling readers as a whole-class or whole-school intervention, and as a supplement to teaching including use at home.

Fifty-seven schools and 697 pupils took part in this efficacy trial, which was evaluated by the University of York. The trial ran from September 2018 to July 2019.

The evaluation report was published in September 2021. Today’s addendum includes new analysis of the impact of the programme on disadvantaged pupils (those eligible for Free School Meals).

The evaluation found that children eligible for Free School Meals (FSM) who were offered Lexia made, on average, the equivalent of three additional months’ progress in reading compared to other children eligible for FSM. These findings have a high security rating.

The full evaluation report, together with the EEF’s commentary on the findings, is available here.

PALS-UK

Peer Assisted Learning Strategies (PALS-UK) is a whole-class, structured intervention in which pupils work together in pairs to improve their reading comprehension and fluency.

The efficacy trial of PALS-UK, evaluated by RAND, started in February 2019 and ended in April 2021. 89 schools and 2,283 pupils took part.

The trial was impacted by covid-19 related disruptions to learning. A high proportion of the pupils who started this trial were not included in the final analysis. Outcome testing was also delayed and took place in the context of significant disruption to children’s education.

This means there’s considerable uncertainty around the findings from this trial and the evaluation is unable to make robust estimates of the impact of the programme.

The full evaluation report, together with the EEF’s commentary on the findings, is available here.

Two further reports have also been published today:

Assessing class moves

The aim of this study was to learn more about how common changes in class membership are and their potential consequences for the design of trials and the analysis of trial data.

The full report is available here.

School incentive payments for mentor engagement in training

This randomised controlled trial (RCT) was commissioned to test whether providing financial incentives to school-based mentors has an impact on the time Early Career Framework (ECF) mentors spend in training and retention of ECF mentorship.

The full report is available here.