Case Study: Closing Achievement Gaps for Adolescents
with Severe Behavior Disorders
October 14, 2013--Lisle, IL.
Blomeyer & Clemente Consulting services announces:
Blended Learning in a Supplementary Education Program for Severely Disturbed Adolescents: An Ethnographically-Oriented Case Study.
Author: Robert L. Blomeyer Jr. Ph.D.
(Copyright© by Author, All Rights Reserved)
Abstract
The “South-Side Home for Trouble Youth” established a research and demonstration project to evaluate use of a blended implementation of a computer-based Integrated Learning System (ILS) in a residential treatment facility for severely emotionally disturbed pre-adolescents and adolescents.
Researchers evaluated the project's impact on participants’ grade level achievement in math and language arts (literacy). Impact was assessed and reported based on two data sources: (1) detailed student-level data documenting participants’ daily and cumulative progress toward mastery of assigned mathematics and language arts content, and (2) a pre-post test comparison of sponsored participants’ scores on a contractually required standardized test assessing math and language arts achievement.
An analysis of participant’s scores on pre- and post- standardized achievement tests failed to show any evidence of achievement gains, but data from the Integrated Learning System provided evidence that major gains were made toward grade-level mastery of math and language arts content by nearly all of the participating students.
The project’s positive impact, supporting significant mastery gains and reduction of participants’ pronounced achievement gaps, suggests online instructional delivery systems may be beneficial when used with similar academically and emotionally challenged populations served by today’s public and private schools and community social services agencies.
