Colleagues: It was brought to my attention that in my earlier posting of the
following message over half of it was lost and not posted. Sorry! Following
is the whole message. Tom Sticht

Gail and Laura: Thanks for sending the attachment to the summary report for
the reading gain study. I noted that the  report said that a total of 278
adults participated in the project (123 in Year 1 and 155 in Year 2),
though, as indicated in the following quote, pre- and post-test scores were
obtained for a total of only 82 students in the 2 years combined, which
represents a 70 percent loss between pre-and post-tests.

The report states: Quote:"Documented learner outcomes were based primarily
on pre- and post-administrations of the TABE Reading test. The TABE was
administered after 20 hours of reading instruction. In both years of the
project, learners demonstrated significant gains despite very little
instructional time, often a few hours each week at most. Limited program
hours and sporadic student attendance are typical in adult basic education
programs across the country, due to limited program resources and adults’
busy and complicated lives. For the same reasons, it isn’t always possible
to give post-tests, which results in smaller numbers of post-tests compared
to initial testing (post test scores for 82 adults). Hence, it seemed
reasonable to administer the TABE after 20 hours of reading instruction and
that is what the teachers did. " End Quote.

The figure showing the pre- and post-test data showed that for 39 students
in Year 1 the pre -test score was 5.44 and the post-test score was 6.59 for
a gain of 1.15 years . For 43 students in Year 2 the pre -test score was
4.51 and the post-test score was 5.26 for a gain of 0.75 years. When
combined, for the 82 students the pre-test score was 4.96 and the post-test
score was 5.89 for a gain of 1.03 years.

Where I get puzzled is when the report states, Quote:" For adult learners in
Year 1 these results translate to an average of one grade-level gain for
every 10 hours of reading instruction. For Year 2 students it is an average
of one grade-level gain for every 12.5 hours of reading instruction." End
Quote  If, as stated in the report,   pre-and post-tests were separated by
20 hours of reading instruction how was gain in 10 hours or 12.5 hours of
instruction determined?  And how does the phrase "for every" enter in if
only one set of pre- and post-test scores were obtained for each student,
presumably after 20 hours of reading instruction?

Help please!!
Tom Sticht