Research & Evidence
ESSA Certified
- 80%+ of students moved up at least one benchmark level
- Statistically significant growth across all DIBELS subtests
- Substantial movement out of intensive and strategic support categories
What Is ESSA Tier 4 Evidence?
The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) is the primary federal framework used to evaluate the strength of evidence behind educational programs. For schools and districts, ESSA matters because it helps ensure that instructional decisions are grounded in research and evidence—not just tradition or preference
Sounds of Success has been reviewed by researchers at Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Research and Reform in Education and meets ESSA Tier 4 evidence requirements.
80%+
of students
moved up at least one benchmark category across all three DIBELS subtests*
ALL
students
reached Core or Core^ levels in PSF by middle of year*
significant
growth
Students demonstrated statistically significant growth across all measured literacy skills*
*Findings are based on an independent Johns Hopkins evaluation of 66 kindergarten students across four classrooms over 15 weeks using standardized DIBELS assessments. These results are grounded in decades of research on how children learn to read.
Benchmark distributions showed substantial movement out of the Intensive Support and Strategic Support categories, and most students improved by at least one benchmark level over the study period.
Research Highlights
Center Instruction at the
Phoneme Level
Phoneme-level instruction has the strongest relationship to reading development and produces greater gains than instruction focused on larger sound units. (National Reading Panel, 2000; Rehfeld et al., 2022)
Prioritize Blending
& Segmenting
Blending and segmenting are the phonemic awareness skills most strongly linked to reading and spelling development. (Ehri, 2014; Brady, 2020)
Integrate Sounds with Print
Instruction that connects phonemes to letters is associated with stronger gains in phonemic awareness, reading, and spelling, and supports the development of word recognition. (Ehri, 2005; Keesey et al., 2015; Rehfeld et al., 2022)
Sequence Instruction to Support Early
Success
The way phonemic awareness is sequenced and taught affects how efficiently students develop and apply these skills. (Geudens & Sandra, 2003; Gonzalez-Frey & Ehri, 2021)
When instruction aligns with how children learn,
growth follows
Reviewed by researchers at the Center for Research and Reform in Education at Johns Hopkins University, Sounds of Success meets ESSA Tier 4 evidence criteria, reflecting a program grounded in established reading research and a clear instructional model.
As a result, students demonstrated accelerated gains in foundational reading skills, with substantially more students meeting benchmark and a marked reduction in risk.