A math specialist at an elementary school in Tomball Independent School District in Texas wanted to make sure that the struggling students at her school were fluent with their math facts. Before becoming a math specialist, she was a 3rd/4th grade teacher, so she knew that when students are fluent they have more success with higher level concepts.
After giving all the 3rd and 4th graders at her elementary school a multiplication facts test (32 questions problems up to 9×9), she invited the students with the lowest scores to her SNAP facts club. The students in the club used Reflex in the school’s computer lab twice a week, and then were asked to get on Reflex once more a week outside of school as homework.
The SNAP facts club gave her a chance to get to know the students in RTI better so that when she worked with them on test prep or pulled them out of the classroom, they were already comfortable with each other. To help students see their progress, she regularly showed shared their Reflex reports with them. Once students started to feel success, they got excited about learning math.
After each grade had used Reflex for 2-3 months, she administered the same multiplication test to her students as a post test. She wanted to confirmation that her students had made progress using Reflex.
The results from the pre and post multiplication tests are below in two charts (one for 3rd and one for 4th). Across the board, the students showed quite a lot of growth, especially the students that used Reflex effectively. The students that made the most progress are listed from right to left.
3rd Grade
4th Grade
Most of the students she worked with made huge gains on the test after they had used Reflex. Due to some of the challenges for her students at her school, including absenteeism and difficulty accessing technology outside of school, others did not make a significant jump in their fluency. But most students were thrilled to get on Reflex, used the program effectively and learned their math facts.
Reflex has definitely made a difference and she was pleased to have independent test evidence that Reflex is effective. Her principal also told her that their school’s math test scores went up this past year and were higher than in previous years. And one student she worked with, who had routinely received 70’s in math class, became an “A” student after using Reflex. When she asked the student what had made the difference for her in the classroom, the student replied, “Reflex.”