While it is well-established that students’ foundational reading skills measured at the beginning of the school year are highly predictive of students’ end-of-year achievement, the DESSA research team conducted a study to examine the importance of screening for other factors, such as social and emotional competence (SEC), at the beginning of the school year. Research into this holistic approach to data-informed instruction is critical due to lagging student reading achievement following the pandemic.

The attached research brief details findings from a study examining the DESSA 2 and its ability to enhance the predictive power of a reading screener in identifying students at risk of poor English Language Arts (ELA) outcomes.

175 third-grade students were assessed with the DESSA 2, which evaluates SEC across six specific competencies (optimistic thinking, self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision-making). Reading skills were screened with the Idaho Reading Indicator (IRI), which assesses comprehension, vocabulary, and spelling. Finally, students’ end-of-year ELA achievement was measures using the Idaho Standards Achievement Test (ISAT).

Key Findings:

• Regression analyses support using both the Idaho Reading Indicator and the DESSA 2 to help predict students’ end-of-year ISAT ELA performance
• With a practical approach to interpreting data, educators can leverage screening data from multiple sources to more comprehensively inform instructional supports needed for each student
• Overall, this study provides support for screening both foundational reading skills and social and emotional competence because, for some students, the social and emotional skills measured by the DESSA 2 can make or break student achievement

How should educators support students with this data?

As an example, let’s look at a student profile that includes an IRI score and a DESSA 2 score. This student has a high IRI score (86th percentile) and a low DESSA 2 score (T-score of 37, in the “Need for Instruction” tier). At the end of the school year, this student did not meet grade-level standards on the ISAT.

For practical purposes in the classroom, this student may have benefitted from instructional support to develop their self-management and relationship skills, as these were the two lowest rated skills on the DESSA 2. With the DESSA System, educators can easily identify these skill gaps and select targeted strategies to teach these skills.

Interested in learning more about the connection between social and emotional competence and predicting end-of-year ELA outcomes?

Read the full research brief here.