The Untapped Potential of Supporting Learning Outside School

If educators around the world want to address the learning crisis most effectively, they must help learners beyond the school walls. This is the central conclusion from a longitudinal randomized control trial of Save the Children's Literacy Boost program, conducted by a team of researchers from Stanford University. The RCT assigned students to one of three groups: (1) a group assigned to the full Literacy Boost intervention, which includes supports to improve reading pedagogy in the classroom and supports for families and communities to encourage learning outside school; (2) a group that received supports to improve teacher reading pedagogy; and (3) a "business as usual" control group.

This presentation outlines the Literacy Boost program. It goes on to describe the motivation and methods for the two-year longitudinal study and summarize its findings. It concludes by arguing that educators and others seeking to address the learning crisis must support learning throughout a child's day, week, month, and year rather than just the 15 percent of the time children are in classrooms.