Baseline Report: GraphoGame™ Teacher Training Service (GG-TTS)

The GG-TTS is based on previous research on the use of digital literacy games for supporting early grade reading skills in Zambia. The first pilot projects on the use of digital literacy games were conducted in 2005 with an early version of a computer game that was later developed into the current GraphoGame. Graduate students in Lusaka conducted additional pilot projects and found that children's orthography and spelling skills improved after playing the game for about two hours during one month of intervention. The GG-TTS is designed to support the national literacy framework used by the Ministry of General Education in Zambia. The model has been tested in various implementation models, including playing sessions at schools and on tablets. The results showed increases in the basic reading skills of GG participants in all treatment groups. The GG-TTS aims to provide a cost-effective and scalable solution for supporting struggling readers in Zambia. The Early Grade Reading Assessment (EGRA) is an oral student assessment designed to measure the most basic foundational skills for literacy acquisition in the early grades. The EGRA methodology was developed under EdData II and has been applied in more than 30 countries and 60 languages. The standard EGRA has been adopted by All Children Reading: A Grand Challenge for Development (ACR GCD) to systematically assess reading skills across all Round 2 grantees. The instrument is adapted according to each grantee's project context. A baseline assessment was conducted in 30 schools in the Eastern Province of Zambia using the adapted EGRA instrument. The results of the baseline data collection, conclusions, and recommendations are presented in this report. The majority of students in the sample lack foundational reading skills needed to decode simple one- and two-syllable words, as seen in the Nonword Reading subtask. More than 92 percent of students received zero scores, indicating that they could not correctly identify any of the nonwords presented. Students in the sample are unable to read with fluency, as seen in the Oral Reading Fluency (ORF) subtask. The mean score for all students on this subtask was less than one correct word read per minute, and on the same subtask, over 87 percent of students were unable to read a single word. The results of the baseline assessment highlight the need for targeted interventions to improve early grade reading skills in Zambia. The GG-TTS model has shown promise in improving basic reading skills in previous studies, and it is designed to be a cost-effective and scalable solution for supporting struggling readers. The adapted EGRA instrument used in this study provides a comprehensive assessment of early grade reading skills, and the results can inform the development of targeted interventions to improve reading outcomes in Zambia.