PLAY GAMES

The Evidence for Engagement
Why Game-Based Literacy Accelerates Growth

Research from our pilots, university partnerships, and the broader literacy field supports a simple thesis: students who engage with text improve. Those who don't, don't.

Efficacy Study

Michigan Virtual Partnership

Fall 2024

Study Design:

  • 8-week pilot program
  • 300 students in 13 classes across 6 districts
  • Recruited through Michigan Elementary and Middle School Principals Association
  • Designed to evaluate Shoelace's contribution to Michigan's literacy goals

Key Findings:

  • 42% of students achieved 3+ months of reading growth in 8 weeks
  • High sustained engagement throughout the pilot
  • Platform effective when facilitated by teachers without specialized literacy training
42%

achieved 3+ months growth in just 8 weeks

The Implication:

Engagement-first approaches can accelerate growth at rates that traditional programs often fail to achieve with checked-out students.

80%

right challenge level

70%

better engagement

60%

self-reported improvement

University Research

University of Calgary Research

2024

Study Design:

  • Partnership with Professors Gabrielle Wilcox and Meadow Schroeder
  • 70 fifth-grade students
  • Evaluation of Shoelace as supplementary educational tool

Key Findings:

  • 80% reported content was at the right challenge level
  • 70% rated engagement equal to or better than other classroom reading materials
  • 60% self-reported improvement in reading skills

The Implication:

Students experience Shoelace as appropriately challenging and more engaging than traditional materials, the conditions necessary for growth.

Content Quality

Rooted in the Science of Reading

Shoelace's academic content supports structured literacy instruction grounded in research-based best practices.

Morphology

Comprehensive coverage of roots, prefixes, and suffixes developed under guidance of Dr. Hélène Deacon and Kyle Levesque of Dalhousie University.

Syntax

Sentence-level comprehension activities that build grammatical awareness and help students understand increasingly complex text structures.

Semantics

Vocabulary instruction using the tiered approach from "Bringing Words to Life" by Beck, McKeown, and Kucan, focusing on high-utility academic vocabulary.

Comprehension

Authentic text passages with comprehension questions that build toward college and career readiness across fiction and non-fiction genres.

The Science of Reading tells us what to teach. It doesn't solve the engagement problem of getting students to practice.

Shoelace embeds rigorous, research-backed content inside games that make practice feel rewarding. We don't compromise on content quality. We change the delivery mechanism so students actually engage with that content.

Ongoing Work

Research Partnerships

The Ensuring Full Literacy Project

Shoelace is a member of this research partnership involving Canadian and international scholars working on literacy acquisition in multicultural and digitally-connected contexts.

Current Research Collaborations

  • Dalhousie University
  • University of Calgary
  • Michigan Virtual

Active Research Areas

  • Reviewing student performance

    Guiding improvement of e-learning materials

  • Learning affect measurement

    During literacy game play

  • Morphological awareness

    Development assessment

  • Automatic question generation

    Comprehension question AI

  • English language learners

    Supporting reading development

See the Evidence in Your Schools

We guarantee outcomes because the evidence supports it. Let us show you what's possible.

Schedule a Vision Meeting →