Story Champs® Research

The development of Story Champs has spanned ten years and has included over 20 feasibility and experimental studies. The initial program design was grounded in research-based principles such as frequent opportunities to respond, systematic scaffolding, and immediate corrective feedback. After the initial design, the developers followed an iterative framework for designing, researching, and revising Story Champs and its components. Each of the tiers (large group, small group, individual) have been studied separately and as an integrated multi-tiered system. The effects of the Story Champs intervention has been documented with preschoolers and K-3 students in several states, and with typically developing students, students who are at risk, and students with disabilities. Outcomes have included improved story retelling, personal story generation, fictional story generation, story comprehension, acquisition of targeted vocabulary, inferential word learning, story writing, information retelling, and reading comprehension. During the evolution of this research base, the developers, research assistants, clinicians, teachers, and paraeducators have delivered the interventions, and the effects have consistently been strong. In many studies, the dose of Story Champs intervention was small (e.g., only two times per week for ten weeks), suggesting that this is a powerful intervention capable of producing robust effects in a short amount time.

Research Review