What’s New in the Great Leaps Elementary Program
The latest update to Great Leaps Elementary edition adds new content, sharper placement tools, and a smoother path for student progress.
Smarter Placement
Each section now begins with placement exercises, making it faster and easier to start students at the right level on day one.
Expanded Phonics
We’ve added a multisyllabic words section focused on prefixes and suffixes, plus a new section on commonly used words of foreign origin that spark discussion and expand decoding skills. There are 30 new exercises, bringing the total to 95 phonics-focused exercises. The Alphabet section has been removed from the core program but is still available separately.
Targeted High-Frequency Words
Drawing from student performance data, the high-frequency word section now prioritizes the words that cause the most errors. This adjustment was informed by analyzing aggregate data from hundreds of students collected in the Great Leaps Digital reading program. The 66 exercises move from isolated words to short sentences, with optional tongue twisters and abbreviations for extra practice.
Broader Story Range
New stories at both the easiest and most advanced levels create a smoother progression across difficulty. Comprehension is now supported by three types of questions: Concrete, Abstract, and Activities, along with newly added activities for engagement. The new comprehension section challenges students to retell the story in their own words to identify gaps in recall and teach them how to summarize stories effectively. Student will make connections between the stories and their own life as well and engage with reading in a positive, highly productive way.
Where the Real Change Happens
We refine Great Leaps based on what the data shows, but the greatest gains come when it’s done daily, from start to finish. When that happens, the reading problem doesn’t just improve, it ends. We will go as far as tying compensation directly to results when we can verify usage fidelity in our digital program. The books deliver the same program, now updated in our new edition, but require your team to handle charting and implementation. After simple training, most of the solution comes down to coordination and follow-through, ensuring the time is set out for students to complete Great Leaps sessions 5 days per week to ensure that they attend at least three. When we have used our own tutors, the dramatic results from consistency have been confirmed. These results have also been achieved without automatic charting, at the very conception of the program itself, using volunteers, ancillary staff, and paraprofessionals. In fact, we've seen indredible student growth through successful implementation by high school students in Baldwin Florida, just north of our office in Gainesville. Where there is a will, there's a way. Talk to us today and let's find a path to making it happen with what you have.