ABZ Learning is a K–8 literacy platform of games, interactive storybooks, and teacher reporting, built by a reading and ELA interventionist.
A record of what we know, and what we only believe.
A public K–8 literacy content audit, CCSS mapping review, measurement framework, and research protocol.
Every outcome claim ABZ makes carries a status tag on this page. Nothing here is edited after publication—corrections are appended below the entry they correct, dated, and left where they can be read against the original.
ABZ is live. Anyone can create an account today. No classroom is currently using it under a structured measurement protocol, and no ABZ learning-outcome data has been published.
Status vocabulary
○ Not yet measuredBelieved. No data.
◷ Measurement plannedMethod defined; collection not started.
◐ In progressCollection underway.
● MeasuredData exists; date and sample required.
✎ RevisedCorrection appended.
Two statuses are unused at launch. There is no earlier entry to correct, and manufacturing one would defeat the purpose of the log.
Current snapshot
Pinned · accurate as of
The left column is what is simply true today. The right column is everything ABZ believes about learners, and not one line of it is unlabeled.
Verified facts — no tag required
Statements about what exists. None of these is a claim about what ABZ does for a learner.
Practice content
7,441Authored student tasks
Not separately countedDirect literacy-only subset
Verified by internal audit on . The literacy-only subtotal will be published after each task is classified by instructional demand.
Counting rule
One unique, locally stored student task counts as one item. Identical content repeated within an activity or across difficulty settings is deduplicated. A word used for a materially different task counts separately. Excluded: generated permutations, teacher-supplied word sets, planned or unused content, interface actions, archived copies, and cross-origin games whose question banks are not locally inspectable.
ABZ is live at abzlearning.com with working public signup. Games, interactive storybooks, teacher dashboards, assignments, and student portals are functional. No classroom is currently running ABZ under a structured measurement protocol.
Skill taxonomy
67 named skills and instructional targets across 10 instructional families, including 18 named phonics targets. The taxonomy is under active development and should not be read as 67 mutually exclusive mastery standards.
Grade scope
K–8 is represented, with substantially greater depth in K–5. Active games by grade: K 22 · 1 31 · 2 36 · 3 33 · 4 24 · 5 21 · 6 6 · 7 5 · 8 4.
CCSS mapping
Explicit CCSS codes appear in 23 of 40 active game routes and in all 10 interactive storybooks. The mapping is partial, distributed across activity files, self-reported, and has not been independently curriculum-audited.
Educator input to date
Three teachers have given informal feedback on prototypes. None of it is independent, and none is treated as learning evidence.
External review
No independent literacy specialist has reviewed the skill taxonomy. The founder’s intervention experience is domain expertise, not independent review.
Accounts
Account totals will be published only after production records and test accounts have been reconciled.
Student accounts
Student accounts are created by educators. Students cannot create independent accounts.
Who maintains this page
The founder, personally. There is no research team.
Outcome claims — every line tagged
○ Not yet measured
Children accumulate more completed literacy practice in activities they return to than in activities they complete once.
○ Not yet measured
Practice repetition relates to growth in literacy skill on a validated measure.
○ Not yet measured
Skill-level reporting changes what a teacher does next with a specific student.
◷ Measurement plannedCollection begins 1 Aug 2026
The practice constraint ABZ was designed around is one educators actually report.
◷ Measurement plannedCollection begins 1 Aug 2026
Educator dissatisfaction with existing K–8 literacy applications clusters around practice volume rather than content quality.
How we define our metrics
Definitions carry the date they were fixed. When the product changes in a way that makes a definition inaccurate, a new dated definition is published. Earlier definitions stay visible.
Practice repetition
One completed instructional item aligned to a specific literacy skill or instructional target. Items abandoned before an answer is submitted do not count.
Engagement
Completed activities and repeat sessions during a defined period. Voluntary returns are reported separately only when assignment status is reliably distinguishable.
Growth
Change in performance on a validated, independently administered literacy assessment between two fixed assessment points. ABZ does not administer or score the assessment.
Mastery
A target is treated as mastered when a student answers it correctly across three sessions on three different days, with no more than one intervening error.
Teacher-reported usefulness
Educator report at thirty days on whether ABZ’s skill data changed instructional decisions. Exact survey wording is published with each study.
Platform measures
Platform adoption — continued educator activity and instructional use over time.
Assignment completion rate — the proportion of assigned activities completed by students.
Voluntary return rate — the share of sessions initiated without an active assignment, where reliably measurable.
Data and privacy stance
Every statement below is intended to match the live privacy policy. Where implementation is still under review, the uncertainty is stated.
No student email addresses
Students sign in with a class code and picture password.
No audio recording
ABZ activities do not record, upload, or store children’s voices.
No inference of disability status
Skill patterns are reported to educators. ABZ does not diagnose or label students.
Educator-created accounts
Student accounts are created by educators. Export and deletion requests are handled directly rather than through a self-service teacher control.
What is actually collected
The service can collect IP address, browser and device data, referrer, screen dimensions, analytics identifiers, and product activity needed to operate and improve ABZ.
Third-party services
Firebase, Google Analytics, Formspree, GIPHY, Netlify, Roblox, and other services named in the privacy policy may process limited data when their features are used.
Advertising
Advertising placement and child-facing treatment are under final implementation review. The public privacy policy will remain the controlling disclosure.
Equity and access
ABZ has not yet measured who is excluded by device access, internet reliability, language, disability access, or available adult support. Future studies will report access variables that can be collected ethically and lawfully.
Written with COPPA and FERPA expectations in mind. Full operational detail appears in the privacy policy.
Accessibility status
What is real today, and what has not been tested yet. No accessibility certification is claimed.
Keyboard navigation
Primary navigation, buttons, and interactive controls on ABZ’s marketing and account pages show a visible focus outline when the page is navigated by keyboard.
Reduced motion
Site styling checks for a visitor’s operating-system “reduce motion” setting and turns off non-essential animation when it is set.
Read-aloud support
Several interactive storybooks and games include a read-aloud or narration option, as noted on our About page. Coverage is not yet consistent across the full library.
No-typing student sign-in
Students sign in with a class code and picture password instead of typing an email address or password, which removes one barrier for early readers and emergent typists.
Not established. ABZ has not completed an independent accessibility audit or a WCAG conformance test. Screen-reader behavior and image alt-text have not been reviewed game-by-game across the library. A “Skip to content” link exists on the Privacy Policy and Terms of Service pages but is not yet on every page, including this one. These are open items ABZ is working on, not claims already met.
Limitations
ABZ has not conducted a controlled or quasi-experimental learning-outcome study. Platform use is not the same as learning.
The content and standards audit was designed and coded by the founder. It has no independent curriculum review, no second coder, and no inter-rater reliability estimate.
The 67-skill taxonomy mixes broad categories with narrower instructional targets. K–8 representation is not equally deep across grades, and the CCSS mapping is partial and unaudited.
Three activities still require hand verification within the audit. Corrections will be dated and appended rather than silently absorbed.
A meaningful portion of the 7,441-task count consists of engagement or preference activities without a direct literacy target. The literacy-only subtotal has not yet been separately counted.
A substantial portion of the library is built around externally trademarked properties. This is under review and is a structural risk to the stability of the library described here.
The research log
Newest entry first
Market research protocol, published before results exist
This entry states what will be studied, how, and what result would tell me I am wrong. It is published in advance so that nothing in the eventual findings can be reverse-fitted to a conclusion I already wanted.
What this study can and cannot answer. The educator survey in Phase 2 runs inside ABZ, so everyone answering it already chose to use ABZ. That makes it a study of fit—not a test of whether the practice gap ABZ was built around is one educators generally report. Phase 1 provides the only signal in this protocol from outside ABZ’s users.
Question. What do educators report as the binding constraint on foundational-skills practice, and does ABZ address the constraint they name?
Why the phases run in this order. Phase 1 exists to build the Phase 2 instrument. Its codebook will be published before the Phase 2 survey fields.
Phase 1 — Desk research and content analysis
Review corpus
Apple App Store, Google Play, and Common Sense Education reviews posted 1 Jan 2025–30 Jun 2026, capped at 50 reviews per application across four applications.
Reference sources
NAEP Data Explorer, What Works Clearinghouse, ERIC, and New Jersey school performance reports.
Coding
Open coding to a first-pass scheme, then a fixed codebook applied to the full corpus.
Output
A published codebook and candidate constraints released before Phase 2 begins.
Not used
Social-media posts are not a data source. Competing products are analyzed in aggregate and not named.
Phase 2 — In-product educator survey
Population
Educator accounts only, gated behind educator login and never shown to students.
Instrument
Questions derived from the Phase 1 codebook and published before fielding.
Framing
Questions concern the educator’s practice and constraints, not satisfaction with ABZ.
Reporting
Response rate, denominator, missing data, and exact wording published with any result.
Phase 3 — Needs assessment with non-users
Not committed
Interviews with K–2 educators who have never used ABZ would provide the strongest opportunity to challenge the premise. This phase is listed honestly as uncommitted until it can be recruited and completed at an appropriate standard.
What would disconfirm the premise. If educators most often name a constraint ABZ does not address—such as planning time, assessment load, or classroom management—then engagement is not the bottleneck I assumed it was.
Limitations. Phase 2 respondents self-select into ABZ. Phase 1 reviews are also self-selected and describe software perceptions rather than learning. I designed the instruments and will conduct the coding myself; there is no double coding or inter-rater reliability check.
Linked findings articleNo findings article yet. This field will link to the permanent article after results are published.
Research log established, and the position it starts from
This log was created to document ABZ’s research publicly from this point forward. Earlier versions of the site described what ABZ does; none preserved dated snapshots of what was believed and when. From here, entries are appended rather than rewritten.
Starting position. High-quality, engaging practice increases the likelihood that students willingly spend more time practicing literacy skills, while giving teachers actionable skill-level data without increasing instructional burden.
The primary testable claim. A student who chooses to reopen an activity accumulates meaningfully more completed literacy practice than one who completes an assignment once. If that fails, the rest of the position does not hold regardless of how the reporting layer performs.
The instructional science of early reading supports explicit phonemic-awareness instruction, systematic phonics, and practice with connected text. The question ABZ is trying to investigate is whether its design can help students complete enough purposeful repetitions without requiring a teacher to stand beside each learner.
What would falsify it. If students who report enjoying ABZ do not complete more literacy practice, the first link fails. If repetition shows no relationship to growth on a validated measure, the second fails. If teachers read the skill reports and change nothing, the reporting layer is decorative.
On external review. No independent literacy specialist has reviewed the taxonomy, and no page carries a “Reviewed by” line until a real reviewer agrees. There is no peer-reviewed ABZ publication. Citations to other research support instructional choices, not claims that ABZ itself is effective.
Linked findings articleNo linked article for this entry.
What would change my mind
Conditions stated in advance. If one is supported by evidence, it receives a dated entry and a revised status.
Educators report that their binding constraint is planning time or assessment load rather than student practice volume.
Students who report enjoying ABZ complete no more literacy practice than students who do not.
Practice repetition shows no relationship to growth on a validated measure once starting skill is considered.
Teachers read the skill reports and change nothing, making the reporting layer decorative.
A well-implemented paper routine produces comparable practice volume at no cost, making software the wrong intervention.
Classroom device time is too constrained for a meaningful implementation period.
Corrections, questions, and citation
If something on this page is wrong, tell us. A correction will be appended with its date rather than silently replacing the original statement.