CARP

Hollywood Elementary SchoolCollaborative Action Research

Project

Harmony BiscoeAmanda KerbyLaurel Matthew

Donald RedmilesElizabeth Vicini

Problem and Justification to Hollywood’s SIP

Our team will address Hollywood’s SIP in order to support the 5th graders’ transition to Middle School, specifically in terms of “… study skills” by designing and delivering a series of study skill strategies to all three 5th grade classes over a series of three weeks.

HES S.I.P.

Strategies &

ActivitiesSpecific Action

StepsStudent Groups

Targeted

Timeline/

Frequency

Person Responsible

Evaluation/

Evidence of Student

Achievement

5th Grade Transition to Middle School

Classroom Guidance Lessons:

Topics covered:

Bullying, locker use, and combination lock practice, peer pressure, organization & study skills

Grade 5

All Students

March-May 2011 M. Long,

Counselor

Implementation

Research QuestionsDATA SOURCE 2

DATA SOURCE 1

Does Super Scanning improve reading comprehension?

Does using the matrix strategy improve students’ understanding of the content?

Will student performance on memorization tasks improve after the tutorial on nonlinguistic representation study skills?

Pre-Test Post-Test

How to Test Our Results: Chi-Square Test

• Test a significant difference between two categories (expected versus observed).

• visual and reading strategies pre/post test.

• Used large sample size.

Table Pre/Post Test Results

Reading Strategy Data Plan

• Pre-Test• Students given a sample reading • Offered five minutes to read • Questioned on comprehension• Strategy Implemented• Walked through process• Post-Test• Review strategy• Given a different sample to read• Offered five minutes to read• Questioned on comprehension

Reading Strategy“…text comprehension strategies are needed to enhance "reading to learn" skills.”(Reed, Marchand-Martella & Koltz,

2007)

• Prepare • Restructure Physical Context• Restructure Socially and Emotionally

(Zimmerman, 2002)

• State• Super Scan• Read • Review

(Reed, J., Marchand-Martella, N., Martella, R., & Kolts,R, 2007)(Zimmerman, 2002)

Qualitative Analysis Methods and Interpretation

• Students appeared comfortable with the strategy

• Expressed interest in continuing to utilize the strategy

• Asked for a copy of the strategy steps to be distributed

Reading Strategies Results

Average Scores on Quiz (out of 4)• Pretest = 2.06• Posttest = 3.26• T-Test Results = 2.74xE-7 (significant results

P<.05 )Perceived Comprehension Average Scores• Pretest = 3.16• Posttest = 3.43• T-Test Results = 0.035791(significant results

P<.05)

The Visualization Tutorial

• Pre-Test (automatically advancing slideshow)– Attitude survey– Group of 20 pictures– Write down as many as possible– Repeat for group of 10 words

• Visualization Skills Lesson– 2 techniques explained and demonstrated

• Tell a Silly Story and Walk Around Your House• Repeating to recall• Make connections. • Visualization

The Visualization Tutorial

Following the lesson, students were given anew group of pictures to practice with.

Sharing strategies or stories was provided.

Post-Test (administered the following day in a manner identical to Pre-Test, with a different set of 20 pictures and 10 words)

The Visualization Test

10 Words

1) Crust 6) Rocks

2) Plate7) Core

3) Mantle 8) Syrup

4) Dirt 9) Nickel

5) Fossil 10) Iron

20 Pictures

Qualitative Analysis, Methods and Interpretation

• Students appeared attentive and engaged in slideshow

• Three minutes might have been too long a time period for answering; too much wait time for students to sit through

• Students were attentive when I demonstrated the silly stories

• Most students were eager to share their own stories at the end of the lesson

• If a student didn’t recognize the image, I named it for the whole class; In retrospect, I probably should have identified every picture

• Spelling errors and mis-identification of pictures became a problem in grading tests

Visual Strategies Results

• Picture Pretest = 10.93

Picture Posttest = 11.97

T-Test = 0.0351 (significant results. P<.05)• Word Pretest = 7.17

Word Posttest = 9.01

T-Test = 2.213xE-5 (significant results. P<.05)• Chi-Square Test = 3.593xE-5 (significant results.

P<.05)

Distractor Analysis

• There were no multiple choice questions.

• However, test design inadvertently left room for interpretation or error, which was taken into account during grading.

Matrix Note-Taking Strategy

• We decided to discontinue the note taking section of our CARP because of unforeseen time constraints.

• We did not realize that it would take students twenty or more minutes to read a two-three page selection and take notes on it.

Conclusion

• Chi-Square test/T-test was successful.

• Research questions answered: – Significant difference between super scanning and

reading comprehension.– Significant difference between memorization tasks

and nonlinguistic representation study skills.

• Limitations

Next Steps

Fifth grade students at Hollywood Elementary can be prepared for future academic endeavors through reading strategies and nonlinguistic representation study skills.

Thank You