Alphabet Knowledge Capstone

Data Collection #1

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The first data collection method, that served as my pre and post test, was a Fountas and Pinnell (F&P) running record. F&P’s reading levels are broken down by alphabetic levels, starting at level A and maxing out on level Z. The running records assess students on how many words they can read correctly looking at accuracy, comprehension questions, and fluency.  For kindergarten, the standard is for students to get to a Fountas and Pinnell reading level of D by the end of the year. At the beginning of my study the targeted students were each at a pre-reading stage and had not yet been able to master a level A. F&P was chosen for my group of students due to the purpose of my study. The purpose of the study was to see if alphabet knowledge would lead to improved reading achievement. For the students’ district assessments, they were assessed on their reading levels with F&P. So, I chose to use the pre and post test because of the district standard of assessing with this system, and for the multiple areas that the test can show growth.

 

 

Data Collection #2

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The second data collection method that was used was a Climate Survey. The Climate Survey was an assessment that was given to each student that assessed their enjoyment of working with the teacher, classroom and peers as well as their behavior in the classroom. This assessment was used to see how the students perceived their relationship with the teacher as well as their attitudes and emotions related to school.  I chose this because attitudes and relationships can affect achievement and student performance. If relationships drive instruction, then an assessment to see how the relationship might affect the instruction was needed. For the students in the action research, this assessment was appropriate to see how their pull out direct instruction was affected by their enjoyment of learning away from their general education classroom. When working with students who have diagnosed disabilities, many times behavior can affect their academics. For the students in the action research, it was important to make sure that the behavior was not directly related to the student and teacher relationship.

 

 

Data Collection #3

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The third method of data collection was a weekly formative assessment over letter identification, letter sounds, and sight words. At the end of each week I gave a formative assessment with each student utilizing flash cards. Flashcards with the alphabet, one capital letter per card, were used for letter identification and sound recognition. For flashcards, on letters, there was always 26 flashcards. The next set of flashcards were cards with sight words on them. For two of my students, the first ten kindergarten sight words were assessed. These two students only focused on the first ten sight words due to their IEP goals; they each had the goal of recognizing the first ten kindergarten sight words by their next IEP meeting. The third student was higher in his baseline score for sight words, so he was focused on the grade level Wonders ™ sight words. This method of formative data was chosen due to the disabilities of the students.  The first student had a diagnosis of developmental delay, a disability for students who show slower growth rates than average students. For this student, monitoring progress through formative assessment was important as a way to monitor the pace, and which areas were the areas of most growth for her. In turn, it showcased the letters, sounds, or sight words with which she needed more practice and exposure. Two of the students in this study had epilepsy, students #2 and #3, a disorder that causes seizures. This attributes to why the students have shown slow growth, and at times, regression of skills. It was necessary to see how they did from week to week to recognize and celebrate growth over time. The weekly check in was also appropriate to monitor if the letters, letter sounds, or sight words mastered were consistent from week to week.

 

 

 

 

Monitoring student progress to inform instructional decisions

​On January 28th, the first day of action research, a new student started to receive special education services and joined our small group instruction. This student was also diagnosed with epilepsy, along with academic and cognitive achievement levels that are significantly below average. Due to the student's needs, according to his IEP goals and present level of academic performance, this student was added into the action research. At the start of the study, this student was at the same level of reading achievement as the first student with epilepsy, and below the student who was diagnosed with developmental delay. The data shown on the pre-test suggested that this student would benefit from explicit instruction of alphabet knowledge to improve reading achievement. 

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During the study, progress was monitored, primarily utilizing the third data collection method. This form of data was formative, meaning it was informal assessment during instruction. Data was used during the study to watch how students were showing growth, or lack of growth, in response to the intervention. Throughout the study, a theme that emerged was the lack of sight word growth.  After reviewing my action plan, it was decided to add in a daily instruction of sight words in place of recognizing letters in text. This adaptation was made because due to the lack of direct sight word instruction happening, within group, with the student who had demonstrated strong letter and sound recognition. Data suggested he was ready for, and required, more rigorous instruction.  

 

After the addition of sight word instruction, students were being pushed harder and in more areas to showcase their reading achievement. As seen in student #1’s graph, in the data analysis tab, there is a large jump in sight word scores from week #5 and #6. During the study, I realized that the student was able to recognize more sight words than those we had been practicing with our flashcards. I realized that I had only been using the Wonders ™ high frequency sight words to assess the students; in the classroom they were learning more than the words from Reading Wonders ™. Starting in week 5 I assessed student #3 with the expanded classroom sight word list, in addition to the Reading Wonders words. This afforded Student  #3 the opportunity to truly showcase his sight word knowledge from both our intervention and his classroom work. A large jump in his sight word scores can be noted beginning at week #6. For student #2 and student #3, no changes to the sight words assessed were implemented, as focusing on the first ten sight words was aligned with the students IEP goals, and they had yet to show mastery.

 

An important change that was made was the length of the instruction with the students, I started with 30 minutes of explicit instruction, yet I found this was too much time to continue with explicit instruction. After 20 minutes, students showed more off task behaviors, so I decided to focus my instruction to 20 minutes of explicit instruction. The off task behaviors consisted of blurting out, moving around the room, and a lack of motivation to get through the lesson. Once the lessons were switched to less instructional time, with a faster pace explicit instruction, the students were able to get all of their work done more efficiently. The off task behaviors were still present at times, yet showed a large decrease in the frequency of the behaviors. 

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