Putting On Our Reading Glasses

After beginning the week with a freezing rain delay, our enthusiastic teachers got right back into the swing of things (though I know they are really hoping for at least one small blizzard). Last week when our school improvement team met the teachers were excited to share updates about the development of their problem statements. After we helped each other clear up questions about the action research problem statements, we discussed the next steps in the process. We decided that each of the teachers should begin their literature review this week. I hope you are as anxious as I am to read what these teachers have learned since last week!

 Pre-K Hallway-Ms. Kelly Bryant

This week, I have continued to narrow my focus on my action research topic. I have begun to fine-tune my research questions and have further contemplated the type of research that I will conduct. As I further my knowledge on methodology and the various designs for action research, I am able to assess which method and design would be most appropriate for my plan. Thus far, I have concluded that the best design or designs would most likely be observation, perhaps with some interviews or surveys of other teachers and school personnel. I foresee my action research plan having mostly qualitative data; however, I do see room and purpose for quantitative data as well. The qualitative data will most likely be of student observations before and after certain methods or changes are implemented, whereas the quantitative data will most likely cover occurrences of certain target behaviors. I hope to finalize my research problem and questions as I continue with my action research progress and hope that my questions will be further clarified once I begin searching for related literature.

1st Grade Hallway-Ms. Aprell Adams

 "Buckle Your Seat Belts" As I enter into phase two of my action research I am finding myself faced with many accomplishments as well as challenges. Through my research I have found many articles that give valuable information on topics such as reading fluency and reading interventions. However, I have come across limited resources solely on the benefits of sight word recognition and how it may connect to a students overall reading fluency and comprehension. My hope as I continue my research is that I will find a variety of resources that will allow me to fully address my problem statement. I have a long road ahead and this is just the beginning!

 3rd Grade Hallway-Ms. Stacey Seiler

Like Ms. Bryant, this week I have been working on refining my research questions and problem statement. As a teacher who employs Understanding by Design (Wiggins and McTighe), I try to keep the end in mind.  Though this has taken a lot of time and reflection is helpful and important to understand what exactly I am trying to do before I begin!

 4th Grade Hallway-Mrs. Jaime Lambrinos

 At this point, I think some of our teachers might feel like this....

After revising my problem statement this past week I have begun to “hit the books” and search for literature to support my quest for understanding the effectiveness of interactive notebooks in mathematics. This search for literature has taught me several valuable lessons:
1. I have learned that Google Scholar is a valuable search tool for finding academic literature and research. Seriously, how have I gotten this far into my graduate program without using this search engine before? By using this search engine I was able to find a plethora of resources for my action research.
2. I have learned that as you begin to search for literature that supports my action research I may need to think outside the box. My problem statement focuses on the effectiveness of interactive notebooks in mathematics but there is not much literature out there to support this. Therefore, I have begun to collect literature on the effectiveness of interactive notebooks in the science classroom, the importance of note taking in order to increase student achievement, and literature on best teaching practices for mathematics. My goal is to bridge this literature with my research of interactive math notebooks.
3. The final lesson that I learned this week is that you must ALWAYS print the literature you find before you shut down your computer. Yes, I found many articles of literature to review this week and felt a sense of satisfaction until….in my haste to head home I shut down my computer and all my open internet windows of literature were lost. Oh, what a fabulous lesson that was to learn! With all the successes and yes, failures of this past week I am still enthusiastic about this next step of the action research process. I look forward to reading the literature to support my project and using this knowledge to better the project and success of my 4th grade students. Till next week….

 5th Grade Hallway-Mrs. Rebecca Young

Check it out ChooseMyPlate.gov

As I dive into the next step of action research, review the literature, I could not help but take another swipe at my research questions before deciding what literature to review. I wanted to get more specific about how I will integrate nutrition education and what I will measure as success. I was very impressed by the government's ChooseMyPlate website. The website itself is very kid friendly as well as having useful resources for teachers. I was able to find a 4th&5th grade nutrition integration curriculum on the website. My next math unit is on fractions and fraction operations and the curriculum guide had a few ideas for integrating nutrition education using fractions. I also decided that I wanted a research question to address the attention and participation of my students during small group math time at the end of the day. At the end of the day I would like to see if students that pack lunch as opposed to buying the school lunch are more likely to participate and maintain focus during small group math instruction.

 After this third revision to my research questions I am now going to look for literature that makes any connections between NSLP and attention in school as well as how and even if nutrition education affects attitudes towards food. I also know that I will be returning to ChooseMyPlate.gov and looking into any research they have in nutrition education in math.

 Time to put my reading glasses on...