Quince dance?

Found this today after my post. Even uses the term, “Apples to ….”. Quince dance? I think not. Enjoy my friends!

Preliminary STAAR

Apples to Oranges?! Who will save the day????

Well, I’m half way through the Lamar program and things are going well, but they are getting REAL!! LOL, this week I have started gathering my data, reviewing it and I’ve started drafting me Action Research Report. I think I may pull my hair out!

During my progress, I discovered that my original plan to review classroom data and scores from our AEIS report for the last two years was NO BUENO! I decided it wasn’t legit enough. AEIS was providing me with extra information that wasn’t relevant to my project and I felt like I was comparing apples to oranges. Last year was the first year that STAAR was administered. Many of the questions were field questions and there were many changes made for the assessment this year. When I realized these two things I began to panic!!! How was I going to isolate the information I needed from the AEIS report??? How would I determine if our high-yield instructional strategies had worked??? At that moment my angel from intermediate stepped in. My friend Elizabeth, reminded me that while there had been changes to the assessment, the reporting categories where still the same. But how would I determine how our African American students did in each of those categories from the AEIS report, you ask? Well, I wouldn’t but thanks to Elizabeth I learned how to find the information in Edugence! The sun had come out again and this research project seemed possible, THANK YOU JESUS!

The more I work on this project, I have decided that primary teachers at my school need more training on Edugence and we also need the amount of data in Edugence that the intermediate teachers have. I really feel like if we (primary teachers) had the same amount of data at our finger tips we could exercise the use of more data driven instruction with our students.

More to come my friends. Keep an eye out for the information I found during my lit review.

Its Been Awhile

It has been awhile since I’ve blogged, but I’m happy to report that all is going well with my research. The teachers are working harder than ever to attempt to get our STAAR scores up in our sub populations. Have I mentioned that we almost every sub pop represented at our school??? Yea, makes for a hard job. Anyhow, as we move towards the testing season I have started looking at this year’s Walk-though data (which is designed to follow Marazono’s high-yielding instructional strategies) with last year’s WT data. I’m seeing some good things, but I’m still having trouble locating research that is directly related to African American and Hispanic students. Most of the research is qualitative vs. quantitative making it hard to track its progress without using my own opinion or someone else’s estimation. I’m not saying that qualitative is bad, but knowing my audience…qualitative will get me more teacher buy-in. If you have some insight/research please, hook me up!

Week 4- Thanks for the Input!

I was very excited to hear the responses from my site supervisor, who was positive and thought that the action plan was a very good topic and the topic would hopefully affect other issues in a positive way such as improve student behavior, improve test scores and improve classroom performance.

She was also very interested to learn of the outcome of the various analyses of data, surveys, interviews and actions from the students and teachers. She also suggested that when I finish the readings suggested by my peers that I share those with my team and give her a brief book review. She agreed with me that this research isn't just about increased student achievement on STAAR, it is also about better serving our student population and making them more successful. The results of this research can only make us a stronger staff. 

Also, thank you fellow bloggers for all of your suggestions! Not only does it save me some time, but it also helps me look for things that others in teaching have found interesting and beneficial. Some of the suggestions were a book titled “How to Teach Kids Who Don’t Look Like You.” The purpose of the book is apparently to "take teachers and place the mirror of bias, categorization, and prejudicial thinking before them in order to bring underlying issues about race, gender, culture, SES and so forth to the forefront". In the majority of the research I have read, it suggests putting down judgments and making the kids trust you. I also liked the suggestion to us this as a book study for PD. This type of PD might help me continue any success my research has. Another book was, “What Is It About Me That You Can’t Teach.” I also received some great suggestions about ways to come up with my own data. I hadn't thought of before. I’m a little skeptical, just because I feel like by doing that I will have less buy in from my peers (yes they can be...difficult) ultimately I want to see them try and implement some of these strategies so that all of our students can be successful. I have also decided to open up my research more to include low SES and ESL students. I think I was too focused on my two sub populations making it more difficult to find resources. 

 

8 Steps, I can't Forget!

1. Examining the work: Setting the Foundation – After reviewing our school annual yearly progress we determined that there is still a slight disparity in the achievement of our African American in Hispanic students on the STAAR test.
 2. Analyzing data – Compare data that indicates instructional strategies and styles being used by staff members (Campus Walk-Through Data), examine teacher “readiness” (professional development opportunities), compare student achievement this year on STAAR compared to last year, teacher interviews and surveys, and various scholarly journals and research-based text.
 3. Developing deeper understanding – 2011-2012 STAAR data with scholarly journals and text will provide a starting point for my research. Surveys about professional development opportunities and classroom walk-through data will outline possible causes, or links, to the gap in achievement amongst our diverse learners.
 4. Engaging in Self-Reflection – I have met with my mentor and she agreed that my research is not only helpful to a current problem at our campus but it will also increase our instructional strength from this point forward. I hope that I am able to find research that directly relates to my plan. My initial research revealed far fewer studies than I had hoped. I hope that by looking for more specific subjects I will find more research to support my plan. I also hope that I am able to effectively share my research with my peers in a manner that they find helpful and beneficial.
 5. Exploring Programmatic Patterns – Does my data and current research findings adequately correlate with my action research plan? Have I correctly laid out my time lines and evaluations? Ask for input from my mentor and peers about the best method of carrying out my research and collecting my data.
 6. Determining direction – Discuss with mentor and ESS (Laurie Toben) working with our campus concerns about my research to insure that I am on the right track. For example, does my data and current research findings adequately correlate with my action research plan? Have I correctly laid out my time lines and evaluations? When will I meet to collaborate with grades 3-5 and my mentor? How often does my mentor want to meet to discuss progress? What is the best way to share my findings with the staff?
 7. Taking action for school improvement – With guidance from my mentor I will implement and follow the steps laid out in the Action Research Plan from Examining What We Do to Improve Our Schools (Harris, Edmonson, and Combs, 2010).
8. Sustaining improvement – Any achievement or links to short comings in our instructional strategies will be shared with the staff during professional development. My findings will also help drive decisions for professional development opportunities.

Examining what we do to improve our schools: 8 steps from analysis to action by Sandra Harris, Stacey Edmonson, and Julie Combs, (Eye on Education, 2010). 

Plan In Place...I think

During week 3 I have completed my readings and put my thoughts and ideas in to the  Action Research Plan below. I'm sure that I will have many changes as I become more familiar with this document and process. For now, I think it works. WE SHALL SEE!

Choices, Choices, Choices!

After this week’s assignment, I feel like I have made a good choice for my action research topic. My goal is to look at what changes we can make to instruction to address the needs of our Hispanic and African American students. These two sub groups kept our campus from making AYP this year. This is a huge problem considering our school’s demographics. We are 36.1 percent Latino, 27.0 percent African American, 22.3 percent Asian, and 14 percent White. It goes without saying that if we have African American and Hispanic students failing on standardized test, we are not meeting the needs of the majority of our students. As my campus begins making steps to improve this year, I plan to compare this year’s walk-through data to last years. This data will allow me to see what we were doing instructionally last year, compared to this year. I will then be able to use that information to determine if we are using best practices defined by research for diverse learners. I also plan to look at what professional trainings are offered by our campus this year that may, or may not, be helping our teachers change their instruction. In the end, I hope to see that changes are being made compared to last year and that these two sub groups will show gains on this year’s STAAR test. I’m very excited about this project. It will be very empowering and beneficial to me and my campus.