Robbie's+Research

Student Need: (In what areas do you see a gap in student achievement or behaviors? What is the present reality in your classroom? Describe your students- academics, demographics, behaviors) Students need more feedback from teachers that directly corresponds to their individual needs on a consistent basis.

Research Question: (What question would you like to answer? e.g. How will the use of Socratic Seminar in an 8th grade language arts classroom increase student achievement in reading comprehension?) How will specific teacher feedback to students on their individual quiz scores improve their performance on unit tests?

Literature Review: (What literature/articles/books have you looked at to support your question and to help guide you in your intervention?) Marzano

Intervention Plan: (What do you plan to do in the classroom?) Individual student meetings during classroom work.

Evaluation Measurements: (How will you measure success? Quantitatively (with data) and qualitatively (by asking students) and by observation?) Test scores and student interview.

Results: Students confidence rose. They believed that they had done better on the post test than they had believed they had done on the pre test. As evidenced:

|| || Confidence || || || || || post || || || pre || || || a || 5 || || a || 2 || || b || 10 || || b || 7 || || c || 6 || || c || 10 || || d or f || 4 || || d or f || 7 ||

Student scores increased. As evidenced by the scores:

|| || Period 1 || Period 2 || Period 4 || Period 5 || Period 6 || || Pre-test Avg || 62.9 || 63.4 || 52.5 || 67.5 || 66.2 || || Post-test Avg || 69.9 || 78.2 || 73.3 || 73.7 || 78.2 ||

The findings are statistically reliable. This is evidenced by a p-value that illustrates the chance of this occuring due to random chance as about one in a thousand.

|| test variance || || || 1.748038117 || test stat || || 1.362201734 || table value || || 0.001527019 || p value ||


 * Year Two: 2009-2010**

Leon Lederman is a Nobel Prize winning Physicist and he states that there is more vocabulary in a high school Biology class than a French class. This illustrates the incredible significance of teaching vocabulary effectively in Biology and other general sciences. I know this is an area that is importance for my Biology students and I know it is something that I can influence with my instructional strategies. My students have demonstrated an unbelievable amount of variation in their understanding of basic biological terms almost as expected based on the available research.
 * Student Need:**

Can I increase student understanding of terms by anchoring vocabulary instruction in solid conceptual understanding?
 * Research Question:**

__**Literature Review**__: Carlo, Maria et al(2004). __A__ **the Gap: Addressing the Vocabulary Needs of English-** **Language Learners in Bilingual and Mainstream Classrooms **.//Reading// //Research Quarterly //, 32, 188-215

Cheung, Li Siu (2006). __A Constructivist Approach to Designing Computer Supported__ __Concept-Mapping Environment __. //International Journal of Instructional Media//, 33, 1-13.

Marzano, Robert J. and Debra J. Pickering (2005). //Building Academic Vocabulary//, Association for Supervision and Curriculum.

Marzano, Robert; Pollock, Jane and Debra J. Pickering (2001). //Classroom instruction// //that works: Research-based strategies for increasing student Achievement. // Association for Supervision and Curriculum.

Wilson, Brent (1996). //Constructivist Learning Environments: Case Studies in// //<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 12pt;">Instructional Design //<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 12pt;">. Educational Technology Publications.

<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">Woods, Robert and Ray Montago (1997). __Determing the Negative Effect of Teacher__ __<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 12pt;">Attendance on Student Achievement __<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 12pt;">. //Education//, 118.


 * __Intervention Plan__**:

<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%; margin: 0in 0in 10pt; text-indent: 0.5in;">Studies have found a direct relationship between students’ academic vocabulary and their comprehension of concepts. The volume of vocabulary learning is important but so is the depth of understanding. Some of the major conclusions that they found after analyzing the achievement of hundreds of thousands of students is that affective teachers and effective teaching strategies are the single most important factors in determining student achievement. I plan on using a constructivist approach to teaching Biology vocabulary and concepts by anchoring vocabulary to bigger and more essential concepts. The prevailing view is that there are many valuable instructional strategies to teach vocabulary through incidental learning opportunities while focusing on conceptual knowledge. I want to increase student achievement by changing the way I teach and assess student knowledge of vocabulary and concepts. I would rather a student be able to describe cell theory and indentify function based on structure and location than tell me what the scientific name for that structure is. I plan on utilizing student creativity and background knowledge to teach vocabulary in a way that puts more of an emphasis on students understanding the concepts and the depth of key processes than volume of words. All of my research points to the importance of vocabulary and teacher specific instructional strategies on student achievement.

<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%; margin: 0in 0in 10pt; text-indent: 0.5in;">My 7th period Biology class will be the group that assess the effectiveness of my instructional approach on. There are 32 students and the majority of them are high school freshmen although there are three sophomores and two juniors.

<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%; margin: 0in 0in 10pt; text-indent: 0.5in;">I plan on finishing up an action research proposal by the first of December 2009. I have been sporadically implementing lessons for my research throughout the semester but will do all of my genetics pre-testing on January 4th 2010. Then my genetics unit will span approximately six weeks. I will do some student interviews every two weeks as benchmarks and then post-test at the end of the unit on approximately February 16th. <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%; margin: 0in 0in 10pt; text-indent: 0.5in;">The primary sources of resources will be my textbook adoption, the internet, student background knowledge, personal knowledge, state standards, district curriculum, and research from Robert Marzano as well as Brent Wilson.

<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%; margin: 0in 0in 10pt; text-indent: 0.5in;">My main form of data collection will be keeping a notebook with field notes and student interviews. I will also videotape at least three lessons. Finally, I will rely on quantitative results by utilizing backwards lesson plan design and administering a pre/post-test that addresses all the essential standards of learning.
 * __Evaluation Measurements__**:
 * __Results__**:


 * Year Three: 2010-2011**


 * Student Need:**


 * Research Question:**

__**Literature Review**__: (What literature/articles/books have you looked at to support your question and to help guide you in your intervention?)


 * __Intervention Plan__**:


 * __Evaluation Measurements__**:


 * __Results__**: