Always Learning...

I am still looking for a way to display my data on this blog, but I am struggling with the technology part of it. Hopefully I can figure something out soon.

What I have learned from my data (data = surveys, grades, and observations) is that choice is motivating! When students were asked to write down three words to describe their feelings about the subject of reading at school their responses remained positive! They included words like: fun, awesome, cool, good, fine, love it, excellent, sweet, exciting, relaxing, and interesting, among other positive words! Of course I did get a few ho-hums and OKs, but the majority of the students used positive words to describe reading.

Additional information that I gathered from the surveys was not exactly what I had hoped it would be. At the start of the year I gave students a Reading Attitude Survey, and I administered this survey again in January. The survey looked at their recreational reading, academic reading, and then combined the two for a look at their full scale attitude. I did not see as many significant changes as I had hoped to see, and in fact some of the percentages decreased from September to January. In reflecting on the surveys and the results I am able to see where and how some of these shifts, or lack of shifts, may have occurred. The initial survey was given during the first week of school, which is a time when most students are still in the "honeymoon" phase of being back at school. During this first week students are enjoying seeing friends, having fun, building a classroom community through a variety of different activities, and trying impress their new teacher in different ways.  Lets face it, the first week of school is not that rigorous in the academics department. By January the students have settled in to the routines and things may no longer feel as exciting, even if they are enjoying what they are doing. While the overall attitude percentages did not show any significant changes, but specific questions, regarding reading, have shown that students attitudes towards reading at school have become more positive over the year. They have shown that they are enjoying reading and the choices that come along with it.

I am thrilled with the results that I am seeing, even if the data is not as strong as I had hoped they would ultimately be, but do I think they Reading Workshop I have created is perfect... by no means. Moving forward there are things I would like to change and improve on, some things I will try this year, and some things I will implement next year. Some things I would like to change and/or improve are: the Word Work/Spelling choice, looking at the value of the Work on Writing choice (knowing that students have time to write during Writing Workshop), the way in which students log their choices, and a way to find a way to incorporate more than one choice per day. This will always be a work in progress... it will change as I gather new ideas, it will change each year as the students I have in my class change, it will change as we adopt a new reading curriclum, but one thing I am certain will remain, I will continue to offer choices in Reading Workshop.

The Peek into Our Classroom for this week is another choice that the students have had a chance to partake during the month of February. Because February is I LOVE TO READ MONTH I invited my 4th graders to be Mystery Readers in our classroom. We typically have Mystery Readers every Friday (parents, siblings, other teachers, etc) but during the month of February I allow my students to be Mystery Readers if they would like to be. They write down clues about themselves that are then shared with the class on the day that they are the Mystery Reader. I started out with quite a few Student Mystery Readers, but after a few students had their chance to read they inspired others and we have now had to extend our Student Mystery Readers into the beginning of March! Students are embracing this chance to share their love of reading with their classmates. It has been a lot of fun to watch! Below is a picture of one of last week's Student Mystery Readers:

  

Thinking About EVERYTHING...and Drawing Conclusions

Taking it all in... looking at everything.. trying to figure out what it all means! This has been my most recent task as I prepare to present my learning with others. I am currently surrounded by surveys, comprehension quizzes, and logging sheets trying to make meaning of all of the work that I have done this year to enhance my Reading Workshop through student choice.

My focus has been on the attitudes of my students and my hope was to create students with positive attitudes towards reading. Research and experience have taught me that if a student has a positive attitude about something they are more likely to truly engage and therefore learn more and be successful.

As I look through the different data that I have collected over the months one thing has become very clear, each and every one of my students is different. I know that seems like an obvious statement, but it became very apparent to me as I read through one of the most recent surveys. On the survey there were quite a few questions, but two questions that I have come to see as very valuable data were: "What part of Reading Workshop do you enjoy the most?"  and "What part of Reading Workshop do you enjoy the least?" I did not intend for these questions to overly important, but as I read through their responses I reazlied that everyone had different feelings towards the choices that they enjoyed the most and the least. It was like an AH-HA moment. Why would I want to "make" someone always Read to Self (as I have in the past during Reading Workshop) if that was something they do not enjoy,  clearly they are not going to be engaged in something they do not enjoy. Offering choices allows students to figure out what works best for them, in terms of their enjoyment and their understanding, and the majority of the time if students are doing something they enjoy they are motivated and engaged in what they are doing. The variety of responses that I have about most and least favorite parts of Reading Workshop is DATA, students want and need different things in order to have a positive attitude and therefore be engaged in what they are doing!

I am currently working on some "numbers" data that shows how my students attitudes have changed over the year so far. Not all of that data is showing significant changes, and some are showing changes in the opposite directions of what I would like to see, but  I know there are different factors that contribute to that, and I will save that analyzes for an upcoming entry. What I do know is that what I  am seeing in the classroom is showing me the power of choice. Today during Reading Workshop I took a moment to stop and look around, and what I saw was 25 students ENGAGED in reading. Some were doing it in pairs, some were listening, some were reading alone, and some were working on patterns in different words, but everyone was truly engaged.

As the implementation of my Action research project begins to wrap up I have decided to try and bring a little bit more of my classroom and what we do each day to this blog. I will try and include a few different peeks at what we do each day in some of my upcoming blogs.

This Peek into Our Classroom shows a student's weekly reading log. Each student has a log that they fill out daily. This first picture shows the log, this tracks what choices the students has completed over the course of a week. On this log the Writing About Reading choice was blocked out as no journals were due, and Friday was blocked out as we were on our Catholic Schools Week field trip to the roller
rink that day! :)

                          
      

This picture shows the back of the reading log. Each week on the back of the log the students apply some of their learning through our weekly story. On this log students had to fill in Venn Diagram as we had been talking about comparing and contrasting. At the bottom of the log are the week's vocabulary words which students fill in through our discsussions or through the glossary in the back of their reading book.

Looking at Data... Data... Data...

Throughout my Action Research I have tried to collect data mainly through observations and surveys. My students also take part in NWEA testing, however we only test in the fall and the spring, so at this time I am unable to use that data at this time. In April when I present my Action Research to other educators I will have the NWEA test scores and will be able to use them as a part of my final presentation.

Overall my goal of providing choices during reading was to create 4th graders with positive attitudes towards reading. My research stated that one way to help promote positive attitudes towards something is to allow for student choice. Therefore I provided choices in reading in hopes that the students would be more motivated to take part in reading and the correlating activities associated with reading. Ideally this would then have positive impacts on their success in reading, which would carry over into many areas, as reading plays an important role in many aspects of our lives.

My observations are a comparison of my students from previous years (keeping in mind that each class is different) with my current students, and a comparison of my current students and how they have changed throughout the year. At the start of the year I had a handful of students who struggled with settling in to read, and reading for the duration of "choice" time. As the year has progressed and more choices have been added I have seen some of those students fully engaged in their choices during "choice" time. Some continue to need my support, but I definitely spend less time keeping students on task then I have had to in previous year, or since the start of this year. I find that to be a sign of success for allowing these choices during reading. In the past I have felt that half of the battle of independent reading time can be keeping students on task and focused, at this point in the year I do not feel that is a battle I need to fight with my students as they often times are motivated to complete the task that they are working on.

My survey results have remained positive throughout the year. At the beginning of the year I gave a Reading Attitude Survey. During the first week of school, before introducing choices my 4th graders had the following results:
When asked: "How did you feel about independent reading time in 3rd grade?"
11 = Love it! 9 = Like it! 4 = Ho-Hum! and 1 = Don't like it!
When asked: "How do you feel when it's time for reading class?"
13 = Love it! 6 = Like it! 5 = Ho-Hum! and 1 = Don't like it!
These reults showed me at the start of the year that I did have a group of studets who, for the most part enjoyed reading.

At the end of September a survey with different questions showed similar results.
When asked: How do you feel about Reading Workshop so far in 4th grade?"
8 = Love it! 12 = Like it! 4 = Ho-Hum! and  1 = Don't like it!
When asked: "How do you feel about having choices in reading?"
12 = Love it! 11 = Like it! 2 = Ho-Hum and 0 = Don't like it!

In December when asked the same questions, the results had shifted slightly, and the attitudes stayed positive. At this point in the year as I looked at the results I also thought about the fact that we had been in our routine for awhile, and over time things that are routine can become a little less exciting. The results however continued to show postive attiudes towards reading and my observations continued to show engaged and motivated reader. At this point in the year I was THRILLED to see 0's in the Don't like it catergory.
When asked: How do you feel about Reading Workshop so far in 4th grade?"
8 = Love it! 14 = Like it! 4 = Ho-Hum! and  0 = Don't like it!
When asked: "How do you feel about having choices in reading?"
12 = Love it! 12 = Like it! 1 = Ho-Hum and 0 = Don't like it! I have made a few bar graphs to show a comparision of some of these results, however I can not figure out how to upload them to this blog. I will talk to some of the "tech support" people in my life and see if the can assit me with gettin the visuals onto this blog.

Looking forward I plan to give my students the Reading Attitude Survery again to look at their overall attitude towards reading, compared to the start of the year. This survey is 20 questions, compared to the smaller 4 - 5 question surveys I have given throughout the year. I look forward to getting the results of the attitude survey and comparing them to the start of the year.