Action Research Proposal Questions

1. What is the problem?

 The problem is that basic literacy skills need improvement in these kindergartners and these students struggle with recognizing rhyme and word families in text.

 

2. What is the rational for the project?

The rational is that research shows that implementing a range of rhyming games can help students improve their recognition of rhyme and word families in text.

 

3. What strategy will be used to address the problem?

A variety of rhyming games will be introduced during reading instruction. These games will require the students to use basic elements of phonetic analysis.

 

4. What is the question?

"How can I use a variety of rhyming games to help my students recognize rhyme and word families in text?"

 

5. What evidence is presented that the strategy will work?

A study performed by Bradley and Bryant in 1983 is presented. This study documented a strong relationship between rhyme and reading.

 

6. How will data be collected?

Pre and post test results will be given to the students and the results will be compared, a reading attitude survey will be given to the students prior to and after the project, small groups observations with checklists, observation of participation and performance (recorded in a teaching journal), and work samples will also be used to asses student progress.

Questions from Action Research Summary

What is the title of the project? The title of the project was “Using Readers Theater to Show Off Good Reading”

What is the Question? The main question is how can one effectively utilize Reader’s Theater to improve the fluency and reading comprehension skills of my students? Other questions that follow along these lines are:

• What does Readers Theater look like in the classroom?
• What is the impact of Readers Theater on students’ levels of fluency?
• What is the impact of Readers Theater on students’ levels of comprehension?
• What changes in students’ level of interest in reading and reading behaviors are noted following the use of Readers Theater?

What strategy is being used to address? Simulation and games

What evidence is presented that the strategy will work? Caluris noted that The National Reading Panel in 2000 identified fluency as a key ingredient to successful reading instruction because of its effect on students’ reading efficiency and comprehension.

How will data be collected to determine if the strategy will work?  Data was collected through surveys, observations of student performances, and student fluency assessments.

How was the data analyzed? Data was analyzed by breaking it into the four major groups that were represented in her classroom: academically talented, general education, bilingual and special needs. Caluirs learned that the academically talented group showed no gain because they were already fluent readers with great comprehension. She saw about the same percentage of gains in word recognition for the remaining groups. She noted that overall comprehension was greater for the general education and special needs students than the bilingual students

What were the results? Readers Theater improved the students’ reading rate, word recognition accuracy and use of expression while reading as well as their attitudes toward reading.

How do the results inform teacher practice? These results could help teachers of struggling students realize that utilizing Readers Theater will provide their children with an enjoyable opportunity to engage in rereading texts to improve fluency and comprehension levels. Teachers will also find that fluency instruction can be incorporated through the teacher creation of Reader’s Theater scripts across the curriculum.