Action Research Introduction: Part Two

1. What percent of students are achieving Mastery or above in any content area? After viewing test data from my PDS school, I noticed that the majority of students are at mastery or above in math, but over 50% of students are novice and below mastery in reading.

2. Provide a brief explanation of the learning need. According to the test data, it seems that students need more instruction regarding effective reading strategies and comprehension.

3. Find an Instructional Intervention that you might use to address the learning need. Collaboration between the School Library Media Specialist (SLMS) and classroom teacher can have a positive effect on student reading by developing a love of reading and books. Determining student reading interests through an interest inventory and cultivating these interests in the library can positively impact students' engagement with reading both in the library and in the classroom.

4. Provide three pieces of evidence that the strategy works. Research findings show that utilizing a thematic approach to instruction is an effective way for students to understand new concepts through nonlinear patterns that emphasize coherence. Thematic instruction also gives students the opportunity to become an active participant in their own learning, since making choices requires critical thinking, decision-making, and reflection on their part as learners. Since students learn in a variety of ways (different learning styles, multiple intelligences, etc.), thematic instruction can allow for learning engagements that promote and value all types of learners and, in doing so, increase opportunities for students to access and retain new knowledge.

5. What is your Question? How do student interests in reading affect their engagement and time-on-task in the reading classroom?

6. What kind of assessment will you use to help you collect data? Monitoring and anecdotal records of number of books read by students in student-selected genres, as well as assessment of struggling students' time-on-task in the classroom will provide me with data to determine if student interests in reading affect their engagement and time-on-task in the reading classroom.