I decided I needed to jump on in with my research and get started, with or without all of the consent forms. I actually received two more today, so I am only missing two. I am doing my research with 6 students during our small group reading block each day. One student was absent today, so I began with a group of five. I introduced the first five sight words on the Dolch list. These words include: a, the, of, to, and. These students have been working on these words since the beginning of the year and still have not mastered them. The students in this group are considered at-risk for developing reading difficulties in the future based on their MAP scores, PAST and Phonics assessments, and formative assessments within the classroom. To introduce each word I used flashcards that I have made for this small group. Each student gets a set of cards and we spell, read, and write the word that we see on each card. When spelling the words today we used sign language that I have taught the entire class and we "air" write the words. Each week when introducing the words I will use some kind of multi sensory activity.
After spelling, reading, and writing all five words we went through each card and read the words quickly. I explained to the students that sight words are words they need to know in a snap. At the end of the lesson, I took the cards and flashed them to each student individually so they could practice the words. I used this as a quick assessment. There were two students that were able to recall all five words. Ben missed "and" and "of", Jon missed "of", and Ted missed "the". When they missed the word, I stopped them and gave them the correct answer and then asked them to repeat me. This is a strategy that I recently learned called constant time delay. I have documented this data on a chart using a (+) when they read a word correctly and a (-) when they read a word incorrectly.
I am anxious to see the progress my students make with this daily sight word instruction. Tomorrow I will introduce their first sight word readers that will include the words we are learning this week. I feel like I will need to develop an organizational system to keep up with the words we are working on, the sight word readers, and a good monitoring tool that will work for me.
Wednesday, January 30, 2013
Monday, January 28, 2013
Getting started...
Last Tuesday I sent home my consent forms with the students for their parents to sign. Unfortunately, I have only received two forms back out of the six I sent home. I am trying not to get discouraged..we did only have three days last week because of the snow day on Friday and several forms and information going home to parents about after school activities coming up in February. The parents of my students this year are usually very prompt when sending things back to school. I sent the consent form home again today with the four students I still need permission from. I hope to get them back tomorrow. I may have to wait and send the parent survey home next week so the parents do not become overwhelmed and so the survey doesn't get overlooked with all the other papers. I am ready to start our new sight word instruction tomorrow...anxious to see how the students respond!
Sunday, January 20, 2013
A little nervous...
After working on this blog, reviewing my research question, watching the Action Research videos from last semester, and getting myself organized to begin my research I have one overwhelming feeling...I am nervous! The nerves are coming more from the actual organization of the data and how I am going to keep up with everything I find while working with my students. Throughout discussions in our class I know that I will have lots of data and information, so I want to find a good way for me to keep everything organized, as well as a good system to go through the information I find. Coding is the word that I keep thinking about...what trends will I find? Will these methods work?
Even with the nervousness, I am also very excited! I can't wait to try new methods of sight word instruction with my focal group of students. This year has proven to be a difficult year for sight word retention in my class as a whole. I want to try new strategies to see if my students can begin to retain sight words, and in turn become better readers. I cannot wait to see their growth!
After making my project timeline, I am more clear on when each part of this project will occur. I will use individual data journals and data summaries as a way to monitor student progress, keep track of trends, ask questions, and make changes throughout the study. I will need to create these journals using notebooks and binders so I can put information from day to day in them, which will make reviewing information from the week much easier. Field notes will also be kept in the same binder for each student or the small group as a whole.
Even with the nervousness, I am also very excited! I can't wait to try new methods of sight word instruction with my focal group of students. This year has proven to be a difficult year for sight word retention in my class as a whole. I want to try new strategies to see if my students can begin to retain sight words, and in turn become better readers. I cannot wait to see their growth!
After making my project timeline, I am more clear on when each part of this project will occur. I will use individual data journals and data summaries as a way to monitor student progress, keep track of trends, ask questions, and make changes throughout the study. I will need to create these journals using notebooks and binders so I can put information from day to day in them, which will make reviewing information from the week much easier. Field notes will also be kept in the same binder for each student or the small group as a whole.
Here we go!
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