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Assessments and SurveysIn my project, I had two goals: improve kindergartners' letter-sound fluency, and develop partnerships to enhance student learning outside of school. On this page, you will learn how my project fared in the assessment of these two goals. Should you want to develop similar partnerships, consider that your academic goals could vary from mine. Extra practice outside the classroom can improve nearly any simple skill (depth of knowledge level 1) such as recalling facts, information, or procedures (alphabet letters/sound recognition in my project, but could be many other skills).
Letter-Sound Fluency AssessmentTo identify target students, I examined results from a fall-administered district mandated assessment that measures letter naming fluency. DIBELS (Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills) Letter Naming Fluency assessment captures how many correct letters a student can name on a page of randomly ordered upper and lowercase letters in one minute. Once I had my target students, I administered the Nonsense Word Fluency, Correct Letter Sound assessment as a pretest. This assessment tests the student's ability to blend letters into words using their most commonly used sounds. I used this assessment as a pretest and posttest for each of the groups of students in all three rounds of action research. Below you will see the pretest and posttest scores for the three groups I with whom I worked this year.
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The results from the pretest and posttest scores show an increase in student letter-sound fluency (DIBELS assessment, correct letter sounds identified per minute) following the five week parent intervention program in all but one of the nine participating students. The mean score increased 9 correct letter sounds per minute.
In just four weeks of participating in the after school program, nine out of twelve participating students showed improvement in letter-sound fluency. The mean student score increased 12 correct letter sounds per minute (DIBELS Correct Letter Sounds assessment).
In this four week program, eleven of twelve students demonstrated improvement in letter-sound fluency, with an increase in mean score of 11 correct letter sounds per minute on the DIBELS Correct Letter Sounds post assessment.
Summary and Conclusions:
While growth in early literacy skills was demonstrated in all three programs in the study, only the parent intervention program produced a significant relationship between time spent doing activities and score improvement. The parent intervention program lasted one week longer than the others, however additional factors to consider are variations in implementation, setting, individual student development, and classroom instruction.
While growth in early literacy skills was demonstrated in all three programs in the study, only the parent intervention program produced a significant relationship between time spent doing activities and score improvement. The parent intervention program lasted one week longer than the others, however additional factors to consider are variations in implementation, setting, individual student development, and classroom instruction.
Program Evaluations
Below you will find results from post-program surveys and questionnaires that were intended to capture participants' feedback about the programs' features and components.
Parent Intervention Program:
One hundred percent of respondents indicated that the poems, pictures, and letter sound activities were helpful. Every program feature was selected by at least three parents as being helpful.
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One hundred percent of parent respondents gave the highest rating of 5 ("Very Much") when asked if they enjoyed the activities. Six out of seven parents indicated that their children enjoyed the activities at the highest level (5), and one parent rated her child's satisfaction at a level 4 out of 5.
After School Program:
In the interest of including more open ended, qualitative data for my project, I used these survey questions for the after school program. My intention was to dig deeper into the perspectives and priorities of the staff at this organization. While only two out of three staff responded to the survey, I feel that the information they shared was very valuable.
Siblings Program:
One hundred percent of the participating older siblings (14) responded to the questionnaire, with the majority citing the games and activities as the favored feature of the program.
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When asked how they felt about the program in general, a total of 62 percent of all students gave the program the highest rating ("I liked it very much") of satisfaction. The remaining 38 percent gave a rating of 4 ("I liked it") out of 5.
Summary and Conclusions:
Reflecting on the feedback from each of the programs, here is a summary of my conclusions:
- The programs were well received and enjoyed by all.
- The most favored feature of all three programs was the primary content: the games and activities.
- This study potentially enabled positive routines and associations with learning outside the classroom that will last.