Significance
The findings of my action research are significant because I was able to learn about my students, myself as an educator, and have larger implications for the educational community.
It is important as an educator I develop a diverse and differentiated curriculum due to the different types of learners in a classroom.
As I described in my introduction, in my particular classroom there was a wide variety of academic abilities. Through my research, I was able to discover that in a classroom with numerous types of learners providing a diverse and differentiated curriculum provides more opportunities for all students to learn. Tomlinson et.al. (2003) described differentiation as a, "modification of teaching and learning routines to address a broad range of learners' readiness levels, interests, and modes of learning." She argues that, "as a transformation in society and schools evolves, effective teachers in contemporary classrooms will have to learn to develop classroom routines that attend to, rather than ignore, learner variance in readiness, interest, and learning profile (Tomlinson et.al., 121)." My research found that switching the curriculum towards the end of the semester and having hands-on projects that were evaluated similar to formal, individualized assessments allowed me to observe the different abilities of my students. Students that struggled with one aspect of the curriculum seemed to thrive in another; for example, the changes in student assessment scores from algebra to statistics. In addition, students that did not participate during class discussions or collaborative in-class assignments become engaged during group projects. It is important to mention that differences among my students as learners can also be a result of individual differences and not primarily the result of differentiated instruction. For example, Santrock (2008) describes factors such as motivation and social environment that can have a significant effect on student learning and may also provide an explanation for the variation among student learning. My particular action research study has shown that creating a diverse curriculum led to a wider range of student achievement. Therefore, as classrooms continue to become filled with more and more students of varying academic abilities creating a diverse and differentiated curriculum may benefit students of different learning capabilities.
I found creating a collaborative project with a finished product yielded a high level of student engagement.
During this action research project, students worked on three different collaborative assessments; hot dog cookers, pick a car, and casino day. Throughout both phases, I was able to monitor students' engagement, ability to collaborate, and received feedback on personal attitudes towards collaborating. According to Marzano (2007) there are two ways to view student engagement; participation or time on task. Using these definitions, my research has shown that the highest levels of student engagement were during the two activities where students created a finished product (hot dog cooker and casino day). I now offer two theories on why I believe this was the result of my research; high energy and mild competition. The high energy theory by Marzano (2007) speculates that physical activity and teacher enthusiasm can stimulate student engagement. During both projects, students were required to physically build something; a hot dog cooker or casino game. They needed to find appropriate materials, design, and ultimately build a finished product. I also designed a finished product for both projects that I enthusiastically modeled for the students in order to try and illicit student buy-in. In addition, I was full of energy during the students design and building stages because I was constantly moving to help and monitor each group. The mild competition theory by Good and Brophy (2003) states that, "the opportunity to compete can add excitement to classroom activities, whether the competition is for prizes or merely for the satisfaction of winning." For both projects, students were told that their would be a big winner at the end of the project. The big winner for the hot dog cooker was the group that had the best looking design and a thoroughly cooked hot dog. The big winner for casino day was the group that had accumulated the most chips at the end of the class period; providing an incentive for each group to design a fun and creative game but where the odds were still slightly in the favor of the house. For both projects, there was no prize for a big winner because I did not want an extrinsic motivator to be a confounding factor of my research study. I believe that student engagement was stimulated because each group knew that they were going to be evaluated by their peers and myself in a mildly competitive environment. Using my research and these theories, I believe that the creation of a physical product and the use of a mildly competitive environment yielded a high level of student engagement.
Based on the findings of my action research I believe, I need to provide a diverse curriculum with differentiated instruction for my students. In addition, a finished product may yield higher student engagement when implementing collaborative activities. Therefore, when I design a collaborative project it may prove effective for student engagement when students are required to produce a finished product.
The findings of my action research are significant because I was able to learn about my students, myself as an educator, and have larger implications for the educational community.
It is important as an educator I develop a diverse and differentiated curriculum due to the different types of learners in a classroom.
As I described in my introduction, in my particular classroom there was a wide variety of academic abilities. Through my research, I was able to discover that in a classroom with numerous types of learners providing a diverse and differentiated curriculum provides more opportunities for all students to learn. Tomlinson et.al. (2003) described differentiation as a, "modification of teaching and learning routines to address a broad range of learners' readiness levels, interests, and modes of learning." She argues that, "as a transformation in society and schools evolves, effective teachers in contemporary classrooms will have to learn to develop classroom routines that attend to, rather than ignore, learner variance in readiness, interest, and learning profile (Tomlinson et.al., 121)." My research found that switching the curriculum towards the end of the semester and having hands-on projects that were evaluated similar to formal, individualized assessments allowed me to observe the different abilities of my students. Students that struggled with one aspect of the curriculum seemed to thrive in another; for example, the changes in student assessment scores from algebra to statistics. In addition, students that did not participate during class discussions or collaborative in-class assignments become engaged during group projects. It is important to mention that differences among my students as learners can also be a result of individual differences and not primarily the result of differentiated instruction. For example, Santrock (2008) describes factors such as motivation and social environment that can have a significant effect on student learning and may also provide an explanation for the variation among student learning. My particular action research study has shown that creating a diverse curriculum led to a wider range of student achievement. Therefore, as classrooms continue to become filled with more and more students of varying academic abilities creating a diverse and differentiated curriculum may benefit students of different learning capabilities.
I found creating a collaborative project with a finished product yielded a high level of student engagement.
During this action research project, students worked on three different collaborative assessments; hot dog cookers, pick a car, and casino day. Throughout both phases, I was able to monitor students' engagement, ability to collaborate, and received feedback on personal attitudes towards collaborating. According to Marzano (2007) there are two ways to view student engagement; participation or time on task. Using these definitions, my research has shown that the highest levels of student engagement were during the two activities where students created a finished product (hot dog cooker and casino day). I now offer two theories on why I believe this was the result of my research; high energy and mild competition. The high energy theory by Marzano (2007) speculates that physical activity and teacher enthusiasm can stimulate student engagement. During both projects, students were required to physically build something; a hot dog cooker or casino game. They needed to find appropriate materials, design, and ultimately build a finished product. I also designed a finished product for both projects that I enthusiastically modeled for the students in order to try and illicit student buy-in. In addition, I was full of energy during the students design and building stages because I was constantly moving to help and monitor each group. The mild competition theory by Good and Brophy (2003) states that, "the opportunity to compete can add excitement to classroom activities, whether the competition is for prizes or merely for the satisfaction of winning." For both projects, students were told that their would be a big winner at the end of the project. The big winner for the hot dog cooker was the group that had the best looking design and a thoroughly cooked hot dog. The big winner for casino day was the group that had accumulated the most chips at the end of the class period; providing an incentive for each group to design a fun and creative game but where the odds were still slightly in the favor of the house. For both projects, there was no prize for a big winner because I did not want an extrinsic motivator to be a confounding factor of my research study. I believe that student engagement was stimulated because each group knew that they were going to be evaluated by their peers and myself in a mildly competitive environment. Using my research and these theories, I believe that the creation of a physical product and the use of a mildly competitive environment yielded a high level of student engagement.
Based on the findings of my action research I believe, I need to provide a diverse curriculum with differentiated instruction for my students. In addition, a finished product may yield higher student engagement when implementing collaborative activities. Therefore, when I design a collaborative project it may prove effective for student engagement when students are required to produce a finished product.