It's the People, Not the Program

This is something that's been nagging at me since the inception of my action research study. My action research is based on the effectiveness of an intervention "program", but now Todd Whitaker is telling me that the program has nothing to do with it. In many ways I do agree, but my hope is that I have great teachers implementing the program. Now I begin to wonder how I can use this to help shape my action research plan even further...

A Day of Learning

YesterdayI had the opportunity to attend the TWU Reading Recovery & K-6 Literacy Conference in Dallas and it was so worth it! Since my action research plan is based on student achievement in reading, this was right up my alley. I had the opportunity to attend sessions that were geared towards administrators/leaders on campus and have conversations with educators from all across Texas. I think one of the greatest insights was knowing that there are schools just like mine all across Texas that are struggling with the same thing, but there are also schools just like mine that are making things work!

One of the most inspiring sessions I attended was one presented by the principal and instructional coaches of a school that is just 45 minutes north of mine. Apparently Denton County has taken a whole new approach to what intervention is all about. Rather than hiring more "interventionists" that work with various groups of students, they have various "Instructional Coaches" on one campus. These coaches work with just a few teachers, who have asked for the help, to help with planning and co-teaching. My action research study is based on whether a certain type of intervention is effective in increasing student achievement in reading, but now I'm wondering if the approach that this particular school is taking is more effective. Considering that they are an Exemplary campus with the same demographics as we have I am thinking it's probably pretty effective!

Although I plan on continuing the plan that is approved right now by my site supervisor, I've already begun to think about possibilities for more action research. Especially if the results from what we're doing this year are not favorable.

Another insight I gained from this session is that change takes time. They have worked for the past five years to get to where they are at. The most important factor is having a unified vision of where we want to go and constantly reassessing how we're going to get there.

A Little Change Doesn't Hurt

First of all, a million thanks for commenting on my action research plan! Although I'm not totally changing courses as the picture might suggest, the comments were great and got me to think a little bit more about some small changes I might want to make. 

There were a couple of comments asking about how the intervention was going to be done. They wondered whether it was done by the teacher, a pull-out, or a push-in. In this case, there will be a little of everything. There are two teachers who are providing the intervention for their students during small group time in class. However, one of them tends to lean more towards “whole group” instruction and is having a hard time getting started. As an intervention teacher, I am “pushing in” to one of the classrooms and providing the intervention with a small group in class. However, there are two students who are getting pulled out from their class in order to join my "push in" group. All of this led to a new wondering. Does the method of the intervention play a part in the effectiveness of it? At first I was going to combine all of the students’ data into one group. However, now I have decided to separate the students based on the type of intervention method that they are receiving. By doing this I will be able to compare the different groups to see which ones had greater success.

Another comment that made me rethink part of my action research plan was Farley's question about how often I was going to look at the Istation data. I had planned on just looking at the results of the universal screener done at the beginning, middle, and end of the year. He made the suggestion of administering the monthly Istation test to these students in order to keep better track of whether the intervention was making a difference or not instead of waiting a whole year. I'm planning on adding these monthly assessments to my action research study!