1. Setting the Foundation
The SBDM committee had questions as to why our third grade students were struggling with practice TAKS Reading assessments. The data showed that almost 55% of the students were struggling and unable to pass these assessments. In looking at those students’ data from their previous school year showed that those students had also struggled in second grade with reading fluency and comprehension on the Texas Primary Reading Inventory assessment. In fact only 11% of the students had a fluency above 90 wpm which is the end of year goal for a typical 2nd grade student. Their comprehension was also low in that only 64% of the students were able to pass the comprehension portion of the assessment. As a reading specialist it was obvious that the students are struggling with the comprehension questions because of their lack of fluency in the reading the text. Too much effort is being put into the decoding of the text that the students are not able to comprehend the context and therefore they are unable to answer questions. Therefore in an effort to improve the performance of our third grade students as a school we will focus on increasing reading fluency in second grade in an effort to also improve comprehension.

2. Analyzing Data
Data from the Texas Primary Reading Inventory (TPRI) will be used to compare this school year’s beginning of year data to middle of year data after the fluency improvement project has been implemented. The researcher will also compare this school year’s data to last year’s data for the same time period. The researcher will also analyze the bimonthly data submitted by teachers to see improvements of students’ fluency or lack there of. The data received will also be compared to fluency norms for second grade students.

Electronic searches will also be done on this topic to see if similar studies have been done and the results of such studies in similar school settings.

3. Developing Deeper Understanding
Monthly meetings will be held with second grade teachers to gain their insight on the project and whether they feel the project is helping or hurting their teaching efforts. Are the students invested and if not what could be done to get students more invested? Teachers will also be able to share with each other how they are motivating students?

The researcher will also seek out additional Reading Teacher resources to see other research on related topics.

4. Engage in Self-Reflection
How can I make this research minimal in the work that has to be done by the classroom teachers?
Will the teachers be open to completing the extra work?
How can I design my research plan to utilize technology, in an effort to save me and the teachers time?
Will I be able to provide necessary resources to carry out my research?

5. Exploring Programmatic Patterns
In discussing my action research with my site supervisor she stated that as the research comes along you will find solutions to problems as they arise. She stated the key to this research is to stay organized and on schedule. She stated that the teachers will comply because this research has the support of the principal and it is in the best interest in the students.

6. Determining Direction
A) Are you clear on what you are attempting to solve? Yes. In what ways will targeting fluency in our 2nd grade students affect their comprehension performance on the Texas Primary Reading Inventory?

B) Have you adequately addressed the skills and resources questions? I definitely feel that I have the needed skills to carry out this research. However, I will need to do more digging to find the necessary resources to carry out my research. I will need to find necessary fluency probes for teachers to use and also find a way to provide file folders to teachers in order to carry out the data collection.

C) Have you established a collaborative approach to the issue? Collaboration has been done with the SBDM committee and site supervisor. Once school returns from summer break, collaboration will be done with 2nd grade teachers also.

D) Are your timelines realistic? Yes. We will not begin fluency monitoring until after beginning of the year TPRI testing is complete and then monitoring of fluency will occur in between BOY testing and middle of year (MOY) testing. Data will be collected during that time and all data collection will be completed prior to this researcher’s graduation date.

E) Do you have a reasonable plan to monitor the project? Monitoring of the project will be done by the researcher with requiring teachers to turn in bimonthly fluency assessments of the students. Data will be gathered by this researcher and inputed in data base.

F) Do you have a reasonable plan for determining the level of success—how do you evaluate if the plan is effective? Yes, I will compare our students’ fluency data to fluency norms of typical 2nd grade students. Success will be improvement in both fluency and comprehension.

G) How will you revise and improve the plan based on monitoring and evaluation? As the research data is collected, this researcher will make improvements as necessary to make the data collection easier and or less time consuming.

7. Taking Action for School Improvement
A committee of for the research will consist of the researcher, the 2nd grade teachers, and the on-site supervisor. See table below for written plan of action:

Goal: The goal of the action research is to increase students’ reading fluency in an effort to also improve students’ reading comprehension.

*****The following was in a table, however it did not transfer well from Word.*********
Objective/Outcome
Activity
Resources for Data Gathering
Timeline for Completion or Implementation of Activities
Person Responsible for Implementation of Action Research Plan
Process for Monitoring of Goals and Objectives
Assessment Instrument for Evaluation of Effectiveness

Increase students’ reading fluency and comprehension on the.


Students will be given fluency goals and then teachers will monitor and assess their fluency every two weeks.

Teachers will need file folders for each student. Teachers will be given fluency probes and a fluency chart to monitor each student’s progress. Fluency probes will be provided to teachers. Researcher will analyze teacher data and data received from the Middle of Year Texas Primary Reading Inventory.

Teachers will begin to monitor and assess beginning in October and data will be analyzed and compared to Middle of Year Texas Primary Reading Inventory data from the previous school year.

Veronica Cuenca-Wilson
And
2nd grade Teachers
With monitoring by on-site supervisor Linda Rios, Academic Coordinator.

2nd grade teachers will help in the monitoring of students’ fluency, however all materials will be prepared by researcher and monitoring and analyzing of data will be done by researcher also.

Weekly fluency will be assessed using various grade level fluency probes. Fluency norms will be from Jan Hasbrouck and Gerald Tindal, 2006 study. Other assessment resources to be used will be the Texas Primary Reading Inventory data.



8. Sustain Improvement
Currently the positive aspect of my research is that it will impact student achievement. It is a study that will help us increase student performance and that in itself is an accomplishment. As my research continues this plan will be updated with my findings.