Research Study Update #3
Plan basics: Determine impact of sustained silent reading
and external rewards on reading motivation
My research study has now concluded and I am putting the
final touches on the last two chapters of the rough draft of my research
paper. When I inputted the final pieces
of quantitative data into my spreadsheet, I found that students’ reading
motivation had increased by 2%, so I am definitely happy about that. When I looked at the data further though, the
middle school students’ reading motivation decreased 22% while the high school
students’ increased 43%. Those wild
swings make me question if the way I calculated reading motivation was
accurate. However, I do feel comfortable
with my measurement and feel that more “normalized” data would have appeared
had the study been conducted over a longer period of time.
11 of the 12 participating students indicated they would
like the sustained silent reading period to continue, so when I present these
findings to teachers and administration in my school, I will make the
recommendation that at least one block of homeroom period per week be dedicated
to silent reading. I still plan on
implementing a silent reading day (20 minutes of one block per week) in my
seventh grade English classroom next school year.
As I mentioned in my blog update last month, I am happy to
have helped contribute to building a reading culture in my school. Maybe the study didn’t show completely viable
results in this two month period, but being able to see the students actually
reading and having them tell me that they enjoyed having SSR has made me label
this research study an overall success.
Now hopefully, I’ll write a great paper and get that diploma.
