What were the challenges and successes? The most challenging element of my study was creating ways to differentiate for students who were already fluent and accurate readers. I initially thought these students easily identified a majority of words they read, so their letter-sound knowledge had “plateaued” (or so I thought). It was a challenge for me to constantly ensure that these students were still experiencing effective instruction even though they were advanced in their letter-sound relationships. In order to combat this challenge, I sought the help and guidance of my capstone advisor, who had suggestions for challenging my higher learners. One challenge I issued my students was encouraging them to complete open sorts, in which they were not told how to group words. They had to look at a group of words and determine the pattern of them. I also had students find words to build that fit within a specific spelling pattern. The original challenge of my action plan eventually became one of my successes. Throughout the process of the study, I began to notice my high ability learners had less word attack skills than I initially thought. Since these students were fluent and accurate readers, I assumed they would be advanced in building and sorting words. I quickly learned this was not the case. On a daily basis, my high ability students spelled a sight word correctly because they had the spelling memorized. In contrast, when asked to build a word, any word they wanted, based on a specific spelling pattern, they had a really challenging time. I found it was hard for my most advanced readers to step outside the box and create words they do not normally see. This was incredibly eye opening for me to see. Had it not been for daily guided instruction with all students, I would have never noticed that even my most advanced students could benefit from explicit phonics instruction. Therefore, I consider it a success that all students grew throughout this process, not just those who needed help with letter-sound understanding.
What did I learn as a result of the action research? One of the most prominent learnings I have gained throughout this experience is that I can never make assumptions about students and their ability to succeed. I originally thought my lower achievers, with much room to grow in letter-sound knowledge, would have a really hard time building, sorting, and identifying words. However, these students were able to build, sort, and identify words just as efficiently as my higher level students. During the last few years of reading development, these students have built word attack skills, along with the ability to detect individual sounds, because that was their best attempt at reading. Word automaticity has not always come easy to them, so segmenting and blending letter-sounds became their best reading strategy. Having to consistently segment and blend most words has allowed these students to develop grit, persistence, and motivation. These skills carried into our action plan process, pushing students to make greater gains than I ever thought.
How has the action research impacted learning? To provide an equitable and accessible learning environment, the learning that took place within my classroom’s space/structure, along with the materials used, were tailored to meet each student's needs. For example, my classroom is designed in a way that allows for collaborative activities and discussions. While taking part in word sorting, picture sorting, word hunts, and writing words, students were given the opportunity to pick a spot at our semi-circle table, a private spot on the floor, a spot at our writing table, or a spot at their own desks. This allowed students to not only take ownership of where they wanted their learning to take place, but also allowed them to have a choice. So often in my classroom, I am telling my students where to go and what to do. Word study was the same in that I told them what their task was each day, but different in the way that they got to choose where to go. During this time, I was checking in with each student and monitoring the task they were doing. It was then that I would have each student collaboratively share their sort and other students would compare/contrast their sort to that of the student presenting. This allowed for meaningful conversations to take place, as students explained what they did and why they did it. Additionally, students knew where to find each material they needed. Some needed clipboards and a quiet place to work, while others wanted to work next to a friend and collaborate ideas together. Giving students the choice of where to sit, the materials to use, and who to sit with during word study provided an equitable and accessible learning environment. In giving students an equitable and accessible learning environment, the learning that can take place is endless. I saw my students developing letter-sound relationships through collaborative and independent work, while utilizing a variety of strategies. The long-lasting effects of student learning became evident through my post-study data collections.
If I were to do this research again, I would implement more strategies, in addition to the strategies I already did. I learned that students need various exposures to words and working with words in order to truly grow in their skills, especially in letter-sound knowledge.
How has the action research impacted current and future teaching? In creating my action plan and strategies, I considered the various perspectives of myself as a teacher, as well as each my students. In doing so, I wanted to create an environment that exposed my students to something they would be able to understand. This clearly looked different from student to student. I knew that every single strategy would not fit every single student. Therefore, I had to develop a variety of strategies that would meet student needs in at least one way. For this reason, some of my strategies encompassed hands-on activities, while others included visual pictures, some had a combination of words and pictures, once utilized engaged writing, and another included reading and highlighting (a huge motivator for students). Some of my kinesthetic learners worked best manipulating hands-on letter tiles to see how the movement of letters creates new words and sounds. Other students liked to only sort words, while others worked best seeing words and pictures. As I differentiated strategy methods, I knew that at least one day a week, each student would be able to make letter-sound connections using a method that worked best for him/her. Implementing constant differentiation in phonics is something I still currently do, as it has been proven to be effective over the course of my action research.
Creating different methods of learning for each student allowed me to truly reflect on my current teaching practices and future teaching practices. I have learned that while I may plan for differentiation to take place during guided reading, one of the most important parts of teaching phonics skills to children is to constantly be observing students. In doing so, I must always meet students with where they are at. Data is an extremely useful means of determining where my students are, but informally observing my students while they are reading and writing is also key. From here on, I have learned to look at a student from all angles, taking into account his/her data points, observable reading/writing behaviors, and word attack skills on a daily basis. In the coming years as a teacher, I plan to implement explicit word work daily. I want to start this right away, as soon as I begin guided reading with my students. After my action research, I have seen firsthand how important it is for students to manipulate letters and build words in order to truly advance in phonics skills. Immediate exposure to various word work strategies will allow students to use these strategies for the entire year, but with curriculum-led weekly phonics skills.
How did I collaborate with professionals and community members to improve learning? Throughout the process of my capstone study, I collaborated with many professionals within the realm of my learning community in order to create a study that fit the needs of my students that was research and data based. When looking at my baseline data to decide upon a focus of study for my action research, I had changed what I wanted to focus on multiple times. I initially wanted to focus on comprehension because that was an area that I saw my students struggled in. However, I only had 1-2 data points that supported comprehension. With the help of my CADRE associate, we dove into ALL of my students' data for all subject areas. The process of crunching numbers and figuring percentages allowed us to find that letter-sound relationships were a big concern for a majority of my students. Fortunately, this was an area that was supported by loads of data. Without the professional support of my CADRE associate, I would have neglected to see the real area of need for my class.
After choosing explicit phonics instruction for my action plan, I sought the guidance of my school's reading specialist, as well as the two other reading specialists in my district. Each of these teachers guided me towards research based strategies, such as Words Their Way word sorting and word building, that increased growth of letter-sound knowledge. I was even fortunate to watch two reading specialists model these strategies for me with their reading students. This allowed me to see research-based phonics strategies put into practice by professionals who excel in this area of teaching.
Other professionals included in my learning community were my first grade teammates, my principal, CADRE peers, CADRE alumni teachers within my school, my CADRE capstone teacher, CADRE coordinator, the students within my class, and their parents. Reflecting on the learning community that helped shape my capstone project, from start to finish, has allowed me to see that the success of my study would not have been possible without all of these people.