Action Research Methodology

I teach first grade at Lowe Elementary School; my class is made up of twenty-four very diverse seven year-olds; they come from all over the city of Louisville, from a variety of socio-economic situations. Each student brings a unique personality to our classroom community, and they all work hard to become “smarter and smarter” and to “go to college”. Thirteen students are boys and eleven are girls. Of these twenty-four students, three of them are English Language Learners. Additionally, eight students receive tier two interventions and two receive tier three interventions in reading. In math, five students are tier two and four are tier three. I also teach one student who receives ECE services for a developmental delay. Within my class there is a wide achievement gap.

Gifted students have a higher risk of dropping out of school due to a number of factors including a lack of challenge in academic areas, feeling disconnected to their fellow students and their teachers, potential drug and alcohol abuse and the lack of coping skills to deal with increased sensitivities. Additionally, gifted students are known to experience a lack of community or none acceptance at school, a high sensitivity not acknowledged in school, no help in learning coping skills for dealing with a major loss such as illness, death or changing schools, issues with authority but most importantly, they often do not have an advocate to help bring out meaningful change (Hansen and Torso, 2007). These factors have led to gifted students being underachievers, dropouts, or students who have developed an overall negative impression on school and learning in general.

As an ELPT, I was well informed and trained in the laws, rules, and responsibilities with running English as a second language and Bilingual Programs. I screened students using the W-APT screener for proper placement of our EL students. I monitored the progress of transitional students and worked collaboratively with their teachers to offer interventions. I understood how to use ACCESS data to inform instruction and meet the linguistic needs of our EL population. With this knowledge, I was able to work collaboratively, coach, model, and facilitate the learning of adults on how to best use data to design and differentiate instruction for our students success.

gifted students within those states, and are not consistent across the United States. “Seven states

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Miss Kane’s first grade class at Lutie Lewis Coates Elementary School (also known as Coates Elementary) has twenty students and seventeen of them are considered English Language Learners (ELL) (E. Kane, Personal Communication, October 4, 2016). This is very frustrating for both Miss. Kane and her students because it is very difficult to communicate with many of her ELLs. Out of Miss Kane’s twenty students eight students are Hispanic, five Indian, five Black, and three White. Miss Kane’s class is very diverse and this allows students to feel more accepted because not all students are similar. Coates Elementary as a whole is very diverse: Asian 28.86%, Black 18.26%, Hispanic 37.32%, and White 12.08% (Fairfax County Public Schools, 2015). Miss Kane’s classroom reflects similar diversity as Coates Elementary does. Both Miss. Kane and the Coates staff really show their appreciation for diversity and attempt to treat all children equally giving all students equal opportunity. Coates Elementary is a Title I school; about fifty percent of students receive free and reduced lunch (Fairfax County Public Schools, 2015). This school was placed in the center of poverty and many of these students who participate in the free and reduced lunch program are English Language Learners.

(2013). Curriculum Issues. Gifted child Today. Retrieved from Education Full Text (H.W. Wilson), Ipswich, MA. Accessed July 29, 2015.

In order to meet the equal-opportunity challenge in education this mandate requires funding for all public schools at levels. This is sufficient to provide a rigorous curriculum in a wide range of subject areas, delivered by Highly–Qualified Teachers, with support by excellent school district leaders. This also, requires adequate funding for school districts that provide education for high numbers of students from low-income families, ESL students, including students with special needs (Baker, B. D., Sciarra, D. G., Farrie, D. (2010, p. 1).

So, we do have . . . the English Language Learners as a subgroup in our school. We also have the autistic support population of students in our special education department, we have . . . [a] magnet . . . special education population . . . [pause] trying to think, outside of those particular groups if there is anything to consider. We don't have a large African American population, even for a large school, I would have to pull out our . . . profile even to just take a look . . . [and] not a very large Latino population [pause] and we are in the area of the district where we do have a higher SES status. So, we do not have a large number of historically underperforming students.

For the purpose of observing a school environment, I was granted the opportunity to visit Marcy Open School, a K-8 Minneapolis Public School located in 415 University Ave SE, Minneapolis, MN. Like all magnet schools, Marcy Open School strives to achieve racial balance and incorporates specialized curricular themes to reach out to its scholars. In addition, the school website states the mission of the school is to,” Educate for life-long learning in a respectful environment that emphasizes responsibility, creativity, curiosity, and connectedness to the world”. To enhance students’ learning outcomes, Marcy Open School incorporates the following nine unique programs: Marcy Arts Partnership, a program that funds for arts-integrated programs and residencies for all children, regardless of race, religion, developmental level or socioeconomic status. Parents established the program in 1995 in an effort to connect students with the wider community and strengthen students’ education. Also, the school provides Path to Reading Excellence in School Sites (PRESS) a partnership between, target, the University of Minnesota, Reading Corps, and select Minneapolis schools (Marcy included), that focuses on teachers and students in grades K-3 and provides them Quality Core Instruction, Data-Based Decision Making, Tiered Interventions, and Professional Development. This program was designed because ample research proves that children’s’ ability to read by third grade determines their future

Apply principals of effective teaching based on educational theory, laws, county and school policy, and ethical practice in the comprehensive

Those who are currently teaching are required to take a course called Rethinking Equity and Teaching English Language Learners (RETELL) or Secondary English Language (SEI) course so they can be better prepared to teach the students of other primary languages. The data from the ELL students in the three districts are more dramatic than percentages of students with disabilities. Compared to Norwood and Brockton’s ELL student population, Monson only had 7 ELL students in their district in 2016. When comparing the ELA, math, and science scores for all three towns, Monson didn’t even have sufficient data to record. Norwood and Brockton however, had interesting data to compare. In ELA, Norwood scored higher than Brockton with a percentage of 41 and Brockton at 13 percent for students who performed with high proficiency. In math, Norwood had a 40 percent higher academic standing, whereas Brockton only had 15 percent. Both Monson and Brockton ELL students performed below the achievement gap goal with negative scores. Norwood, however, performed above the state level for all three subjects. There was no data found in the scoring of ELL students in Monson for MCAS scores. Out of the 5th grade ELL students in Norwood, who participated in the MCAS, 6 scored in above average, 31 percent scored in proficient, 50 percent scored needs improvement, and 13 percent scored as failing.

Because of this law being at the forefront of any educational program, educational leaders must develop plans that effectively enhance learning and increase student achievement. The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) serves as a roadmap for improving teaching and learning by educators. These standards are designed for students, teachers, and administrators. They help measure proficiency and set ambitious goals for the knowledge, skills, and attitudes needed for students to succeed in today’s schools. The National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC) standards developed 1998, is also enriched in technology standards in efforts of helping school districts examine the quality of their programs for the gifted learner. These standards help foster and encourage high standards of learning, and in doing so, support must be provided for gifted education programming services. In fact, NAGC Standard 4.1 E states that, “Gifted education programming should provide state-of the-art technology to support technology services.” While most findings concerning, gifted education are made primarily by the states and local school districts, NAGC collaborates a great deal with members of Congress and the U.S. Department of Education to ensure that guidelines in legislation

Action learning, in contrast to action research, focuses on the learning and the action does not require the extension of new knowledge in a theoretical sense. In action learning the participants select some issues, analyze them, take some action and say on that action, while Action research is a process by which change and understanding can be pursued at the one time. It is usually described as cyclic, with action and critical reflection taking place in turn. It is commonly done by a group of people, though sometimes people use it to improve their practice. It has been used often in the field of education for this purpose. It is not unusual for there to be someone

The topic of gifted and talented education is one that has always sparked debates among parents and teachers, and recent movements towards totally integrating classrooms have added to this debate. For many years now, "average" children, gifted and