Date of Award
2003
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Education
Department
Fischler Graduate School of Education and Human Services
Advisor
Gypsy Abbott
Committee Member
Gigi Outz
Committee Member
Barbara Packer
Keywords
action plan, Alabama Direct Assessment of Writing, Alabama Direct Writing Assessment, attendance, BES, Burroughs Elementary School, fifth-grade students, instructional strategies, Mobile County Public School System, parental support, professional development, student learning, teaching strategies, technology integration, test scores, writing abilities, writing development, writing instruction, writing teachers
Abstract
This applied dissertation was designed to help increase the low-writing scores on the Alabama Direct Assessment of Writing, Grade Five at Burroughs Elementary School (BES), and how these low-writing scores have caused multiple concerns for the staff, students, and community. Planned intervention strategies were applied to effectively implement teaching strategies to assist with increasing the writing scores of the students. In order to write effectively, an individual must have certain teaching skills that will allow the students to accept and internalize the learning.
The writer developed an action plan to address the low-test scores of BES’s fifth-grade students who had scored at Level 1 or Level 2 on the Alabama Direct Writing Assessment, Grade Five. This plan included the need for strengthening instructional strategies, conducting professional development activities, increasing attendance, utilizing technology, and increasing parental support for student learning. The experimental group for this controlled study consisted of randomly selected fifth-grade students as well as teachers from located in the Mobile County Public School System. The teachers were taught specific skills that matched the students’ deficits. The on going professional development was designed to enhance the instruction of writing skills.
An analysis of the data combined with the implementation of a half-time writing teacher and other improvements in the area of writing suggested that by developing staff proficiency in teaching writing skills, students in the fifth-grade at BES experienced an increase in their writing abilities.