Date of Award
2003
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Education
Department
Fischler Graduate School of Education and Human Services
Advisor
Maureen Fitzpatrick
Committee Member
Sidi M. Lakhdar
Committee Member
Barbara Packer
Keywords
assessment, bilingual teachers, case studies, data driven instruction, Developmental Reading Assessment, elementary schools, English-as-a-second-language teachers, Guided Reading, instructional assessment, instructional strategies, Massachusetts, Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System, Milford, professional development, reading achievement, reading assessment, reading instruction, reading teachers, reflective practice, running records, special education teachers, student achievement, teacher training, writing samples
Abstract
Woodland, a 3rd- and 4th-grade elementary school in Milford, Massachusetts, implemented a multiyear professional development program in order to improve student achievement in reading. The need for improvement became obvious after 3 years of low scores on the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System tests and a failure to meet state expectations for the school. This project involved training all teachers to use the Case Study of an individual student to illustrate how to assess and guide reading instruction for all students in the classroom.
Every regular education teacher, special education teacher, bilingual teacher, English-as-a-second language teacher, and reading teacher selected a student as his/her Case Study student. The selecting teacher was responsible for the reading instruction of this student. Teachers documented Case Study progress over the year through the use of the Degrees of Reading Power (Touchstone Applied Science Associates, 1995), Developmental Reading Assessment (Beaver, 1997), running records, and writing samples. They also critiqued their own teaching through the use of Guided Reading rubrics developed by Lyons and Pinnell (2001). Teachers discussed the progress of their Case Study student using these assessments at regularly scheduled reflective sessions throughout the school year.
This project examined the use of case studies as a way to provide manageable practice in delivering both new instructional assessments and instructional strategies. Additionally, it considered whether the attention provided to Case Study students, based on these practices, led to improved achievement for these students and others in the class.