Data Analysis
Section A: Reaching Consensus about Proficiency
In my 9th grade English class the students have shown repeated
evidence of grammatical errors at the sentence level. In order to
correct these mistakes for their next papers, and their educational
careers going forward, we returned to the most basic form of
communications, the sentence. In doing this they will need to
understand not only what constitutes as a complete sentence, but how
to punctuate it correctly as well. At the end of the lesson students were
expected to identify and create complete sentences with 80-90%
accuracy while punctuating those sentences with 70-80% accuracy.
Because punctuation is finicky by nature the expectations that
students learn and retain all of the rules associated with them is
unrealistic so the expectations are lowered to best accommodate their
abilities.
The standard addressed for these lessons was:
Standard: 3. Writing and Composition
3. Writing for grammar, usage, mechanics, and clarity requires ongoing
refinements and revisions
a. Demonstrate command of the conventions of Standard English
capitalization, punctuation, and spelling when writing. (CCSS:
L.9-10.2)
i. Identify comma splices and fused sentences in writing
and revise to eliminate them
ii. Distinguish between phrases and clauses and use this
knowledge to write varied, strong, correct, complete
sentences
In order to evaluate students ability they were given a pre and
post-test on their abilities to identify complete sentences and place
punctuation in the correct places in a block of text that was provided.
All capitalization and punctuation was omitted from the text so
students needed to read it and fill in the punctuation in order to make
the text readable and to clarify meaning. The text chosen came from
To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, a text the students had been
reading in class before the lessons. In order to be proficient students
needed to add the correct punctuation indicating the end of a
sentences within 80-90% accuracy. Complete sentences were
something that had been covered the period before, and periods,
question marks, and exclamation points have been covered every year
since kindergarten. Because of the exposure students have this section
was evaluated much higher. The other part of the assignment was to
place other forms of punctuation, such as commas, in the correct
places to create clarity within the text. Because the nature of these
elements have many rules, some that could not be covered in class, or
are different because they are stylistic and optional, like semi-colons
and dashes, they will not be evaluated as harshly with 70-80%
accuracy to be proficient.
Section B: Diagnosing Student Strengths and Needs:
Pre
Student Name
Assessment- Pre AssessmentPost
Daisy
High
Low- Comma
Macee
High
Low- Comma
Emily
High
Expected
Alex
High
Expected
Joseph
High
Low- Comma
Sophie
High
Expected
Brie
High
Low- Comma
Aidan
Expected
High
Grace
Expected
High
Addie
Expected
Expected
Sam
Expected
Low- Comma
Cassidy
Expected
Low- Comma
and Sentences
Parker
Expected
Expected
Logan
Expected
Low- Comma
Max
Expected
Low- Comma
and Sentences
Alec
Expected
Low- Comma
Dylan
Expected
Low- Comma
Clover
Expected
Low- Comma
Taco
Expected
High
Chris
Expected
Low- Sentences
Antonio
Low
Expected
Irelan
Low
Expected
Hadrood
Low
Low- Comma
and Sentences
Leo
Low
Low- Comma
Out of 23 students 16 students, or 70% of the class, scored less on
their post test than they did their pretest.
Pretest
Low- 17%
Expected- 56%
High- 31%
Post test
Low- 60%
Expected- 30%
High- 10%
When sorting students I looked at the number of sentences and
the number of commas in the section. For example, if there are four
sentences and five commas in the passage a student can incorrectly
identify one sentence and/or two commas to still be proficient or
expecte. Students who missed more were considered low and
students who missed less were high.
Obviously, when looking at the data it is clear that this
assessment was faulty. I have several theories about why this may
have happened seeing as so many students went down a grade. My
first is students, after hearing that the first assessment was not going
to be counted against them, decided to not take the second
assessment as serious. Many students who received a low
assessment did not include commas or had one of two when the
instructions clearly said there were five in the passage. Students did
not have the same amount of time to complete the second assessment
as the first. I did not plan for the correct amount of time in my lesson
for the second assessment. Because of this students may have not had
enough time to work with the text to properly show their
understanding. The last theory I have was something I noticed while
evaluating the students work. The first passage had more flexibility.
Depending on how the student read the text there were three or four
ways they could have evaluated the punctuation while being
grammatically correct. The second passage did not have this flexibility.
The point of all this is I know the evaluation was faulty. I will not
base the students ability on the results of this assessment alone.
Section C: Identifying Instructional Next Steps:
As stated above the assessment was faulty for a number of
reasons. However, I noticed a few patterns that can influence the
instruction going.
While looking over the post-test evaluations there were two
areas that 70% of students missed, one was using commas to separate
nonessential information, and the other was separating two sentences
in the correct location. Incidentally both of these aspects were found in
the same sentence. Many students did not use commas at all or placed
them in the incorrect location to offset the nonessential information,
and/or put a period in between the subject of the sentence and the
predicate.
Because so many students missed the same few things I know
that this section needs to be covered again with a focus on those
elements. Going forward I would have a mini lesson for nonessential
information with targeted practice on when commas are needed. For
the error with the sentence I would return to complex sentences and
show students how to identify the parts of the sentence (the
independent clause, the dependent clause, and the subordinating
conjunction).
Without these errors 75% of the student who received a low
assessment would have been expected or high. For the students
who had plentiful errors in other places I would pull them aside for an
extra mini lesson to reestablish how to use commas in a general sense,
such as how to avoid comma splices, as well as the lesson for the
whole class. These students need more support that can be provided
with a small group or one-on-one.
In order to give the high students a chance to excel I was
thinking about having them teach their peers in groups. This way they
have a chance to show their mastery of the skill while helping their
peers along the way. Different thinking is required to teach a concept
rather than to perform a task. These students could find examples of
sentence structure and punctuation in the text they are reading and
show their peers how it is working, or could walk around and help their
peers like a teachers assistant. Perhaps another way to challenge
advanced students could be to have them find a way to punctuate the
text a different way than they first time they did it. This activity would
work perfectly for the first text provided. (Would this count has making
them do extra work? I see it more as challenging them to think a
different way, but I can see how it seems like more work.)
What it boils down to is the way the lesson was taught and the
way the students were assessed was not the most efficient way to
convey this information. Going forward I would revamp the instruction
completely. I would teach mini grammar lessons for a few weeks,
focusing on one area and allowing students to practice each
component. This way students will have more exposure to more
elements instead of getting a survey of them all at once, and not
having the opportunity to practice all of the elements.
