FIN Commons

Summary of Inquiry

Plans for Data Collection and Analysis

A. Zoom-Lens Data: Focusing on Students

B. Mid-Range Shots: Focusing on the Classroom

C. Wide-Angle Lens: Focusing on Trends in Institutional Data

D. Additional Video Footage

E. Inclusion of Student Voices

Team Timeline/Calendar – Spring 09 & Summer 09

Summary

Skyline College

Non-native English speakers at Skyline College have a complex and diverse set of backgrounds and represent a variety of linguistic needs. Some students have attended one or more years of high school in the United States. Others are newcomers to the country and are fully literate in their first languages, with some even holding degrees in their first language. Still others are only marginally literate in their first language. The Early Childhood Education department has identified a cohort that has the lowest success rates of all students in the ECE department: Spanish speakers. This cohort typically enrolls in the minimum number of courses (6 units) required to get a job as an assistant teacher in a child care center – a low-paying job with no advancement without further education – and they do not pursue other options within the enormous realm of job opportunities connected to ECE education. Few succeed: many of these students have low English skills, and ECE faculty suspect low first language literacy. By and large, these students do not prepare for their ECE studies via ESL classes and make use of translation and support from classmates. A team of English, ESL, and Early Childhood Education faculty members will investigate the English language needs of students in the Early Childhood Education program (ECE), asking: What is the impact of first-language literacy levels on Spanish-speaking students’ ability to succeed in the ECE program? Can an intervention that combines Spanish literacy education and contextualized ESL improve outcomes for these students?

Team Leader:
Leigh Anne Sippel / ESL
650-738-4408
sippell@smccd.edu

Team Members:
Kate Williams Browne / ECE Program Coordinator
Dr. Luciana Castro / Spanish

Plans for Data Collection and Analysis

A. Zoom-Lens Inquiry: Focusing on Students

1) What data will you gather and analyze on individual students? (e.g. student work, self-reflections, interviews, videotaped think-alouds or problem-solving)

Data about the students: demographics (education, birth, languages spoken, languages formally taught, language use)

Data from the students: surveys, videotaped focus groups, videotaped one-on-one interviews, most likely in Spanish but perhaps some in English.

We will gather surveys on students about their goals, their educational backgrounds, their long-range views of their potential, their support networks, and their identities as students or successful people. Some of these surveys will be done in writing and some will be videotaped interviews. We want to find out:

• Is first-language literacy a factor these students’ success overall?
• Is first-language literacy a factor in why most Spanish-speaking ECE students do not routinely take ESOL classes before enrolling in ECE classes?
• Do these Spanish-speakers consider other options than entry-level jobs in childcare, or do they only opt for these jobs because they think it aligns with their potential?
• Can an intervention help improve outcomes for these students?

2) How do you imagine this data will help you understand the problem/issue you’re investigating? In other words, how does the data connect to and inform the overall focus of your inquiry?

Our goal is to either confirm our hunch or to discover other factors in our students’ barriers to success. We hope to use this information to design interventions for these students. The project will also act as a model for the campus in that three different departments will be collaborating to discover important information about a demographic that does not get enough attention.

3) When and how will you collect this data? (e.g. Which classes will you target? Where will you conduct interviews or think-alouds?)

Core ECE classes will provide the field for this data: ECE 201 Child Development, ECE 210 ECE Principles, ECE211 Curriculum, and ECE Child, Family, & Community. Some lessons will be videotaped for analysis by the team. Interviews and focus groups will be conducted outside of the classroom in empty classrooms or in the campus conference facilities. We will begin with a general survey to all students; the survey is designed not to take out time from an ECE class (it will be part of a normal classroom activity) and it will hopefully reveal our cohort. After we identify our cohort, we will approach individuals about joining focus groups and/or interviews.

The courses above are explained here:
ECE. 201 Child Development (3) (Credit/No Credit or letter grade.)
Three lecture hours per week. Recommended: Eligibility for ENGL 836
In-depth exploration of areas and issues of major importance in the field of child development. Focuses on personality, intellectual, social, and physical factors. Theoretical concepts, practical application, and current research are covered. Also listed as PSYC 201. Transfer credit: UC; CSU (D3).

ECE. 210 Early Childhood Education Principles (3) (Credit/No Credit or letter grade.)
Three lecture hours per week. Recommended: Eligibility for ENGL 836.
Overview of the history, nature, and goals of Early Childhood Education. Exploration of various program models in ECE, current issues, and long-range trends. Qualifications and training required for teachers of young children. Transfer credit: CSU.

ECE. 211 Early Childhood Education Curriculum (3) Credit/No Credit or letter grade.)
Three lecture hours per week. Recommended: Eligibility for ENGL 836.
Selection and management of activities for young children that provide quality learning experiences. Appreciation of the value of children’s play. Development of appropriate curriculum evaluation methods. Transfer credit: CSU

ECE. 212 Child, Family, and Community (3) (Credit/No Credit or letter grade.)
Three lecture hours per week. Recommended: Eligibility for ENGL 836.
An overview of contemporary family and community issues influencing childhood. Interactions among the child, family, school, peers, media, and community are explored. The course focuses on the socialization process., including cultural and ethnic diversity, parenting styles, gender roles, and the role of the community. Community resources available to children and families are also covered. Transfer credit: UC; CSU.

4) When will you analyze this data? (e.g. mid-semester team retreat, after lesson-study session, at the end of the semester; )

We will begin analyzing the survey data immediately (survey will be given in March and our cohort will be extracted from that information). After that, we will approach individuals and set up focus group sessions in the remaining months of the semester. We hope to have some preliminary data from those groups to analyze by May. Our team may do some limited work over the summer.

5.) How will you analyze the data? (e.g. analyzing student work with a rubric or analytic frame like Polya’s method for problem-solving or Perry’s scheme for student development; analyzing themes in student self-reflections according to their performance in the class – how did the responses of students who did not pass compare/contrast with students who performed well?)

For our video footage, we will follow Kolb’s experiential learning model. The team will first clarify one element of our original question that we are focusing on for this session. We will then watch the footage and make note of things of interest: surprising patterns, unexpected responses, anticipated behaviors, etc. We will talk together about what we see and the relationship it has to our original question. From this, we will formulate a clearer, more concise question that hopefully will help us get to the core of our inquiry. That question will lead us to a new hypothesis that can also be observed, either with the same data, or via new data (interviews, footage, surveys, etc.)

6) What questions/concerns do you have about this element of your Inquiry? How can your Inquiry Coach support you in this phase of your Inquiry?

We are a bit concerned with how to begin evaluating this data because it will likely be so rich and far-reaching, but using the Kolb model will help us to keep the frame of our questions narrow and easier to see. We would appreciate any assistance in helping us approach the analysis of the data.

B. Mid-Range Shots: Focusing on the Classroom

1) Please name ONE specific lesson in a particular course that will give you a good vantage point for observing student learning relevant to your Inquiry.

Sample Lesson Study: An ECE lesson on the importance of parents modeling good reading and writing behaviors in the home. Such a lesson gets a deep reflection on the part of students when they are asked to remember, for themselves, when they might have witnessed good reading and writing behaviors from their parents as a child. In this manner, we might be able to tap into student perspectives on reading and writing, their own feelings of their strengths in that area, and their views about literacy.

2) How do you imagine the Lesson Study will help you understand the problem/issue you’re investigating about students and their learning? In other words, how does it connect to and inform the overall focus of your inquiry?

ECE faculty are keen to know ways that will improve outcomes via teaching strategies to this particular cohort. The experience of an ECE faculty, an ESL faculty, and a Spanish faculty will coalesce to help single out successful strategies for this cohort and strategies that need improvement.

3) When and how will your team conduct this Lesson Study? Please detail the timeframes and participants for the three parts of the Lesson Study process (collaboratively planning the lesson, teaching/observing the lesson, and debriefing/analyzing videotapes & student work from the lesson).

We hope to film the lesson, providing we get appropriate permissions from all classroom members. Timeline:

Late March, 2009: Identify a class to do the lesson study. Set up date for Lesson Study in April.

Early April, 2009: Meet to examine lesson plan and formulate specific questions to be answered during observation:

• What are the goals of the lesson?
• How will the learning be visible to us?
• What behaviors are we hoping to see?
• How will we know the lesson is a success?

Mid April, 2009: Conduct Lesson Study; Teacher teaches the lesson and one or two team observers film the lesson.

Late April, 2009: Team convenes to analyze the lesson.

4) What kinds of things will the observers be looking/listening for during the lesson? What artifacts of student learning and student experience will the team collect during the lesson? Will you videotape any portion of this process (pre-planning, lesson, debrief)?

Some possible behaviors we may be looking for can include:

• The number of questions raised by a cohort member
• The amount of activity in group participation, in English or Spanish
• The number of times students in the cohort refer to reading materials
• Note taking behaviors
• Noticing of any simultaneous translation of the lesson
• Noticing of any off-task behaviors

5) What questions/concerns do you have about this element of your Inquiry? How can your Inquiry Coach support you in this phase of your Inquiry?

We aren’t entirely sure if we fully understand what is meant by lesson study. Is there anything missing from our understanding of Lesson Study?

C. Wide-Angle Lens: Focusing on Larger Trends in Institutional Data

1) What data from your Institutional Research Office will you integrate into your Inquiry? For example, will you look at patterns of student success, defined as grades of CR, A,B C? Retention rates (completion of semester without withdrawl)? Persistence from one semester to the next, or from one course to the next in a sequence? Comparisons of student outcomes disaggregated by race/ethnicity, gender, age? Data from surveys on student engagement? For a sample Inquiry using this kind of data, go to http://facultyinquiry.net and look for the category “Using Institutional Research,” then see the Learning Community Impact study posted there.)

We will ask our research office for data regarding overall pass rates, retention rates, success rates, and applications for certificates and/or degrees. We would like to go back at least 2 semesters and begin tracking as of this semester.

We would also like to know:

• Whether any of our cohort students are taking other (non ECE) courses at the college. This might indicate an interest in something larger in their goals.
• Whether any of our cohort students are taking ESOL courses at Skyline or elsewhere
• Whether any of our cohort students are taking advantage of tutoring, study groups, or other student assistance
• Whether any of our cohort students express (in interview, focus group, or survey) a marked difference in perceptions of career changes as a result of our meetings and discussions.
• We will ask the research department for suggestions on more data that can help us. We may wish to share our findings with other colleges, especially our sister colleges.

2) How do you imagine this data will help you understand the problem/issue you’re investigating? In other words, how does the data connect to and inform the overall focus of your inquiry?

The data will give us a larger picture of who our students are and what their goals are, and whether those goals change over the course of our interaction/intervention.

3) What questions/concerns do you have about this element of your Inquiry? How can your Inquiry Coach support you in this phase of your Inquiry?

This piece is the most daunting for us as it will be the proverbial “can of worms” that is hard to contain. We would appreciate any help at this stage to help keep us focused and to help us see trends worth pursuing further.

D. Video Footage

We are asking each team to collect at least 10 hours of video footage in the Spring semester.

1) Beyond plans detailed above, please describe any additional footage you intend to gather.

We plan to video at least one class, and several focus group and interview sessions. This will entirely depend on getting the appropriate permissions from participants.

After the preliminary data is gathered, we will design interventions that may include contextualized ESL or Spanish in the ECE class, or support sessions either in English or Spanish. Some of these will be videoed as well.

2) How will this footage inform the central questions of your Inquiry?

The footage will provide us with visuals of behaviors and clearer pictures of what happens with our students during a lesson. It will also allow us to set the camera back in a focus group session and hopefully let students forget that it is there (as opposed to filming a student up close); we hope to get more candid and relaxed responses this way.

In addition, the video footage of the interventions will provide fodder for analysis and information to share.

3) What questions/concerns do you have about this element of your Inquiry? Is there any support you’d like from the FIN Leadership Team in this area?

Our research committee has no language guiding us in the legality of filming classes. We are unsure how to proceed and are working out the details as this is being written.

We’re unsure whether we can use students as co-inquirers – we may need a separate vetting/approach process to find a student who may be able to help us. Many ECE courses are at night because students typically have impacted schedules. Many ECE students have language, family, and social concerns that may impact their ability to assist us with such a project.

E. Inclusion of Student Voices

As noted during the Kick-Off Convening, an additional $1,000 will be made available to each team to support making student voices a central part of each Inquiry. We encourage you to be creative and draw upon students as co-inquirers who can provide expertise in helping you understand the problem/issue you are investigating. Please describe how you plan to include student voices in your Inquiry (e.g. hiring students to capture video footage, interview other students, review data from your inquiry and tell you what they see).

We have budgeted in the $1000, but we may not use it. It entirely depends on whether we can find a student or two who can help us in our inquiry. We do not have a film department at our college, and all film work is typically done by the district IT personnel, who are more technically adept than they are sensitive to research particulars. If we do not use the $1000 for student co-inquirers, we will give it back and instead use our existing budget to get footage via focus groups and interviews.

Timeline/Calendar

So that we can visualize how the work will proceed over the next several months, please give a timeline for when the above components will occur. It can be in either calendar or outline format.

Late February/Early March, 2009: Initial survey to reveal cohort.

Early March, 2009: Cohort approached and invited to participate.

Late March, 2009: Identify a class to do the lesson study. Set up date for Lesson Study in April.

Early April, 2009: Meet to examine lesson plan and formulate specific questions to be answered during observation:

• What are the goals of the lesson?
• How will the learning be visible to us?
• What behaviors are we hoping to see?
• How will we know the lesson is a success?

Mid April, 2009: Conduct Lesson Study; Teacher teaches the lesson and one or two team observers film the lesson.

Late April, 2009: Team convenes to analyze the lesson. New questions formed: what is the next step.

Summer, 2009: Limited work on design of interventions for cohort based on data.

Fall, 2009: Implement interventions on cohort (possible course support, contextualized instruction, etc. Video of key components).

Spring 2010: Analyze data and prepare to present.