Data Reflection Assignment

Analysis of Data Reflection

The main question of my TIP was, “how does podcasting affect student performance in reading fluency?” The following is my response to that question based on the data that I’ve collected. The main data that I’m basing this response on is student achievement on their one minute oral reading test scores and the overall performance change from the first podcast to the second.

The ‘cwpm’ test results seem to suggest two things, both of which seem to support the conclusion that podcasting positively impacted student’s oral reading ability. The first finding that I came across is that the majority of students ‘correct words per minute’ scores improved on the 2nd test. Some students, however, did not improve their ‘correct words per minute’,and in fact their totals dropped. The positive thing that I noticed in almost all these cases is that their scores for expression, smoothness, phrasing, intonation and pace all increased, even though the amount of words read in one minute decreased. This leads me to think that students slowed their reading down some for the sake of increasing their expression, pacing, intonation and phrasing. Perhaps the first time through the test they raced a little at the expense of these other oral reading attributes, and the 2nd test is a truer indication of their best oral reading performance.

However, to muddy the waters further, the students whose cwpm scores went down are nearly all in grade eight. The younger students, who tended to have weaker oral reading skills as a whole, made consistent improvements in their cwpm scores. I personally think that they had more room to grow, wheras the gr. 8’s were closer to a maximum word per minute rate during the first test. I mean, there’s got to be a ceiling for the amount of words even the most stellar oral reader can effectively read in one minute.

After having graded their 2nd podcast, I can definitely say that there was a distinct improvement in the quality of their oral reading from their first effort.