Educational Research 5305

Mini-Project

DeAndre M. Carter

Concordia University Texas

 Table of Contents

Chapter I. Introduction ................................................................................................................................. 1

A. Statement of the Problem .................................................................................................................. 1

B. Purpose of the Study ......................................................................................................................... 2

Chapter II. REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE....................................................................................................... 2

Chapter III. METHODOLOGY ........................................................................................................................ 4

Chapter IV. RESULTS ..................................................................................................................................... 6

Chapter V. DISCUSSION ................................................................................................................................ 9

References ................................................................................................................................................. 11
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INTRODUCTION

The Dallas Independent School District is home to 219,000 students. The district has a

little over 50,000 middle school aged students. There are over 900 students enrolled at Atwell

Middle School. Of the 900 students, about a 150 of them are enroll in advanced courses. In the

seventh grade there are 60 students enrolled in advanced courses. Of the 60 students in

advanced courses, 20 of them are enrolled in Math 7 Pre-Ap.

Statement of the Problem

The Dallas Independent School District (Dallas ISD) purchased All In Learning for the

2016-2017 school year in order to improve student engagement and assessment scores. All In

Learning is an advanced clicker system that desegregates data on daily lessons presented in the

system as well as on assessment given in the traditional format. A highlight of the system is the

immediate feedback the student response system gives during instruction to allow a teacher to

realize whether or not the class is mastering a topic and make adjustments accordingly.

Dallas ISD spent a large amount of funding for All In Learning. Due to the amount of

money spent teachers are forced to embed the clicker system into their classrooms. Teachers

are split on whether the All In Learning increases the bottom line in education which is student

achievement. Some teachers are in full support of the clicker technology and use it daily as

designed by the company, All In Learning. Other teachers are reluctant to change their teacher

style for a system that they believe does not directly impact student achievement and student

engagement. Most of the reluctant teachers are teachers who teach advance courses. These

teachers feel that clicker technology will not improve advance students grades. Dallas ISD has
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issued a statement that all classroom are expected to use the clicker technology of All In

Learning.

Purpose of the Study

The purpose of this study is to measure the effectiveness of the All In Learning system

on student engagement and student achievement with advanced students. Student

engagement was defined as the extent unto which a student is involved in the lesson. Student

achievement was defined as the results a student received on test. This study was done to

answer the following question: Does All In Learning increase student achievement and student

engagement for advanced students? There are no limitations to this student as the subjects

have never interacted with the All In Learning system and are all in one class together.

REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE

There are three authors to this journal article: Judith Morse, Margaret Ruggieri, and

Karen Whelan-Berry. The title of the article is Clicking Our Way to Class Discussion. This is

volume 3 and it was produce March of 2010. The article has 9 total pages.The goal of the

research done in this article was to investigate whether clicker responses increase class

participation (Morse, 2010). The literature review section states that the idea of actively

engaging students in the learning process has been widely promoted and encouraged

(Morse, 2010 p 99). This section also mentions that the Personal Response Systems technology,

PRSs or clickers for short, have been brought to the forefront in order to better engage the Net

Generation (Morse, 2010). Net Generation has grown around technology and clicker

technology is a way of bringing technology into the classroom. The methodology taken by the
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researchers was two Pretest-posttest control-group design in which the control group was not

given a clickers. The researchers also had qualitative data from surveys they gave to students in

the classes. In the discussion section, the researchers concluded that students who had the

clickers were slightly more engaged than students who did not have the clickers (Morse, 2010).

In Chapter 6, the researchers stated that their sample size was small (Morse, 2010). In the

conclusion of the article, the researchers stated that through self-reporting students felt that

the clickers improve classroom discussion and about half agreed that the clicker technology

made the feel more freely to partake in classroom discussion (Morse, 2010).

There are two authors to this journal article: Jennifer A. Zapf and Adolfo J. Garciaet. The

title of the article is The Influence of Tech-Savyness and Clicker Use on Student Learning. This

is a single edition and it was produce 2011. The article has 13 total pages. The goal of the

research done in this article was to facilitate a clearer examination of the role of technology

in the classroom, (Zapf, 2011, p 2). In the introduction section of the article, the researcher

stated that previous research never separated the how familiar a student was with technology

with the ability for clickers to enhance a students learning (Zapf, 201). Evidence suggests that

students perceive clickers as useful devices in the classroom, the article states in the

Introduction (Zapf, 2011, p 2). The article also stated that students usual state that they like

clicker classes more than traditional style lectures (Zapf, 2011). The enjoyment is not the only

benefit to having a clicker classroom; the article mentioned that attendance is higher in a

clicker classroom as well on a collegiate level. The article proposed the question of what

happens if a student is resistant to the clicker and conducted research to analyze the question.

The researchers gave a questionnaire to measure the proficiency of students in regards to

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technology in which they called Student Technology Proficiency (Zapf, 2011). The results

showed that student perceptions of clickers did not change whether they were enrolled in a

clicker class or not. The researchers conclude that the clicker technology alone does not boost

GPA scores (Zapf, 2011). The article went further to say that clicker technology could even be a

distraction to a student that is very tech-savvy.

METHODOLOGY

The researcher used a One Group Pretest-Posttest Design. The reason for using this

design is because the researcher only has one group of seventh grade students that was taking

the Pre-Ap course and has not used the clicker technology All In Learning provides. The subjects

were a single class of seventh grade Pre-AP students at Atwell Middle School. The reason for

using this group is because this group had not had any previous experience with All In Learning.

The group was given two pretests before receiving the treatment. One pretest was a common

assessment that is given every five weeks by the Dallas Independent School District. The

common assessment material was taught to the subjects via traditional classroom methods

with limited technology. The other pretest was designed by the researcher and contains

questions that will be taught to the students via the treatment, All In Learning. Students were

also given a questionnaire by the researcher before the treatment. The questionnaire asked five

questions:

1. On a scale of 1 to 5, overall, how engaged are you in class?

2. On a scale of 1 to 5, how often do you now check to make sure you understand a topic?

3. On a scale of 1 to 5, how engaged are you in the daily lessons?

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4. On a scale of 1 to 5, how much do you enjoy getting feedback on problems

immediately?

5. Do you feel as if All In Learning System will enhance your learning or decrease your

learning?

After students were given the pretests and the questionnaire, the researcher taught the

students for 3 weeks using the All In Learning system. The researcher adjusted his lessons

based off the results the clickers shown as the class moved through lessons. If results from the

clickers showed low performance, the researcher asked additional questions to clear

misconceptions; however, if the results from the clickers showed mastery, then the researcher

moved pass that concept. The researcher also took the data provided by the system and

analyzed it to see which concepts needed to be reinforced and which ones need to be retaught.

The researcher also was able to see individual student performance and had conferences with

individual students based on the All In Learning results. At the end of the three weeks with the

All In Learning system, the subjects took two posttest. One posttest came from the Dallas

Independent School District titled Common Assessment 3. The other was a retake of the pretest

that was administered to the students before the treatment. Lastly, students took a satisfaction

survey a satisfaction survey to determine the engagement levels of the students. Below is the

questions that was asked to the students:

1. On a scale of 1 to 5, overall, how engaged are you in class?

2. On a scale of 1 to 5, how often do you now check to make sure you understand a topic?

3. On a scale of 1 to 5, how engaged are you in the daily lessons?

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4. On a scale of 1 to 5, how much did you enjoy getting feedback from the All In Learning

system?

5. Do you feel as if All In Learning System enhanced your learning or decreased your

learning?

The surveys measure response on an increasing scale. The more engaged or the more a student

was conscious of his understanding the higher the number the student marked on the survey.

After the experiment, the researcher compared both pretests and posttests and compared the

pre-survey and the post survey. Students were give a letter associated with their name in order

to compare data confidentially.

RESULTS

The subjects on Pretest 1, the test administered by the district, score an average of

59.2%. After 5 weeks of instructional delivery with All In Learning, the subjects increased the

average by over 20% to 81.2% on Posttest 1. Student A showed the most improvement with a

50 percentage point gain from Pretest 1 to Posttest 1. The smallest gain from Pretest 1 to

Posttest 1 was four percentage points which was Student N. All subjects showed great some

improvement and three subjects received perfect scores on Posttest 1. The results of Test 1:

District Common Assessments is displayed below:

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Test 1: District Common Assessments

120

100

80

60

40

20

Pretest 1 Posttest 1

The average score on Test 2: Teacher Made Assessment was a 42.5% on the pretest

(Pretest 2) and an 86.5% on the posttest (Posttest 2). The scores increased after the use of the

All In Learning system by 44 percentage points. There were three 60 point jumps. Two were by

Student A and Student K who went from 10% on the pretest to 70% on the posttest. Another

was Student L who went from 20% to 80%. The biggest jump in score was Student N who went

from a 10% on Pretest 2 to 80% on Posttest 2 which is a 70 percentage point increase. Five

students scored 100% on the posttest and students passed Posttest 2 with the smallest increase

in score being 20 percentage points. Below is a graph of Test 2: Teacher made Assessment:
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Test 2: Teacher Made Assessment

120

100

80

60

40

20

Pretest 2 Posttest 2

Students felt, overall, that the class was semi engaging before All In Learning was

implemented with an average score of 3.2 on the survey. Students felt that they were engaged

in daily lessons before the implementation with an average score of 4.1. Students did not check

for understanding before the experiment scoring a 2.3 on average on the engagement survey.

The post survey results showed significant increases in student engagement. Overall

engagement increased to 4.3, which is over a full point of improvement. Engagement in daily

lessons increase from 4.1 pre-survey to 4.8 post survey. Checks for understanding increased to

4.2 on the post survey. This was an increase of nearly two points. 100% of the students

responded yes to the belief that All In Learning has enhanced their learning. Students

unanimously enjoyed getting feedback from problems worked in class. On both the pre survey

and the post survey, the students scored an average of 5 on enjoyment of getting feedback.
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DISCUSSION

The purpose of this study was to test two things. First, to look at whether All In

Learning, increases student achievement. Secondly, was to see if All In Learning increased

student engagement. All in Learning is a system that is built to allow teachers to increase scores

by getting immediate data in order to be able to shift lessons in order to achieve mastery on

standards.

The data in this research concludes that All In Learning increases student achievement.

Even if students are advanced, the system still increase student achievement even if the

students are already performing at a high level. For example, Student T was noticeably a high

performing student even before the system was put in place. The student made a 91.7 on

Pretest 1. Yet after the treatment, the student received a perfect score on the posttest. The

reason for this increase for Student T and the other subjects is because with the All In Learning

system a teacher can clear misconceptions and redirect student thinking far before the test.

With a student response system like this in place, a teacher does not have to wait until an

assessment in order to make a topic clearer for students. Nor do students have to think they

know a standard when they actually do not. All In Learning allows both the teacher and the

student to correct errors while instruction is being placed. The ability to make data driven

decisions daily is a benefit even for a group of students that typically perform very well in their

classes.

Engagement seems to not be a problem for an advanced students but there is always

room for improvement and this research reveals that All in Learning actually increase student
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engagement for advanced students. More importantly students take ownership of their of their

learning with the All In Learning system. During the experiment the teacher was asked several

times by students, how is that the answer? This question is evidence of students checking for

their own understanding. When a student is interested in why an answer and the reasoning

behind an answer, a student is a full participate in the classroom The data collected in this

research proves this with the post survey. Engagement increased after the installment of All In

Learning even in a classroom that was filled with advanced students that were already engaged.

The reason for the increase in checks for understanding and overall engagement is the

immediate feedback the system provides during instruction. Students are essentially tested in a

student friendly environment daily with All In Learning.

Another factor about the system is that it brings a competitive component to the

classroom. A teacher can challenge the class to get certain percentage on a question. The

competitive nature of students is another way to keep students involved with the lesson. Even

advanced students enjoy being competitive.

The evidence is overwhelmingly in support of All In Learning. The advanced students out

performed themselves on both of the posttest. The survey results also show increases in

student engagement. This research concludes that All In Learning does increase student

achievement and student engagement for advanced students.

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References

Kulesza, A., Clawson, M., & Ridgway, J. (2014). Research and teaching: Student success indicators

associated with clicker-administered quizzes in an honors introductory biology course. Journal

of College Science Teaching J. Coll. Sci. Teach., 043(04). Retrieved From

http://www.nsta.org/publications/browse_journals.aspx?action=issue&id=100464

Mernar, T. (2015). Using clicker technology: Comparing student perceptions of learning and

participation. American Journal of Occupational Therapy, 69(Suppl. 1). Retrieved From

https://eric.ed.gov/

Morse, J., Ruggieri, M., & Whelan-Berry, K. (2010). Clicking our way to class discussion. AJBE American

Journal of Business Education (AJBE), 3(3). Retrieved From https://eric.ed.gov/

Trees, A. R., & Jackson, M. H. (2007). The learning environment in clicker classrooms: Student

processes of learning and involvement in large universitylevel courses using student response

systems. Learning, Media and Technology, 32(1), 21-40. Retrieved From https://eric.ed.gov/

Zapf, J., & Garcia, A. (2011). The influence of tech-savvyness and clicker use on student learning.

International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Ij-sotl, 5(1). Retrieved From

https://eric.ed.gov/