Methods

Context

Beattie Elementary School was the site used to collect data for this study. Beattie

services grades K-5 within Poudre School District in Fort Collins, CO. There are 31 elementary

schools within Poudre School District and 30,019 students enrolled in its K-12 programs. In the

2017-2018 school year, Beattie Elementary School had 276 students enrolled, with 49 in second

grade, and 19 teachers total. 68% of the students at Beattie were identified as White, 22%

Hispanic, and the remaining 10% consisted of American Indian/Alaska Native, Asian, Black,

Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, or 2 or more race/ethnicity students. At Beattie, 48.55% of the

students qualified for free or reduced lunch, 4.7% are English language learners, 5.07% qualify

as gifted and talented and 16.6% qualify for special education services.

Beattie Elementary uses open concept classrooms to promote collaborative teaching and

learning. Their motto is “Open classrooms, endless possibilities.” This made Beattie a good fit

to study cooperative learning models in, as they are frequently used within the classrooms. I am

an intern in Mrs. Latuda’s 2nd grade classroom. In second grade, there is an emphasis on

teaching and learning literacy, reading and writing. This provided ample time to observe

cooperative learning models within the context of literacy instruction. As an intern, I often

observe small groups during literacy time and sometimes lead them in guided reading lessons.

Focusing on how different grouping strategies effect motivation among the students in 2nd grade

will provide insight into how teachers can best support student engagement and learning in

literacy.

At the end of this study, we will have a greater understanding of how we can utilize

different cooperative learning strategies to increase student motivation during literacy learning.
However, there are many outside factors that can influence motivation among children. Factors

like hunger, a lack of sleep, and/or a disinterest in the topic may affect a student’s motivation and

focus as well, making it hard to observe whether the grouping strategy is truly helping. Thus,

some amount of unreliability must be taken into consideration within this topic.

Mrs. Latuda uses Kagan structures, literacy groups, and other grouping strategies within

her classroom. This study will focus on the use of Kagan structures. Kagan structures are

simple, step-by-step instructional strategies. They usually involve allowing students to pair up or

form a small group to discuss or share an answer or reflection. This allows all students to share

many thoughts or multiple answers rather than just calling on one or a few to give answers. Some

examples of Kagan structures are RallyRobin or a Timed Pair Share. In a RallyRobin, students

pair up and take turns giving one answer at a time. In a Timed Pair Share, students pair or group

up and each one gets a chance to answer the question for a set amount of time.

Participants and Sampling

One of the second-grade classes at Beattie Elementary School was chosen for the

participants of this study. There are 38 students in second grade at Beattie Elementary, 21 of

which are in the class we studied. However, due to the open concept classrooms and co-teaching

model used at Beattie, the students move throughout both classrooms during the literacy portion

of the day. Overall, 20 of the students were male and 18 female. Two students spoke English as

a second language and 3 qualified for special education services. Among the 38 students, 24

were White, 8 Hispanic, 4 Multi-race, 1 Asian, and 1 Hawaiian/Pacific Islander.

Due to the applied simple random sampling, each student was assigned a number in the

class. Then, a random number generator was used to choose 2 numbers each day for the

observation. Different children were randomly chosen to observe each activity. Changing
students each observation allowed us to focus on the key engagement factors of a small number

of students while still collecting data that was representative of the class.

Design

Data was collected through observation. Kagan structures are grouping strategies that are

integrated into daily teaching tasks. Usually, Kagan structure activities don’t take more than 5-

10 minutes and are done throughout the day and across the subjects. Due to the brief nature of

Kagan structures, the best way to study them was through observing and looking for key

behaviors displaying engagement among the students. This allowed natural observation of how

the students responded to the Kagan structures in a timely manner. The observation checklist

used a 5-point Likert scale to rate the degree to which the student engaged with the Kagan

activity.

Action research is an investigative research method used to diagnose weaknesses or

issues within a system and help educators develop practical solutions to address the problem at

hand. The results of this action research study are being used to learn if Kagan structures are

achieving their intended purpose in this classroom. Kagan structures are intended to increase

student engagement and participation with a lesson. The results of our observations indicated

whether Kagan structures should continue to be used to maintain student engagement in the

lesson.

Data Source

A “Student Engagement Checklist” was used during the observation to quickly gauge the

level of student engagement with the activity (see Appendix). It was adapted from the “Student

Engagement Walkthrough Checklist” (International Center for Leadership in Education, n.d.).

The form starts with some information about which Kagan strategy was being used, what student
was being observed, what the lesson was about, how many students were in the class, how many

students per group and how long the grouping lasted for. Then, the checklist used a 5-point

Likert scale to rate the student’s from very high to very low on various indicators of engagement.

These indicators included positive body language, consistent focus, verbal participation, student

confidence, enthusiasm, and remaining on topic. In the end there was a comment box to write

anecdotal notes from the observation that the checklist couldn’t portray.

Validity, Reliability, and Credibility

While the nature of observations can be unreliable, the observation checklist was created

with this in mind. The same 5-point Likert scale was used to rate every student on 6 key

indicators of engagement. Reducing the number of subjects observed in each activity also

provided more reliability. Focusing on 1-2 students at a time allowed the observer to focus on all

the indicators of engagement in individuals rather than the whole class. When the class is

observed all at once, it can be easy to miss key indicators. Further some students may be highly

engaged, while others are highly disengaged, this would be difficult to rate as a group level of

engagement. Randomly selecting different students to individually observe provided data that

was more representative of the class.

To maintain consistency, the researcher only recorded data if the class’s head teacher,

Mrs. Latuda, was instructing the lesson. Students are often more distracted when a substitute or

other teacher is teaching they are not accustomed to. Only observing when the head teacher was

instructing reduced the possibility of these confounding variables. Finally, the observations for

this study took place over a 2-month time period. This allowed for many observations to take

place and gave a more reliable view of student engagement.

Data Analysis
 Qualitative. Written data was collected at the beginning and during the observation.

Background info such as the number of students in the class, the number per group, who was

being observed, the strategy that was used, the lesson topic and the duration of the grouping were

noted. This qualitative information helped account for possible confounding variables. It also

helped account for day to day changes in the class, such as absent students, and the different

grouping strategies that are used throughout the literacy instruction. During the observation,

anecdotal notes were taken on the behaviors that were observed. This accounted for the

individual differences that the checklist didn’t account for.

After the data was collected the information from the anecdotal notes were transferred

into a code book using Excel. The table within the code book organized each observation

recorded by student and identified which code it fell under (positive body language, consistent

focus, verbal participation, student confidence, enthusiasm, or remaining on topic). To analyze

this data, themes were identified within the notes taken during the observations. These themes

revealed the ways students either were or were not displaying the indicators of engagement with

the activity. Sorting the anecdotal notes by indicator helped us gain a deeper understanding of the

data provided through the quantitative analysis by providing examples of how the students

displayed the trends found in the data.

Quantitative. The level of student engagement was scored within 6 indicators of

engagement. The scale ranged from very high to very low and was translated into scores 1-5, 1

being very low and 5 being very high. After the data was collected these scores were organized

in a code book. The table used included the score per category for each student. Additional

columns were added to calculate the sum, mean, median, mode, variance, and standard deviation
for each student and for the class as a whole on the different identifiers. The descriptive statistics

test was performed to obtain a summary of the overall trends in the data. Measures of central

tendency were used to analyze if the strategies helped the students maintain engagement in the

lesson. Both the qualitative and quantitative code books are included in the appendices.

Ethical Issues

This study was conducted on a vulnerable population, so potential ethical issues were of

great importance to the research. Students’ parents signed a non-permission form at the

beginning of the year stating whether their student could be included in photos, videos, or

articles. Any student whose parents did not give permission to be included in articles were not

included in this study. Further, students were given a number within this study to maintain

confidentiality. The purpose of this study was disclosed to the teacher. With the help of the

teacher, we made sure the observations did not disturb student learning time. The relationship of

the researcher with the participants was disclosed and potential biases were accounted for.

Procedure and Timeline

Observations took place twice a week during the literacy period of the school day on

Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Data was collected every time a Kagan structure was used

throughout the literacy instruction period. This study ran from October to the end of November.

To maintain consistency, data was only recorded if the class’s head teacher, Mrs. Latuda, was

instructing the lesson. Simple random sampling was used to choose the participants for this

study. Each student was assigned a number in the class. Then, a random number generator was

used to choose 2 numbers each day for the observation. Different children were randomly chosen

to observe each activity. Changing students each observation allowed us to focus on the key

engagement factors of a small number of students while still collecting data that was
representative of the class. During the observations, the researcher observed and listened to the

chosen students while they were working. The researcher looked for the signs of engagement as

laid out in the checklist. At the end of the observation, the students were rated on the level of

engagement they displayed during the lesson in various ways.