Action Research

Summer Reading Program Cristina C. Compalas Action Research Paper EDUC 526 Capstone Experience in Digital Teaching and Learning Professor: Matt Hixson July 23,2013

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Abstract ! Reading has always been an integral part in the Compalas s household. But this

summer in particular, my husband and I decided to include reading as part of the summers activities for the children. Our children signed up for the summer reading program in three libraries in the community and one in our church/academy. Each reading program is slightly different from each other, and thus requires four different reading logs. With reading occupying their time on top of other activities, idleness is prevented and learning is promoted. This would not only encourage reading uency,prosody and an expansion of their vocabulary, but would instill in them the love of reading. Section One:Introduction ! Being involved in four reading programs is just one of the many activities that

keep our six children busy this summer. Occasionally, our four older children go to summer camps and activities sponsored by our church. They are also busy learning to play musical instruments such as the piano, violin, guitar and banjo. Our older boys are busy with daily football and basketball conditioning as well as working in the backyard with their Dad. The other children keep themselves busy with playing, drawing, painting and taking care of their pets. To date, we have a dog, six cats, and a lot of chicks, for the children to play with and to occupy their time. The girls on the other hand, are learning how to bake cookies, bread and pies. Then there is time for fun and relaxation too. Not to be forgotten are the daily chores and errands that need to be done in order to run our household. With our schedule so packed with things to do and with four different reading logs needed to be completed every week by our six children, it was

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necessary for me to implement a system to help my children be organized and accurate in reporting their reading logs for the summer reading program. I decided on the rst week of our class in EDUC 526, to make this as the topic for my action research and cover four weeks of my childrens summer reading. ! Here are the four reading programs they are involved in this summer: 1.Mission Trail Library Reading Program: Reading is Sooo Delicious This requires each child to have at least 2 hours of reading a week to get a prize. Each child needs to write down their list of books and put the number of minutes spent on each book. 2.Grace Mellman Library Reading Program: Reading is Soo Delicious This requires ve of my children to simply jot down the titles of books read and turn in their reading logs every week. My teenager son was given a booklet that he needs to bring in every week to be stamped. 3.Murrieta Public Library Reading Program: Reading is Soo Delicious ! Every child was given a booklet that has the number of minutes from 20 to

2200 minutes. Each child is encouraged to read in 20 minute increments to get to the prize. 200 minutes read equals a prize. 4.Faith Baptist Academy Summer Reading Program ! Only ve of our children are signed up for this reading program. This is the

only reading program that my three year old girl is not doing. With this program, each child is asked to list down the titles of books read and the number of pages read from each book. !

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Helping my children be successful in their reading programs would allow me to

have an insight on what really goes on with their reading. Organizing their reading logs into folders and adopting a system of completing these will let me come up with the total number of books read, the total time spent on reading and the total number of pages that were read. At the end of their four weeks reading program, I would also nd out the total number of coupons that were awarded to them and the savings that they have gained using some of their reward coupons. ! Section Two: Implementation ! Participating in four reading programs means having several reading logs to ll

up and turn in. This would mean including this activity into our households schedule. It would also entail a lot of work, planning and patience on my part as I try to help them with this endeavor. On the other hand, it would mean an increase in our childrens reading abilities, uency, prosody( especially with the young ones, as the books are read to them), and vocabulary. It would also instill a love for reading which would amount to a love for learning. Receiving prizes from their reading efforts will also encourage them to read more and think that reading is so rewarding. With these thoughts in mind, I set out to implement an organized system to make this work in our household.! ! The following are the steps we implemented to achieve this: Keeping all four reading logs of each child in a folder and having a separate folder for all their rewards.!

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Setting an appointed time during the week ( we chose Wednesday morning and afternoon and Sunday afternoon) for writing down the title of books read, marking down the time spent on reading and jotting down the number of pages of each book that was read. Choosing a day and time of the week to bring back all library books and borrow new ones, at the same time turn in their reading logs. My husband brings them to the library every Wednesday afternoon to do all these. Before turning in their reading logs to the schools secretary on Sunday afternoon, I double check their computations on the total number of pages read for the week. Having a designated area for all the borrowed books from the library. We put all the books in the formal dining table which makes it easier for everybody to ll up their reading logs. Teaching the younger children, ages 6 and 7, to write down their own books, mark their time, and count or jot down the number of pages read. Supervising the older children in lling up their own reading logs and checking if all logs were completed accordingly. Enlisting the help of older children to help the younger ones if they needed help with their logs. Assigning my ten year old daughter to help me with my three year old daughters reading logs as I assist my 6 and 7 year old boys.! Reading to the young ones at least 20-30 minutes before kids nap time and 20-30 minutes before bed time gives us more than enough time as required

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for two of their reading logs. This works easier for me to track down the younger ones reading time. Any extra reading that they do on their own should be reported to me. Letting my husband and older children help me read to the younger ones at the times appointed. ! The established system helps us stay on track and on schedule. However, there

are some problems that I have encountered in implementing this system. These are the following: The younger ones get tired from writing especially if they have read a lot of books. To solve this I have to start early during the day to let them write on one of their logs! then take a break and continue after lunchtime. At other times, I let them just write on one log and copy this list onto the other reading log. Sometimes, the children have more books that they have read and more hours that they put in in reading than the time to write down all of these in their logs. To solve these, I let the younger ones just write what they can as long as they know that they hit the target to be eligible for a prize. The most important thing than writing in all the logs is that they are enjoying and having fun in reading their books. Sufce it to say that for the sake of the research paper only what was written down in the logs will appear as ofcial collected data. If there are other things that come up in our household that we need to take care of on Wednesday morning, writing on their logs gets pushed off from

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schedule. When this happens, I have to help the younger ones catch up with their reading logs. My ten year old daughter is a fast writer and is able to help write down the books for one of the younger boys while I do the other reading logs. Our team work makes it happen. Sometimes, my two younger boys have a different number of pages read even if they have read the same book. I found out that they count the pages differently. To solve this inconsistency, I have to show them the proper way of counting the pages, from cover to cover if there are no page numbers on the book and if there are page numbers to simply jot down the last page number of the book. Two of our children got sick and was not able to turn in their reading logs for the academy on separate Sundays. I still let them write down whatever books they have read within the week that they were sick and let them bring this list separate from the current weeks list and turn in both lists to the Secretary. The academy is gracious enough to allow them to do this. In the nal week of turning in reading logs to the Mission Trail Library, I was not able to make copies of the logs turned in. The library collected these in exchange for their certicates. This left me with just 3 weeks of data instead of four, from the reading logs that were lled up within those weeks that were signed but were not collected by the custodian. Also, since only four of the children have additional pages of their reading logs left with me at home, I would not have the data with my two older boys. I would think any data that I

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have collected for this particular summer reading program is better than nothing at all. Section Three:Results ! With all the reading that the children did throughout the four weeks of this action

research, it is my observation that their knowledge increased about different things. They are able to remember the stories and converse to each other about some of the things they have read. It is my opinion that additional uency has been achieved since they understand the events in the stories. As Zarillo(2011) states in his book, uent reading is essential for comprehension. In addition to this, their vocabulary has denitely expanded through all the stories that they have read or were read to them. With good modeling of reading, such as intonation and expression, the children especially the younger ones will have a higher tendency of reading with the same kind of prosody. ! The following charts and graphs will showcase the numerical results of books

read(for Mission Trail and Grace Mellman Libraries), the total time in minutes spent on reading(Murrieta Public Library), total number of pages read(FBA), total rewards gained from all the reading programs, and total savings used so far. Please note that all data entered in these charts were based on actual data that are in hand and not including the data that were not recovered from Mission Trail Library for the fourth week. Data collected started from the week of June 19 until the week of July 17,2013.

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Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

Total Number of Books Read for Mission Trail Library

20

15

10

5 CJ David Elijah Faith I. Mission Trail Library Reading Program:Data for four of my children in three weeks. ! The three younger children(David, Elijah and Faith) have more books read than 0

their older sister, CJ. This might be because of the type of books read for the younger ones. For their age level, books are shorter in text compared to the books read by my ten year old girl CJ. It can also be seen that the three younger ones have slight differences each week except for Faith during week 1, who had lesser books read than her brothers.

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Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4

Total Number of Books Read for Grace Mellman Library

0 BJ CJ David Elijah Faith

10

15

20

II.Grace Mellman Library Reading Program: Data collected for four weeks from my ve children. (Oldest son has a different program for teens reading program in this library). ! In this chart, the trend again is that the oldest children BJ and CJ, in this order

have lesser number of books. This is again due to the fact that both are more involved in other activities inside and outside the home than the younger ones. Moreover, books read are thicker and longer in text than the books for the younger ones. David and Elijahs books are almost the same in number most of the time because they are both read to by Mom, Dad or oldest brother. David though did extra reading by himself which

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explains his having more books read in some weeks. Faith on the other hand, falls asleep earlier than the two boys which explains the lesser number of books read to her.

Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4

Total Number of Minutes Spent on Reading

3000

2250

1500

750 AJ BJ 0 Elijah Faith

CJ

David

III. Murrieta Public Library Reading Program ! The trend for this chart is showing that the older children, namely, AJ, BJ and CJ,

spent more time on reading than the three younger ones. The reasons for this are the following: the older children spends time reading to themselves, even at night time. They can also read thicker and longer text. They also included time spent on reading their Bibles. In contrast, David, Elijah and Faith spent lesser time on reading and have

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slight differences with their time spent on reading. Among the younger ones, it is mostly David that does extra reading by himself. Most of the time, these three younger ones love it more when Mom or Dad or other older siblings read to them. Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4

Total Number of Pages Read 8000

6000

4000

2000

AJ

BJ

CJ

David

Elijah

IV. Faith Baptist Academy Reading Program: Our 6th child is not included in this reading program. ! This chart shows that my daughter CJ had the most number of pages read. She

spent reading small text chapter books than any of her siblings. She also spent time reading to her younger siblings especially to Faith, which earned her more pages than anyone in the group. She was also sick for a period of time which limited her activities to

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mostly reading. My sons AJ and BJ in this order, are the next in line for most pages read, followed by David then Elijah.

Certicates of Accomplishment Pencils/Bookmarks

Books Fun Centers/Waterparks

MIni-Toys Restaurants

Rewards Gained from Reading

3% 4% 7% 7% 59% 21%

V. Total Rewards Gained from the Reading Programs ! From this pie chart, the bulk of rewards that they received are for restaurants or

food establishments. Rewards for fun centers, bowling centers and water parks come next in line. The children also received fun mini toys such as foam planes, puzzles, mini stress ball, and freezer cone toys. They also brought home bookmarks and pencils given by the libraries. During the fourth week, the children were awarded their free

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books and certicates of accomplishment in conclusion of the reading programs in the three libraries.

Cost of Rewards Savings Gained from Rewards

0 Chick Fil-A Red Robin Stadium Pizza Jack in the Box Del Taco

15

30

45

60

VI. Savings Gained From Rewards ! Within the time frame of this research, the total cost of savings gained from using

some of the childrens rewards for eating in the various fast food establishments mentioned above, amounted to $124.58. The children won and used more rewards for Chick Fil-A than the rest of the fast food places listed. This worked out great because this is one of our familys favorite places to go to. The children enjoyed the time they get to use their rewards. They sure are looking forward to using their rewards for the other places such as the fun centers and parks.

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Section Four:Conclusions ! Doing this action research paper on our childrens summer reading ! program let

me realize how much the children have read within these four weeks. I am so proud of them that they nished well despite of some difculties that came up with writing down on the logs. I am so glad that I decided to choose this topic for research because I found out that the children have already acquired the love for reading books. They continue to read books even with the conclusion of the reading program in the three libraries. The rewards from reading are not limited to the various coupons that they earned from the reading programs. Instead, the real rewards lie in the skills that were harnessed throughout the time they did their reading program. Their worlds have expanded, their vocabulary has grown, their understanding and comprehension of what was read was evident and nally, reading uency and prosody were both exercised within this time period. I am hoping that we will continue as a family to make reading as an integral part of our daily schedule. Section Five: General Comments ! As always, the most part I enjoy doing in research is coming up with the charts

and graphs. It is time consuming sometimes, but as a visual learner, I have fun playing with the colors and the different types of charts and graphs, determining which one would work best for a particular data. Personally, I have learned that data collection is of utmost importance to support the study being made. I believe in coming up with sufcient and reliable data that would represent the ndings or outcome of the research. !

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Reference

Zarillo, J.(2011). Ready for Revised RICA (3rd ed.) Boston: Allyn &Bacon