Connection to PARCC?

Now that my students have completed their first year of the PARCC (Partnership of Assessment for College and Career Readiness) assessment, I feel like I have a more solid understanding of what the test will look and be like. Because it's constantly evolving, and because my students took the test via paper and pencil rather than by computer, I'm hesitant to base too much of my study on the assessment as I saw it.

However, my study has direct implications for the preparation that my students will receive for the assessment. Interested? PARCC Online has posted some sample questions that correlate directly to my study.Scroll down to sample item 5 and sample item 6 to see some examples.

Right now, I just have essay questions on the pre- and post- assessments, but having seen the test, I'm considering adding some multi-step selected response items. Thoughts?

The Methodology

I thought the methodology was going to be the hardest part in writing my action research plan, but it ended up being the part where I was able to see all of my work come together.  Putting the methodology together made this plan seem real.  I feel ready and confident about implementing this action research.

Students will be given a pre- and post-test to determine if the DPR strategy was effective in helping students master mathematics facts.  Below you will find my overall methodology.

Measurement: Pre-test	Treatment:	Measurement: Post-Test
Student Achievement: Mastery of mathematics Facts	Experimental: Students will be exposed to the DPR strategy Control: Students will not get the DPR strategy and only assigned mathematics facts homework on a weekly basis.	Student Achievement: Mastery of mathematics Facts

Do you want to see if you are smarter than a 6th grader?  Take an example of a pre-test the students will take.  This is a shorter version with only 40 questions.  You can use the enter key to move you to the next problem.  Once you are finished please leave a comment with your score and how long it took you to answer all of the questions.

The Hard Part: Methodology

My sister is currently a senior in college studying psychology. I've proofread enough of her lab reports and papers for the word "methodology" to be intimidating to me. However, this week as I've been working of creating my methodology, it's been easier than expected! It can really be condensed into this simplistic chart:

One Group Pre-Test Post-Test Design
Student Acheivement:  Pre-test on RI 7.6 and RI7.8	Treatment:  Direct instruction on informational text strategies.	Student Acheivement:  Post-test on RI 7.6 and RI7.8
		Survey:  Brief survey on strategies student's utilized during post-assessment

Crafting this methodology was helpful in solidifying the steps of my study... what it would look like to actually conduct it. It's real now! It feels manageable. I also wrote my pre- and post- assessments as well as my survey. Something to look forward to next year!