Importance of Data
It is easy to teach the same subject, year after year, without ever changing the content. The problem is that year after year the students are different. Data analysis helps you to differentiate your instruction and identify the gaps between the student's performance and state standards. Low performance areas set the priorities for your teaching instruction.
My school district administers 4-Sight Benchmark tests four times a year. The results of these tests are a way to monitor student progress. Having the right data helps to identify a place to start at the beginning of a school year. Progress is tracked throughout the school year with quarterly tests. Reports are available to all teachers in the district. There are multiple types of reports that can be generated. I create individual classrooms on the website. Each classroom that I created contains the students from my roster. By creating these classrooms, I can generate a report for each individual class and differentiate instruction based on the students' data.
Content Data
After the test was given, I generated my report. The following is an example of the test data that I obtained that correlates to the Pennsylvania Standards, developed from the Reading Grade 6 Assessment Anchors and Eligible Content (2008) and the Standards Aligned System (2009).
Based on these scores, the lowest categories are Interpreting and Analyzing of Fiction and Nonfiction and Reading, Analyzing, and Interpreting Text. Each question on the test is from one of these six categories. The category is then broken down to a specific anchor and eligible content. The item analysis by subscale report further guides instruction by identifying specific questions to the state standard it is testing. All of the following information is provided for each question on the test.
(a) all four choices
(b) the number of students that answered the question
(c) the number of students that chose that answer
(d) the percentage of students that chose that answer
This, for example, suggests what can be learned by looking into one question in detail:
Question:
Which word best describes how Paul and Evie feel when they decide to collect hats, gloves, and scarves?
This information is extremely valuable and useful. The question is testing the specific Pennsylvania Anchor of Reading, Analyzing and Interpreting Literature – Fiction and Non-Fiction. The student is being tested on his or her ability to compare the literary elements within and among texts used by an author, including characterization, setting, plot, theme, and point of view. The eligible content breaks down the skill to a very specific skill: character. The student will identify, explain, interpret, compare, describe, and/or analyze character actions, motives, dialogue, emotions/feelings, traits, and relationships among characters within fictional or literary nonfictional text. It is advantageous to interpret each question that will guide instruction.
Sometimes data needs to be looked at even more deeply. It is important to look at each question and analyze why a large percentage of students chose the same wrong answer. In this example, it is worth looking deeply into why 55% of the students chose choice A. In my experience, students often miss a question, not because they do not understand the skill, but because they lack vocabulary.
Reading Inventory Data
Administering a simple reading attitude survey provides a different type of data. The results indicate student attitude towards reading. A non-threatening elementary reading attitude survey available is one that was designed by Dennis Kear. There are no right or wrong answers on this survey. His survey is commonly referred to as the Garfield reading survey. The survey consists of twenty questions. The first ten questions focus on the attitude of the readers' recreational reading. The last ten questions of the survey relate the readers' attitude to academic aspects. The student chooses from one of four images of Garfield. Each image Garfield is posed in different emotional states, ranging from very positive to very negative. It is important that results are given back to the students. Giving insight to the student empowers them with something that can be worked on.
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