Summary Of Mrs. Helgeson's Reading Survey

One way to learn how to effectively educate students is to ask them what they enjoy and what would like to see in the classroom. By doing this, an educator can gain insight as to how to better educate students by incorporating student’s interests into the classroom and curriculum. Mrs. Helgeson does an excellent job practicing this concept by giving her 3rd grade students a reading survey. This survey asks students if they like reading, what their reading interests are, what genres they enjoy, and what Mrs. Helgeson can do to help students become better readers. The results from the reading survey given to 15 of her 3rd graders gave abundant insight into how Mrs. Helgeson can effectively educate her students. The surveys revealed an even split between students who like to read and who sometimes like to read. When asked what they liked to read, a majority of students listed chapter books, specifically the Magic Tree House. When asked what genre student’s enjoyed to read, the most popular answers were: adventure, animals, fantasy, mystery, picture books, realistic fiction, and science fiction. The most important question on the survey asked how Mrs. Helgeson can make reading fun and help her students become

Students were given a prompt, writing process, and three to four writing block sessions to complete their narrative. These narratives were then graded using a rubric which scores on ideas, content, organization, style, and language skills. This data was then synthesized and used to identify student’s writing strengths and areas students could work on for improvement. Based on the analysis of the narratives, students showed strengths in staying on topic, vocabulary, capitalization, and in subject and verb agreement. The data also showed students could benefit from instruction in paragraph formatting, using transitions, spelling, and writing