Project Title: Fostering Student Success at KIPP
BASIS Advisor: Dr. Brown
Internship Location: KIPP San Jose Collegiate
Onsite Mentor: Mr. Tom Ryan
Student engagement is linked to higher academic achievement. One way to look at the problem of a widening achievement gap is by focusing on the so-called “vulnerable” student population, which consists of low-income, minority students, who tend to have lower academic achievement. This study will be centered around KIPP (Knowledge is Power Program) San Jose Collegiate since they are known for high student achievement and engagement in their classrooms while primarily serving low-income students. In addition, a question that arose during preliminary research findings is whether or not implementing technology can truly be a sort of saving tool or just a barrier to student engagement among low-income, minority students. I will observe both a 9th grade biology and a 9th grade English class for six periods each in order to examine how teaching methods and activities affect student engagement.
My Posts
Reflections and Projections
Apr 05, 2019
My definitions worked well because I was able to follow the same step-by-step, replicable steps each day of my observations and my data was mostly consistent for all 10 observations. While there were a few instances where my definitions did not fully represent the behaviors of the students, I found that this method was most […]
Data Analysis
Mar 29, 2019
The major takeaways that I found were that interactive, student-to-teacher interactions involving continuous back-and-forth questions and answers, cold calls, and personal stories were very successful in getting students to be most actively engaged. Personal stories and videos tend to have an emotional appeal that may connect very well with the student’s personal or academic lives, […]
Final Data
Mar 22, 2019
English: There were lots of transitions and variety in activities. The teacher shared multiple personal stories, which was sometimes similar or relatable to the students’ personal lives, which was when students were most engaged, along with video time. The teacher was constantly asking for attention and silence. Videos were used. Students read aloud and had […]
Preliminary Data
Mar 15, 2019
The first day of observations gave me insight into how KIPP classrooms work, how teachers interact with their students and run their classes, and how students behave. While it did not give me a full view of all the different (or many) activities, it allowed me to see how the first five minutes of class […]
Proposed Methodology
Mar 08, 2019
I will be conducting classrooms observations in KIPP to see how teaching methods affect student engagement. I wanted to observe two classes of different fields (STEM and Humanities) in order to get an understanding of the variety of teaching methods given how different classroom dynamics in these subjects could be very different. Because freshman classes […]
Background Research
Mar 01, 2019
The achievement gap among low-income, minority students and their counterparts is no new concept to the field of education. While there have been efforts to reduce this problem, dropout rates are still high and academic achievement and graduation rates remain an issue for these students and the school system as a whole. The bottom line […]
Introduction
Feb 22, 2019
My project is about trying to bridge the achievement gap between low-income students and their counterparts by looking at student engagement in the classroom, which is an important factor in determining academic achievement. Studies have shown that students who are the most successful academically are most engaged in the classroom, yet researchers over the past […]