Week 4 progress of action plan revisions

I am happy to report that I have no new action research plan revisions!  I want to thank all of you who have posted on my wall to give me the wonderful ideas.  With your ideas from earlier last week, I was able to revise my plan and show it to my new principal who has agreed to be my site supervisor, and she likes it!!  So, I am just going to re-post my plan. 

To start the process of my plan, I am meeting with my 4th grade science teacher when she gets her student rosters to discuss which of her classes will be the control group and which ones will be the non-control group.  After that, we will discuss what type of music will be played, and determine how loud it will need to be.  Then on to when we would like our data testing days to be.  I must admit I am super excited to get this project under way! 

Goal:  To find out if playing music in the background while students are testing has a positive effect on their test scores.

ACTION STEPS	PERSONS RESPONSIBLE	TIMELINE:  START/END	NEEDED RESOURCES	EVALUATION
1.  Start playing music in control classes during work time.	Science teacher	Aug 2013/May 2014	Cd of various composers, and cd player, student roster, objectives for the day	Will ask teacher to record students’  reactions and responses to music being played in classroom
2.  Begin recording daily assignment scores.	Science teacher	Aug 2013/May 2014	Record book or log book	Look at both the control group and the non-control group and compare scores to see if there is any effect.
3.  Send home survey to parents/guardians and give survey to students to fill out in class.	Mary Young, myself	Sept 2013	Survey given to kids to take home to parents,  and surveys given to students	Survey will ask parents if their child likes listening to music, and if so, what kind.  Survey will ask student what they think of having music played in the background during their work time.
4.  Begin testing control classes with music playing in the background.	Science teacher	October 2013/May 2014	Cd of various composers, cd player, test material	Compare the scores of each group
5.  Collect test scores from both groups and make a chart showing the scores of each group.	Mary Young, myself	October 2013/May 2014	Test scores	Using the collected scores, create a graph to give a visual of the data collected and write a reflection of data found.
6.  Give presentation to 4th grade science teacher and school principal about the finding of the project halfway through competition.	Mary Young, myself	December 2013	Data collected up to that point	Power point presentation to show how the data is being collected and what my findings have been up to this point.
7.  Send home another survey to the parents and give another survey to students.	Mary Young, myself	Feb 2014	Survey given to students to take home to parents, and survey given to students for them to complete themselves	Survey will again ask parents if their child likes listening to music, and if so, what kind.  Survey will also again ask student what they think of having music played in the background during their work time and add in test time
8.  Continue to collect daily assignment scores and weekly test scores.	Mary Young, myself	Aug 2013/ May 2014	Assignment scores and test scores from both groups.	Using a chart, I will be able to easily see if there is any difference in scores between the two groups and write reflection on data collected
9.  Compare daily test scores and weekly test scores of the control and non-control group and give end of year presentation on project to principal and science teacher.	Mary Young, myself	May 2014	All data collected throughout the year.  Test scores, assignment scores, survey input	Power point presentation to principal and science teacher to show if music had an impact of the test scores and daily assignment scores by doing a side-by-side comparison of the control and the non-control test group.  I will also pull information from the surveys to see if playing music at school had any impact on the students