Action Research Plan 1

Action Research Plan

Nathan L. Tamborello

The University of Houston

CUIN 7303 - Professional Seminar I: Research

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How can teachers foster a classroom environment that is both enriching, engaging, and

instructive, while at the same time allowing students to play a crucial role in their own

education? The high school to college pipeline currently prepares students to pass tests and

memorise formulas, while failing to promote higher concept ideas, models, and rhetoric that is

actually useful outside of the classroom. Nearly 40% of graduating American high school

seniors enter the workforce after graduation while the other 60% go on to higher education

(Cotton 2000). How many of those children will be able to apply the skills they learned from

reading “classic literature” to either the workforce or to their higher education? This research

focuses on allowing students the freedom to choose books they will actually enjoy reading within

the context of a secondary English classroom and on curriculum that is invaluable to their

success both in school and after graduation.

William Glasser developed an educational model centred around choice in the classroom,

deemed “Choice Theory,” which postulates that student choice can be a powerful motivational

tool by helping fulfill five basic human needs: survival and security, love and belonging, power

through cooperation and competency, freedom, and fun (1998). Survival in the classroom means

that students need to feel both emotionally and physically safe within the confines of the learning

environment. Students need to feel loved, either by their peers or their teachers, and feel like

they belong in order to create and foster a healthy sense of community (Brooks & Young, 2011).

The word power in the context of the student-centred classroom is often mistaken for dominance.

In this context however, power means that a student is able to feel like they have power with: to

feel a sense of achievement when working cooperatively with others. They also want to feel

power within: the power that they can obtain when they are developing both knowledge and

skills in order to positively increase the quality of their own lives. Students also want to feel
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power over: to be able to feel like they have some sense of worth with their ability to externally

influence and motivate others. Students need to feel a sense of autonomy within the classroom.

They want freedom to have choices, but also a sense of freedom from things they deem harmful,

such as disrespect or physical and emotional discomfort (Milyavskaya & Koestner, 2011).

Finally, students want to have fun more than anything. Glasser relates fun to learning, saying

“[f]un is [a] genetic reward for learning. We are descended from people who learned more or

better than others. The learning gave these people a survival advantage, and the need for fun

became built into our genes” (1998, p. 41).

Due to the powerful influence that student motivation plays within the context of literacy

learning, this research is concentrated on understanding the relationships that exists between

motivation, student achievement, and how to help students achieve becoming not only effective

lifelong readers, but also to aid them in the new literacy driven world of today and tomorrow. If

student choice can be a powerful tool in helping students become literate, effective readers and

learners, then this research is centred around discovering the most applicable tools in motivation.

By providing opportunities for students that encourage personal choice, social interactions based

on literature, and collaboration and corroboration between students, a motivational classroom

that extends beyond the confines of the school may be built and students may take a new, active

role in their own learning (Patall, 2012). This action research will attempt to focus on measurable

ways to gauge the effectiveness of student choice in the differentiated classroom, including

concrete methodology to support the idea of a student-centred learning environment. The

following literature sources both provide evidence supporting the role of choice in the classroom

and introduce practicum that can be presented into the class to foster student choice in a

rigourous setting.
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A Review of the Literature

A few common themes existed through the threads of these literature sources, all of

which provided their own methodology to foster student choice by promoting student motivation

within the classroom. The literature themes that arose while researching student autonomy

include: the classroom atmosphere, the role of the teacher, the focus on cooperative and

democratic learning, and lastly, student choice itself, which is the main topic of discussion in this

research. All of these themes can ultimately be traced back to classroom management, but this

research aims to focus on the less broad context of student choice and the ways to promote

healthy student autonomy within a functioning classroom.

The Focus on Cooperative Learning and the Democratic Classroom

Jerome Freiberg’s CMCD (Classroom Management and Cooperative Discipline) model

hinges upon the notion of the student-centred classroom, with students taking active roles as

leaders within the school community. The teacher can take small steps within the classroom to

increase student leadership, such as the implementation of the classroom manager position for

each class, which gives students responsibility and frees up the teacher for lessons. The

classroom manager is a student, or group of students, that assist the teacher in the everyday

minutiae of the class, from answering the classroom phone to ensuring that the attendance sheet

is sent to the front office.

Person-centered communities enable all students to belong and have a

voice in the classroom. They have clear responsibilities, built by consensus;

consequences are rational and fit the situation. Teachers facilitate positive
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interactions through cooperative rule development (e.g., through developing a

class constitution) and through conflict resolution processes (e.g. instituting a

Peace Table to solve classroom disputes) (Freiberg 2010-2013, p. 5).

Freiberg also states that “the teacher creates a consistent but flexible learning

environment and joins with the students in in establishing a cooperative plan for the rules and

procedures that govern the classroom” (2005, p. 64). By expanding leadership roles towards

students and allowing them to self-govern, you recognize the student as independent and

trustworthy, which leads to students feeling more respected and shows more consistency in their

behavior. Kohn explains that “in progressive schools, students play a vital role in helping to

design the curriculum, formulate the questions, seek out (and create) answers, think through

possibilities, and evaluate how successful they - and their teachers - have been” (2008, p. 28).

Alfie Kohn supports the idea of student leadership and motivation through the use of

choice in the classroom. Kohn discusses how choice can not only effect overall student

behaviour, but in turn academic achievement as well. Kohn also discusses the importance placed

upon encouraging students to have a sense of self-determination by allowing students to be in

control of their learning and postulates that student choice has a lasting impact on student

achievement. “Every teacher who is told what material to cover, when to cover it, and how to

evaluate children’s performance is a teacher who knows that enthusiasm for one’s work quickly

evaporates in the face of being controlled” (Kohn, 1993, p. 14). Kohn later goes on to say that

“not every teacher, however, realizes that exactly the same thing holds true for students: deprive

them of self-determination and you have likely deprived them of motivation. If learning is a

matter of following orders, students simply will not take to it in the way they would if they had

some say about what they were doing.” (1993, p. 14) Kohn reinforces his viewpoints on choice
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by incorporating the importance of the democratic classroom. “Students should not only be

trained to live in a democracy when they grow up; they should have a chance to live in one

today” (Kohn, 1993, p. 17). By creating a classroom that promotes choice, Kohn assumes that

students will be given a sense of control over their own actions and achievements both in the

classroom and out.

Not only does cooperative learning within the classroom result in higher academic

achievement and greater long term retention of the materials covered, it can also pave the way

for higher-level cognitive reasoning and critical thinking skills; process gains such as new ideas,

strategies, and solutions being generated; a growing transfer of the material is learned from one

situation to another; more positive attitudes towards the subject being studied; and more student

time spent on-task in the classroom (Erwin 2004). Ellis & Fouts state that “...of all the

educational innovations we have reviewed... [which include brain-based learning, multiple

intelligences, learning styles, direct instruction, mastery of learning, among others], cooperative

learning has the best and largest empirical base” (1997, p. 173) David, Roger, & Edythe Johnson

support this statement, concluding that “over 375 experimental studies on achievement have

been conducted [over] the past 90 years. A meta-analysis of all studies indicates that cooperative

learning results in significantly higher achievement and retention than do competitive and

individualistic learning” (1993, p. 2:16)

The Classroom Atmosphere

The atmosphere that a teacher creates in the classroom plays a significant role in both the

intrinsic and extrinsic motivation that is possessed by the student, and is a catalyst for fostering

student choice and participation within the role of active citizen of the class. The teacher’s

enthusiasm, organisation of the class, active involvement of the students, and rapport with the
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students can all create a positive learning environment (Irvine, 2015). The physical environment

of the classroom can also help to encourage learning and foster innovation and creativeness. For

example, a classroom with bright coloured signs, student work, and manipulatives all over the

room invites exploration, conveys high expectations, and portrays the teacher’s love for his or

her subject matter (Lumsden 2005). Moreover, the role of the teacher also has an effect on a

student’s motivational level within the context of choice. Current generations are based within a

technology advanced culture that offers a multitude of learning technologies, and students need

to be stimulated in the same way in the classroom. Teachers need to present material through a

variety of sensory modalities in order to reach all students in the class and capture their attention

in an active way. Students want and need work that stimulates their curiosity and arouses their

desire for deep understanding (Lumsden 2005).

The Issue of Student Choice in Literature

A collection of essays was produced as a result of the "Reading Stephen King

Conference" that was held at the University of Maine in 1996, which discussed the issue of

student choice within the Language Arts classroom. Stephen King's books have become a high

source of tensions surrounding some classroom choice issues, such as including "mass market"

popular literature within middle and high school English classes, and of who exactly chooses

what students read. King's fiction is some of the most popular of all pop literature, and also

among the most controversial. This collection of essays spotlight the ways in which King's work

intersects with the themes of the literary canon and its construction and maintenance, censorship

in public schools, and the need for adolescent readers to be able to choose books in school

reading programs. Wilhelm discusses the role of the teacher in providing a positive environment

that is conducive to students making their own choices in the literature classroom. Wilhelm,
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however, does not necessarily advocate the degree of choice that Alfie Kohn suggested earlier.

When Wilhelm asked his students about the role of choice in the classroom, they responded,

“You made us think that we had choices, but you were always putting stuff in front of us.’

Another student made the argument that even a limited choice was still a choice, saying, “...hey,

when you go to a restaurant, you can choose a dessert, but only from the desserts they have.” Yet

another student offered his opinion, stating, “Yeah, if you could choose any dessert in the whole

wide world you might never make up your mind…” (Power, et al. 1997, p. 47). Within this

same book, Chandler suggests that teachers be more thoughtful in the books that they choose to

teach, looking outside the standard curriculum set. He wants teachers to “recognize that as

teachers of literature we are not merely inheritors of our cultural tradition, but potential creators

of it as well” (1997, p. 114).

If the aim of being a literature teacher is to make your children passionate, lifelong

readers, then letting students graze through options & choices is one viable way in which to

reach that end-goal. Barabara Kingsolver comments on the freedom of choice in the literature

classroom, stating:

It’s well known that when humans reach a certain age, they identify

precisely what it is their parents want from them and bolt in the opposite direction

like lemmings on a cliff. [As a teenager,] if I was going to find a path to adult

reading, I had to do it my own way. I had to read things I imagined my parents

didn’t want me looking into. Trash, like Gone With the Wind. (I think now that

my mother had no real problem with Gone With the Wind, but wisely didn’t let

on.)
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Now that I am a parent myself, I’m sympathetic to the longing for some

control over what our children read, or watch, or do. Our protectiveness is a

deeply loving and deeply misguided effort to keep our kids inside the bounds of

what we know is safe and sure. Sure, I want to train my child to goodness. But

unless I can invoke amnesia to blot out my own past, I have to see it’s impossible

to keep her inside the world I came up in. The world rolls on, and you can’t step

in the same river twice (1995, p. 50).

So how do we put this idea of student autonomy and choice into practice without

overexposing children and young adults to overly-mature content, and provide a comprehensive

list of literature for student to choose from? What does real student choice of literature look like

in the active classroom, and how do students interact with those texts? Some classrooms have

adopted a “reader-response” approach to their use of student choice in literature, working to

establish a classroom climate that encourages their young readers to actively engage critically

with texts, utilising and drawing on their own experiences in order to construct meaning and

form a relationship with the texts (Rosenblatt, 1982). Using the tools of reader-response analysis,

students’ late-night binge reading sessions could prove beneficial, allowing the student to create

and explore sophisticated connections to popular culture and the world around them, mitigating a

complex, quality, and valuable reading experience.

As a concept, offering students in your classroom some control over their own reading

acknowledges the role that students have in building their own sense of what they read

(Rosenblatt, 1978). Using this logic, there is no real reason to assume that students will make the

same cognitive associations and the same sense out of a Stephen King novel as an adult would.

From a purely political standpoint, the concept of student choice and autonomy is a direct
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response to anti-democratic, authoritarian tendencies that exist within schools that attempt to

prepare good workers by developing them into docile and compliant students (Power, B.,

Wilhelm, J., Chandler, K., & King, S., 1997). While King’s books are seen by many teachers as

the pinnacle of confrontational and oppositional to the authoritarian approach of the classroom, it

is this very opposition that creates a space for students to feel as if they have a voice by

introducing thought-provoking themes, and providing the way for students to challenge what

would normally be viewed as adult values, such as violence and sex.

The Teacher as A Model

Glasser states in his book The Quality School that “the better [that] students know the

teacher, and the more they like what they know, the harder they will work for him or her (1992,

p.48). The teacher must be intentional about developing long-lasting relationships with their

students, which can take time. It is an intrinsic investment that pays off in the long run within

your classroom, and a major tool in fostering positive relationships with students to become both

a positive role model for students and a play a vital role in that student’s well-being.

Gambrell’s journal discusses what research and theory suggest about the role of

motivation in literacy development, describing six research based factors that are related to

increased motivation to read: a teacher who is a reading model; a book-rich classroom

environment that encourages reading; opportunities for student choice and autonomy; familiarity

with books that are available; social interaction with peers about books; and literacy-related

incentives that reflect the value of reading. Gambrell supposes that at the heart of student choice

lies motivation, and proposes that at the centre of motivation is a teacher who is used as a role

model for inquisitive reading. “One very important way in which teachers motivate students to

read is by being an explicit reading model. Research suggests that teachers who love reading and
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are avid readers themselves have students who have higher reading achievement than do students

of teachers who rarely read” (Gambrell 1996).

Conclusion

In conclusion, the sources cited above as part of an extensive review of classroom

autonomy all illustrate different aspects of student motivation that foster and promote the role of

student choice within the differentiated classroom: students look to teachers to model effective

reading strategies; teachers model themselves and create a classroom environment that is

conducive to a student’s motivation through classroom management skills; and finally, teachers

and students work together in a cooperative and democratic classroom to ensure choice is being

promoted and students are becoming global citizens and life-long readers.

In order to satisfy this research project, an extensive review of literature will be utilized

to make a formal analysis on the issue of student choice within the context of a high school

English classroom. The intent will be to successfully create and synthesise a list of

comprehensive literature that is both alluring to students and beyond what they are forced to read

in the normal curriculum. These books may push boundaries and conventions, but they will be

introduced in order to instill a voracity for reading in students. Through the use of effective

analysis, including journalling, reader-responses, and the overall exhumation of themes and

literary analysis, students will be able to have a sense of autonomy while still maintaining and

surpassing the required levels of literature evaluation.

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REFERENCES

Brooks, C., & Young, S. (2011). Are choice-making opportunities needed in the classroom?

Using self-determination theory to consider student motivation and learner

empowerment. International Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education,

23(1), 48-59.

Cotton, K. (2000). The schooling practices that matter most. Portland, OR: Northwest Regional

Education Laboratory; and Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision & Curriculum

Developments.

Ellis, A. K., & Fouts, J.T. (1997). Research on educational innovations. Larchmont, NY: Eye on

Education.

Erwin, J. C. (2004). The classroom of choice: giving students what they need and getting what

you want. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

Freiberg, H.J. (2010-2013). The BIO Content: Behavioral, Instructional, and Organizational

Management.

Freiberg, H. J., & Driscoll, A. (2005). Universal Teaching Strategies (4th ed.). Boston:

Pearson/A & B.

Gambrell, L. B. (Sept. 1996). Creating Classroom Cultures That Foster Reading Motivation. The

Reading Journal, 50(12), 12-25.

Glasser, W. (1992). The quality school: Managing students without coercion. New York:

HarperPerrenial.
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Glasser, W. (1998). Choice Theory: A new psychology of personal freedom. New York:

HarperCollins Publishers.

Irvine, J. (2015). Enacting Glasser's (1998) Choice Theory in a grade 3 classroom: a case study.

Journal of Case Studies in Education, 7. Retrieved October 20, 2017.

Johnson, D.W., Johnson, R.T., & Holubec, E.J. (1993). Circles of learning: Cooperation in the

classroom. Edina, MN: Interaction Book Company.

Kingsolver, B. (1995). High tide in Tuscon: Essays from now or never. NY: HarperCollins.

Kohn, A. (1993). Choices and Children: Why and How to Let Students Decide. Phi Delta

Kappan, 75(1). 8-20.

Lumsden, L. (2005). Motivating today’s students: The same old stuff just doesn’t work. Portraits

of Success, 1(2). 1-13.

Milyavskaya, M., & Koestner, R. (2011). Psychological needs, motivation, and well-being: A

test of self-determination theory across multiple domains. Personality and Individual

Differences, 50, 387- 391.

Patall, E. (2012). Constructing motivation through choice, interest, and interestingness.

Journal of Educational Psychology. doi: 10.1037/a0030307.

Power, B., Wilhelm, J., Chandler, K., & King, S. (1997). Reading Stephen King: Issues of

censorship, student choice, and popular literature. Urbana, Ill.: National Council of

Teachers of English.
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Rosenblatt, L.M. (1978) The reader, the text, the poem: The transactional theory of the literary

work. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press.

Rosenblatt, L.M. (1982). The literary transaction: Evocation and response. Theory into Practice,

21 (4): 268-277.