University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

English language learners utilizing the accelerated reader program

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English language learners utilizing the accelerated reader program

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ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS UTILIZING THE ACCELERATED
READER PROGRAM

by

Frank Gomez II

_________________________________________________________________

A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE ROSSIER SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF EDUCATION

December 2009

Copyright 2009 Frank Gomez II
ii
Dedication

I would like to dedicate this dissertation to my family. First and foremost,
I need to thank my Mom and Dad for always supporting and believing in my
abilities. No words or money could ever express how much I appreciate their
unconditional support, love, and guidance that they have given me over the years. It
is because of their support that I have attained my goals. I also would like to thank
my wife for always believing in my abilities and encouraging me to pursue my life’s
passions and goals. Your unwavering love and support have sustained me during
moments of self-doubt, thank you. Also, to my little sister who has always been my
personal cheerleader; always there to motivate me to the next milestone with a kind
word or smile.
iii
Acknowledgments

To all my professors especially Dr. Dennis Hocevar at the University of
Southern California for always remaining insightful and motivating; you have
inspired me to be the catalyst for change in the world of education.
To the Orange County Cohort 2006 you have really defined the true meaning
of being a part of the Trojan Family, thank you.
Last, but not least to Darrin McDuffy and Terry Nichols for helping me to
“get er done” thanks for being great friends and colleagues and making this a great
life experience.
iv
Table of Contents

Dedication ……………………………………………………………………….. ...ii
Acknowledgments ……………………………………………………………… ...iii
List of Tables …………………………………………………………………….....v
List of Figures …………………………………………………………………… ...vi
Abstract …………………………………………………………………………. ...vii
Chapter 1: Problem Identification ……………………………………………….. ...1
Chapter 2: Review of the Literature …………………………………………….....27
Chapter 3: Methodology …………………………………………………………...47
Chapter 4: Findings ……………………………………………………………... ...57
Chapter 5: Summary Discussion and Recommendations ………………………. ...71
References ………………………………………………………………………. ...88
v
List of Tables

Table 1: Historical Trend of Underachievement for ELL ………………………....16
Table 2: Mean Statistics by Grade Level ……………………………………….. ...58
Table 3: Effect Size Estimates ………………………………………………….. ...57
Table 4: Performance Categories by Grade Level ……………………………… ...61
Table 5: Proficiency Rates (Proficient and Advanced Levels) by Grade Level …...63
Under NCLB

Table 6: Pre- vs. Post- Intervention CST ELA Performance Band Differences: .. ...65
Statistical Findings

Table 7: Pre-versus Post Interventions CST ELA Performance Band ………….....66
differences: Practical Significance

Table 8: API School Wide Comparison, 2007 and 2008 ……………………….. ...69
Table 9: API Subgroups Growth Comparison, 2007 and 2008 ………………… ...69
Table 10: AYP English-Language Arts for the Experimental and Comparison ... ...69
Schools, 2008
vi
List of Figures

Figure 1: Demographics ………………………………………………………….. ...3
Figure 2: Proficiency Rates at Carolina Herrera Elementary School…………….. ...5
vii
Abstract

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact (positive, negative, or
neutral) of Accelerated Readers (AR), a standard based intervention, on the academic
achievement of English Language Learners at Carolina Herrera Elementary School.
Carolina Herrera Elementary School, was analyzed using these specific lenses: (1)
curriculum and instruction, (2) research-based strategies, (3) expectations for student
learning, and (4) data-driven decision-making.
The summative evaluation portion included a pre-post independent groups designs
and a nonequivalent benchmark group design using a high performing school that
has similar demographics. The pre-post design was used to access improvement at
the experimental school from the 2007 to the 2008 school years. The nonequivalent
group design was used to compare the post-test results of English Language Learners
in Grade 2 through 5 at Carolina Herrera Elementary School (experimental group)
and Elijah Flores Elementary School (benchmark group).
California State Standards Test Scores (CST) of “far below basic, below basic, basic,
proficient, and advanced” were converted to a numerical scale ranging from “0”
through “4” to correspond to the CST proficiency band scores. Achievement at
Elijah Flores Elementary School was also benchmarked. The school was chosen as a
benchmark school because it has a large Spanish speaking ELL population yet has
historically outperformed similar schools.
viii
The information and the data utilized for this study was based heavily on
quantitative data (CSTs), but also included some qualitative data. The experimental
group included all students enrolled in grades 2-5 who were identified as ELL in an
urban elementary school. The 2007-2008 academic year was selected as the baseline
because it was the final year that AR was used as the core curriculum of the school
before a change in administration.
Quantitative findings indicated a statistically significant positive change from
2007 to 2008 in the 2
nd
grade and a significantly negative change in the 4
th
grade.
Overall, the change from 2007 to 2008 was both statistically and practically non-
significant. Teacher interviews suggested that while there were many positive
aspects to AR, it did detract from the amount of time spent on the core curriculum.
The results of this study suggest that the impact of Accelerated Reader
standards on ELL learner achievement is minimal, possibly because it did not allow
sufficient time for the core curriculum, Houghton-Mifflin. Further, the qualitative
teacher interview findings suggested that the intervention interfered with the core
curriculum, Houghton-Mifflin. While AR does lends itself to being a useful resource
to assist students into moving into the “proficient” and “advanced” proficiency
bands, steps need to be taken to make sure that sufficient time is devoted to direct
instruction in a core curriculum.
1
Chapter 1: Problem Identification

The Problem of Practice
As the demographic landscape has changed over the years throughout the
state of California, so too have the demographics of this once small, quaint
community that comprises the Mountain Unified School District. This suburban city
is 60 miles east of Los Angeles and 103 miles north of San Diego—making it very
accessible because of its proximity to major cities. As the cost of housing increased
in the surrounding areas, many families migrated to this town because of it remained
affordable. The 86,894 people that live within the 21.2 square miles of the
community have an average annual income of $46,152. According to the United
States Census Bureau data of 2000, 52.8% of the 26,659 residents had children under
the age of 18 living with them and attending a school within the Mountain Unified
School District. This newer segment of the population has caused a dramatic change
in the demographics of the city over the last few years, but particularly in the
neighborhood that surrounds Carolina Herrera Elementary School.
Carolina Herrera Elementary School was built in 1957 and is one of 17
elementary schools located in the Mountain Unified School District in Southern
California. Carolina Herrera Elementary School is comprised of 826 students in
grades kindergarten through fifth grade and is a Reading First site for grades
kindergarten through third grade, which means that proven methods of early reading
instruction are used in the classes. Correspondingly, teachers are given support to
2
incorporate scientifically based research teaching strategies and assessments to
improve student achievement (U.S. Department of Education, 2008). The district is
nestled below the San Bernardino Mountains and takes great pride with the general
growth in student enrollment that had been taking place over the years. However,
Carolina Herrera Elementary School is currently facing declining enrollments—as
are many of the other schools within the Mountain Unified School District.
Carolina Herrera Elementary School has a four track, year-round schedule
with 40 teachers, six instructional aides, four office staff members, one health clerk,
two custodians, a half-time school nurse, an assistant principal, and a principal. It is
these preceding individuals who provide the structure and learning environment for
the 848 students at the school. Carolina Herrera Elementary School, like any other
school, services children with very specific needs. Therefore 5 of the 40 teachers
include a Special Education teacher for an on site Special Day Class (SDC), a
teacher for the Resource Specialist Program (RSP) to assist students with mild to
moderate learning disabilities, a Reading First Literacy Coach who is responsible for
staff development and modeling of effective research-based strategies, a Title I
Support that supports and models best practices in the area of mathematics, and an
English Language support teacher who is responsible for on-site training to help
students move through the California English Language Development Test (
CELDT) to help students become classified as English Only students. Ninety-three
percent of the teaching staff is fully credentialed and highly qualified. According to
the School Accountability Report Card (SARC) 2005-2006, Carolina Herrera
3
Elementary School has a greater percentage of teachers who have one to two years of
teaching experience as compared to the county and state.
Carolina Herrera Elementary School has a total of 826 students enrolled in
school, which is more than both the county average of 666 and the state average of
542 students (See Figure 1). Of those 826 students their ethnicities are as follows: 3
American Indian or Alaskan, 13 Asian, 104 African-American, 691 Latinos, and 37
Anglo students. Of this population, 616 receive free lunch, while 83 receive lunch at
a reduced rate.
According to the 2006-2007 SARC, of the 826 students enrolled 46 percent
were identified as English Language Learners, 80 percent of the households came
from a low socio-economic status (SES), and 25 percent of the students’ parents
attended or graduated from college (See Figure 1).

Figure 1: Demographics

4
The above graph is a comparison between Carolina Herrera Elementary’s
averages and the county and state averages. The graph clearly illustrates that there is
a disparity between proficiency rates from the core curriculum (reading, writing,
math and science). The graph also illustrates that the number of low-income students
surpasses both the state and county averages, has fewer parents who have attended or
graduated from college. When examining the data specifically for Carolina Herrera
Elementary School, 23 percent of its students were in the proficient band as
compared to 44 percent for the state. In the area of mathematics 41 percent of
Carolina Herrera Elementary School students were in the proficient band as
compared to the state average of 53 percent, 15 percent of the students in the area of
science were proficient as compared to the 32 percent for the state.
The data in Figure 2 for the school clearly shows that Anglo students
outperform Hispanics Carolina Herrera Elementary School. In the areas of
Language Arts 24 percent of Hispanics were in the proficient band as compared to
58 percent of Anglos. These statistics clearly reveal that there is an achievement gap
for the Latino students at Carolina Herrera Elementary School in English Language
Arts (ELA), but not in mathematics.
As a result of the previously described percentages in Figure 1, Carolina
Herrera Elementary School is not meeting its Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) goal.
However, Carolina Herrera Elementary School has made substantial gain with their
Academic Performance Index (API). In 2006 Carolina Herrera Elementary School
5
had made a 16-point gain giving them an API score of 689, while similar schools in
the state had a score of 759
Figure 2: Proficiency Rates at Carolina Herrera Elementary School

Despite the statistical data, the mission of the school always has been, and
remains one of instilling a sense of ownership for student learning through reading,
language, and math proficiency. The school aims to fulfill this vision by providing a
higher quality educational program in hopes of assuring that all students will learn to
read by the end of third grade (Mountain Unified School District, 2007). Achieving
this goal is dependent on bringing focus to four main goals that will insure the best
possible educational outcomes: 1) increasing student achievement, 2) increasing
student attendance, 3) maintaining a safe and effective environment, and 4)
increasing parent involvement. The school believes that by working collaboratively
with all stakeholders, educational excellence can be achieved.
6
Carolina Herrera Elementary School, which previously had a predominately
Anglo student population, has seen an increase among Latino students. Within this
population, English Language Learners (ELL) are “children who are linguistically
and culturally diverse students who have been identified through reliable and valid
assessments as having levels of English language proficiency that preclude them
from accessing, processing, and acquiring unmodified grade level content in English
and, thereby, qualifying for support services” (Mountain Unified School District,
2007). The increase among Latino students is directly reflective of the fact, that
there has been an increase in families that speak Spanish in the neighborhood(s)
surrounding Carolina Herrera Elementary School. The dominant language in the
homes of most of the families is Spanish; clearly, this once homogeneous school,
with a primarily Anglo population is now populated by an increasing number of first
and second generation Latinos. This shift has been affecting the overall performance
of the school as indicated by results on the California Standardized Test (CST).
Carolina Herrera Elementary School received Title I funding because there
are a significant percentage of students who receive free or reduced lunches. Title I
monies help to provide equal access to obtaining a high-quality education and to help
students from a low SES background meet grade level proficiency. However, since
the school was entering its fourth year as a program improvement (PI) school, the
district had to make some changes to the current situation because a significant
amount of students were not moving into the proficient and advanced bands.
Therefore, the district was forced to make some creative changes and decided to
7
decline the Tile I funding for the 2007-2008 school year. Declining the funding
would allow Carolina Herrera Elementary School to exit from program improvement
year four.
My role as a teacher in this study is to work in collaboration with the new
administration to increase scores at Carolina Herrera Elementary School by
constructing a clear picture of what needs to be accomplished and helping to define
our purpose and create a corresponding action plan. It is the goal for the
administration to create standards that are high and relevant to meeting the
benchmarks for the class, district, and state.
At Carolina Herrera Elementary School many of the teachers are unwilling to
take responsibility for their lessons failing. Instead, when given time to collaborate
they place the blame on the students. Although systemically Carolina Herrera
Elementary School has devoted three weeks out of the month to professional
collaboration, this time and opportunity is being misused. Often, teachers come to
vent about the habits of a particular student instead of reflecting upon the curriculum,
instruction, and productive assessments that will close the achievement gap at
Carolina Herrera Elementary School.
Overall, Carolina Herrera Elementary School administrative staff is cognizant
that previous expectations were not promoting sustained growth leading to the
ultimate goal of closing the achievement gap. Elmore (2003) states that in order for
school improvement to occur there needs to be internal accountability as opposed to
external accountability. This shift can only be done in a learning environment that
8
believes that all children can learn despite their life circumstances. Carolina Herrera
Elementary School is now consciously attempting to create a change in the school
culture, that will bring a new vitality to the instructional programs in hopes that this
will ensure academic success for its students.
Mountain Unified School District is comprised of 29,895 students.
Approximately 2,800 certificated and classified employees serve this geographical
area. Edith Duke is the Superintendent of Mountain Unified School District —the
35
th
largest district in the state of California. The district’s budget is approximately
$220 million. The Superintendent has had a thirty-five year career in the field of
education. Her experiences range from classroom teacher at the community college
and secondary level, Principal of both a high school and middle school, and a short
stint as a Program Manager for the Louisiana Teacher Evaluation Program for the
Department of Education, Baton Rouge.
The mission of the Mountain Unified School District is to maximize students’
academic, social, and cultural development so that graduates can apply the acquired
knowledge and skills to live meaningful and productive lives in a democratic society.
Using Bolman and Deal (2003) as a lens to view the systemic practices of the
district, it appears that the Mountain Unified School District is working from the
political frame: “in traditional structural views, organizations are guided by goals
and policies set at the top” (Bolman & Deal, 2003). Mountain Unified School
District is governed from the top down, with no real way to voice concerns without
fear of retribution.
9
During the 2002-2003 school year, the Superintendent installed the
Renaissance Learning programs throughout the entire school district. Accelerated
Reader (AR) is a program that was developed by Renaissance Learning Inc., and is
based upon the premise that reading often will eventually improve reading skills.
The goal of this program is to provide immediate feedback, motivation, and a way to
monitor a student’s reading habits and growth. The AR program assesses students
on books that are selected by the students. The program scores and provides the
student, parent(s), and teacher with a detailed report of the book read. The program
is all encompassing and maintains records and gathers data to be used by the teacher.
In combination with the AR program, Renaissance Inc. utilizes the Standardized Test
for the Assessment of Reading (STAR). This reading skills assessment is nationally
normed and is administered using a computer. The results are provided immediately
and show the growth the student has made over the course of a school year.
AR is a computer based way of monitoring the development of reading
comprehension with self-selected books from a specific reading range determined
from the STAR test results. Books are color coded in the school library to signify a
specific reading range. This range is referred to as their Zone of Proximal
Development (ZPD). The program assumption here is that utilizing the ZPD will
encourage students to read books that are not so easy or so challenging that
frustration sets in, and impedes the student from making further progress. Again, the
program assumption is that if students choose books outside of their zone in either
direction, reading growth will be thwarted, or will not occur. Therefore the color of
10
the sticker (on the books made available) becomes critical to the students’ reading
development. The stickers correlate to a specific reading difficulty, while the
number of pages a book contains determines the point value for the book. Once the
student has finished reading his/her book and is ready to test, the number of pages (in
the book they read) determines if they take a comprehension test that contains 5, 10,
or 20 questions. The Star test is administered once each trimester to monitor growth
over the course of an academic year.
Renaissance Learning Inc. has determined what is considered to be best
practices to help all students make growth in the area of reading comprehension,
which the program considers to be the central aspect of the reading program. The
company has found that when students are provided a structure to practice reading
along with a teacher, a student can make a gain of as much as two years of
equivalent growth in one academic year. According to the Renaissance Learning
program, the following must be implemented by the classroom teacher to maximize
the AR program:
• Schedule time for reading practice (which varies from 30-90 minutes
depending upon grade level)
• Find the ZPD—students should have books that are within their optimum
reading level
• Utilize the The Opportunity to Praise Students (TOPS) reports—a
students should get immediate feedback regarding their performance on a
11
quiz, the teacher should provide the appropriate praise or remediation
immediately upon reading over the report
• Utilize the reading log—helps to assure accountability that the student is
reading up to the required time
• Status of the class—teacher should review to make sure students are
testing regularly
• Review the diagnostic report weekly—this reports allows the teacher to
see if the students are meeting the goal of 85% which is consider
significant in seeing reading growth
• Set reading goals—the goals should always be set at 85%, book level, and
points earned goal
• Create an incentive program to motivate
• Use literacy skills tests and other reading quizzes—it is an opportunity for
the classroom teacher to determine the success of the literary skills that
are often assessed on high stake test.
This program was to be instituted from elementary to high school, and it also
became mandatory that all students within the Mountain Unified School District had
to actively participate in the AR program. Although the AR program is a tool used to
reinforce and encourage reading comprehension, school principals were admonished
publicly when their schools did not have a particular circulation count for the library
and a 90 percent implementation index. A direct ramification from having a low
implementation index was the classroom teacher utilizing more of the minutes of the
12
instructional day to maintain the status quo. The district created a Renaissance team
who was responsible for specific schools and could monitor and provide direction to
meet the desired implementation goals and library circulation. It was also
determined that when one hundred percent implementation was achieved, it was a
direct result of utilizing the guidelines set be the Renaissance group and the guidance
from the renaissance support team. This type of scrutiny and watchful eyes made
teachers feel the pressure to reach the desired goal at any cost even if it meant
sacrificing the core curriculum.
Teachers were not able to use Accelerated Reader as an intervention, but
rather as a part of the core curriculum. The Superintendent, along with the support
from the cabinet and the school board, made a decision to have individual school
sites pay for a portion of the expenses incurred from the program including
maintenance and upgrades. She left the individual sites responsible for finding the
necessary monies to support the paper heavy program. This made for a very difficult
and challenging situation for administration and staff at the school sites by forcing
them to become resourceful, and by eliminating intervention programs provided by
teachers to cover the additional costs incurred by the program which was the
Superintendent’s answer for students not meeting the proficient or advanced bands.
Overall Mountain Unified School District does not completely facilitate what the
mission and vision statements are intended to do, which is guide current practices to
close the achievement gap focusing on all children of poverty.
13
MacIver and Farley (2003) have concluded that districts play an instrumental
role in instructional improvement. Mountain Unified School District continues to
struggle with closing the achievement gap, since many of the Superintendents have
not had formal training or experience in examining successful schools from a
research perspective, this will cause long-term effects that will impede the progress
of all stakeholders. The district and its schools have been struggling in increasing
proficiency for the disenfranchised and are now in Stage 2 of (PI) status (Mountain
Unified School District, 2006). The students of Mountain Unified School District
have continued to struggle in English/Language Arts for the past two years. As a
result, the district has developed an improvement plan and requested the assistance
from the California Department of Education (Mountain Unified School District,
2006). An outside evaluator could promote sound decisions and provide guidance
and coherence to a dysfunctional school district.
Mountain Unified School District is no different than any other district in
meeting the needs of its diverse population. However, the district has failed to have
the “courage to acknowledge poor performance and seek solutions” (Togneri &
Anderson, 2003). The unwillingness to self-reflect and make those hard decisions is
what is preventing Mountain Unified School District from being an “ideal” school
district. If the chosen approach were the political frame then a system-wide
approach to instruction (Togneri & Anderson, 2003) would serve the children of the
district better. Ultimately the changes that have to occur would require deliberate
and purposeful actions that would benefit the students of the district. This
14
commitment would then provide a structure that would create lasting systemic
change.

Problem Analysis/Interpretation
The current Superintendent of the district has not taken what might be
considered a traditional approach to becoming a Superintendent. She has not held
any directorial positions nor has she occupied any Assistant Superintendent seats.
Thus, her lack of experience at some of the cabinet seats has been called into
question by the parents and teachers of the community. An effective superintendent
does not always possess a doctoral degree, but earning this advanced degree would
give her credibility with parents, teachers, and all those stakeholders she is intended
to lead. It can only be speculated that that the educational decisions that she has
made have come from the traditional top down approach. The Superintendent’s
Executive Cabinet consists of three Assistant Superintendents and one Deputy
Superintendent. During her tenure she has created two new Assistant Superintendent
positions. They were also filled by individuals who had site-based experience
similar to her own professional, non-traditional background.
The school board is comprised of five members of the community who have
broken the lines of communication and trust between teachers over the past few
years. During board meetings the Superintendent has referred to the teachers of her
district as “cockroaches” who are afraid to speak before her and question her
leadership style and decision-making. She has also stated that teachers lack the
15
dedication and drive to change the future of the school district and do not need to be
concerned with future pay increases and should be content with having a job and
receiving an annual increase. These confrontational comments made by her clearly
demonstrate the lack of respect she has for her teachers and students. Therefore,
given her comments, along with her decisions for implementation of district-adopted
programs, have come in to question. It is because of comments that she has made
during public forums (such as the few cited above) that have caused teachers,
parents, and community stakeholders to take a vote of no confidence on the
Superintendent and the Board of Education in 2001. Such an atmosphere of mistrust
has begun to breed a dysfunctional learning environment.
Problem Analysis and Interpretation: Leadership Action Steps
The administration needs to provide a clear message of what goals will be
focused from the onset to gain buy-in by all stakeholders. According to Marzano
(2003), “leadership could be considered the single most important aspect of effective
school reform.” Merriam-Webster (2003) defines accountability as “ an obligation
or willingness to accept responsibility or to account for one’s actions”. This is the
definition that will be used when examining the effectiveness of the AR program at
Carolina Herrera Elementary School in moving ELL students into the proficient and
advance bands. Establishing a clear definition of the program goals will allow
individuals to know how each person and grade level team will be held responsible
for the overall effectiveness of the AR program. By taking these facets into
consideration, should help with the evolution of change that will need to occur at
16
Carolina Herrera Elementary School. The ultimate goal will be the
institutionalization of a program that will support, challenge, and move the ELL sub-
group in making their target goal and achieve grade level proficiency. According to
Burke (2004), an unambiguous expectation for the desired student performance
needs to be shared by all those who have a vested interest in the success of the
targeted group.
Being a proficient reader is an indispensable skill needed to be learned by all
students, even more specifically the ELL population. Carolina Herrera Elementary
School is entering its fourth year of program improvement. In the 1999-2000 school
year the school had and AYP of 437. According to the CST results in 2003 16
percent of the students were at the proficient or advanced band. In the 200 18
percent in 2005 school year 23 percent were considered to be proficient in English
Language Arts (See Table 1). Comparatively speaking, in the State of California, in
the 2006-2007 school year, 44 percent of the overall population were proficient.

Table 1: Historical Trend of Underachievement for ELL
2007 144/578 students (27%) proficient or above
2006 116/562 students (24.3%) proficient or above
2005 117/566 students (23.1%) proficient or above
2004 87/580 students (17.8%) proficient or above
2003 86/593 students (15.8%) proficient or above

17
The program expectations are that the administration and leadership team, in
a staff development meeting, will disseminate the solutions that are proposed to the
staff. The first phase of implementation is to highlight current data and provide a
rationale for the approaches that are being taken to raise the number of ELL students
in the proficient and advance bands. Once a clear vision and expectations have been
established, a force-field analysis needs to be completed. It is important to formally
acknowledge, however obvious it may seem, that change will come about only if
helping factors are strengthened and hindering factors are reduced. DuFour and
Burnette (2002) have stated that not taking responsibility for student learning breeds
the cynicism and pessimism that are counterproductive to improving the overall
climate of the school. An overall commitment by the staff and financial resources
are needed to eliminate any feelings of frustration, discouragement, or possible
resentment when a new paradigm is being introduced to help the ELL student and all
disenfranchised students.
It is evident after examining the results from the reading comprehension
portion of the CST that 46 percent out of 54 percent of the student population does
not have the necessary skills to perform at the proficient or advanced level. One may
assume that it becomes necessary that the organization needs to focus on the Latino
population because it represents the largest percentage of students not meeting grade
level proficiency standards when substituting the core curriculum of Houghton-
Mifflin for more AR time and testing. It also becomes apparent that AR does not
explicitly teach the structure and organization of the English Language; therefore,
18
utilizing the data would create cognitive dissonance. It would help to compare a
similar school within the district that has also made gains and growth without the
intensity and push of the AR program. Utilizing this approach would help to shift
thinking and help teachers to see that when deliberate steps are taken in creating
lessons, they can directly effect student achievement (Dufour & Bennette, 2002).
Unfortunately, the past administration did not take a proactive approach to the
overall ramifications of these results. The consequent affect was that teachers
continued to use the AR program to teach strategies that could not be taught merely
through reading. It is apparent that this approach did not improve the learning of the
students of Carolina Herrera Elementary School compounding the issues of the
acquisition of knowledge.
The administrative staff, along with certificated and classified staff, needs to
identify current and future trends regarding the ELL population. The ideal situation
will allow teachers and support staff to share concerns about the direction of the
current use of the AR program and what modifications would need to be made to
achieve the desired educational outcome of grade level proficiency for ELL students.
This will help in obtaining group buy-in and help with the implementation.
Everyone will feel that they are being held accountable.
The ELL coach, who is considered to be the on site expert, will provide in-
services regarding the implementation of research-based strategies that will move
students into the desired bands. This goal will be accomplished by walk through
visits that will meet individual teacher’s needs. The content of the in-services will
19
come as a direct result of what the teachers feel they need to strengthen their
programs without relying heavily on AR. The National College for School
Leadership (2005) states “through increasing self-awareness of others and support”
individuals take more responsibility for their behaviors. The ELL coach will
accomplish this goal by visiting all classrooms on a consistent basis and provide
relevant instructional feedback to individuals or groups of teachers based upon their
abilities and knowledge of working with the target ELL group. Taking this approach
will allow those individuals who are at a more rudimentary level the opportunity to
receive the necessary skills; while those who have more experience can hone their
skills or get validation utilizing their current practices. Thus the EL coach will need
to recognize the importance of differentiating her instruction based upon the
experience and competence of each teacher.
Teachers believe that it is important to have a strong focus on developing
reading comprehension. It will be important to the success of any structural changes
that teachers be involved. Intertwining teacher’s voices along with research-based
approaches will determine the direction of the staff development and the creation of
an instructional program that will advance student achievement into the proficient or
advanced levels as determined by the CST. These instructional strategies will be
implemented over a two-year academic period, and it is imperative that teachers
receive proper and on-going staff development to ensure success.
The “cloze procedure” that was first described by W.L.Taylor in 1953 is one
of the solutions that is being proposed as part of the potential solution(s) for Carolina
20
Herrera Elementary School. Cloze is a technique for enabling readers, that omits
words of importance in a given text, that consequently needs to be filled in to
determine the appropriateness and usefulness of the inserted word or words.
According to Kourea, Cartledge, and Musti-Rao (2007) there are two reasons for
utilizing the cloze procedure: “(a) students had to simultaneously process semantic
(word meaning) and syntactic (word order) clues for completing the cloze passages,
and (b) the cloze procedures provide a quick estimate of the relative difficulty of a
particular text for students.” This cloze strategy would be modeled whole class by
the classroom teacher during the class period. The ability to move into small group
settings would help build an individual’s confidence by focusing on the corrective
feedback of the faulty strategy, and not the individual who used the strategy (Clark &
Estes, 2002). Changing the focus would help increase the overall motivation of the
student and help them realize that his/her performance is not a fixed characteristic,
thus each student could achieve grade level proficiency in comprehension. The
overall benefit would encourage students to mastery orientation (Ormrod, 2006).
The instruction would begin with a think aloud demonstrating the desired
response moving towards independence. Students will utilize the cloze strategy to
develop and check comprehension in an organic and purposeful way, and use the AR
program as a supplement to the overall instructional program. Teachers would use
the same model used in the reading of the story while introducing cloze. The teacher
will use chart paper and graphic organizers to benchmark understanding and provide
relevant and immediate feedback—which could also address gaps in knowledge and
21
motivation. Correspondingly, student motivation could also increase because of the
active participation in exercises like the cloze procedure which supports and guides
students to a deeper understanding of reading material. As students begin to grow
academically, it is believed that they will continue to strive to do their best regardless
of the obstacles that they encounter. Such growth would be a direct result of simply
removing some of the organizational barriers that have thus far impeded their
learning.
Teachers revealed that one of the greatest barriers is the lack of relevant staff
development for developing reading comprehension; they attributed this to the
administration. Teachers also believe that parents do not care about the overall
academic performance of their students. Commitment and active involvement from
administration is creating successful organizational changes. One of the
interventions that could help improve the reading comprehension of the ELL
students is peer tutoring.
Peer tutoring will help to compensate for family and socio-cultural risk
factors that are often associated with urban school students. Adding the peer-
tutoring model to the classes would further support the students by providing
immediate feedback and error correction—helping to close the gap. Allocation of
Title I funds would help support the need for continuous and ongoing staff
development in this domain.
Teachers will be trained in utilizing class wide peer tutoring as a way of
reacting to the cultural performance gap that exists at Carolina Herrera Elementary
22
School. Teachers will be presented the strategy and benefits for adopting this
strategy into their classrooms. Teachers will learn that this approach will help with
family and societal risk, and reduce early academic failure. Lecturing and/or direct
instruction will need to be replaced by activities that will allow for active
engagement and practice. As a direct result of these activities, it is hoped that there
will be an increase in students’ on-task behavior, that they will receive receive
instruction that is individualized, receive positive feedback (even when correcting
errors), and improve their overall academic and social skills. Adopting this approach
as praxis, would change the school culture over a period of time.
Teachers would incorporate scaffolding into the existing state adopted
language arts program. Teachers would begin reading the story of the week to the
children (read aloud) allowing them to hear the fluency and intonation of the story.
The following day the teacher would have students working in a homogenous
reading group based upon ability. Students would then work in predetermined
heterogeneous pairs, determined by the teacher, to work towards mastery
performance of both languages. Planning the pairs in advance by the teacher will
also help in differentiating the curriculum (Mafi, 2006). Students would read the text
independently and utilize the AR program to provide immediate feedback in the
progress of developing student comprehension.
Allowing students the chance to work in groups through purposeful
partnering will enhance the acquisition of basic skill and higher-level thinking (Mafi,
2006). As Mafi’s research indicated, students felt as if less time was given to them
23
to answer questions as compared to those students whose primary language was
English. Although they had difficulty articulating exactly how they were treated,
they knew that they were made to feel different. A direct response to this challenge
would be to bring in an outside consulting firm to develop an equity schema—which
would also allow Carolina Herrera Elementary School staff to develop awareness for
a student’s language and culture.
Benchmarking
This self-study will benchmark Elijah Flores Elementary School in the Arrowhead
Unified School District. Elijah Flores Elementary School is very similar to Carolina
Herrera Elementary School in having a large ELL population with 60 percent of the
school’s students being classified as English Language Learners. Hence, both
schools have a strong focus on the success of their students through the English
Language Development (ELD) program. Similar to Carolina Herrera Elementary
School, 381 students at King Elementary are classified as English Learners. At both
Carolina Herrera Elementary School and King, the language most often used by the
students is Spanish.
Elijah Flores Elementary School reflected upon its current instructional
practices to change the educational outcomes of the students that it serves. The
catalyst for this change occurred because of their participation as an Immediate
Intervention/Underperforming Schools Program (II/USP). King Elementary School
hired an external evaluator that, over the course of a year, focused on reflection, data
24
analysis, and planning. As determined by this inquiry it was concluded that there
needed to be a clear focus on literacy.
Although both schools use different literacy programs, the success of the
Elijah Flores Elementary School can be attributed to their willingness to collaborate
and use school wide instructional strategies that will benefit the needs of students
across grade levels. King has slotted an extra two hours per week to directly create
opportunities to collaborate. This in conjunction with the days set aside for staff
development by the district has significantly changed the trajectory of the school.
King created an environment that promoted collegiality and the implementation of
practices that guide instruction. There seems to be a constant dialogue revolving
around instruction that is focused on the standards. The leadership team provided an
initial draft of a plan that outlines a clear path for academic achievement, and then
presented the plan to the staff to build consensus. With the new administrative
regime, the pendulum has begun to shift focus to closing the achievement gap
through deliberate research-based changes. It is the shared decision making
described by Darling-Hammond (2002) that created the impetus for change in the
school. As previously discussed, schools that produce successful students are served
by an institution that embraces the idea that all students can be successful. Although
Carolina Herrera Elementary School did not hire an external evaluator, they did have
a change in principals after six-years. During the first three months of the new
administration, Carolina Herrera Elementary School has also conducted their own
25
inquiry examining both formally and informally the current educational practices and
expectations of its students and staff.

Summary
At Carolina Herrera Elementary School 46 percent of the population is
identified as English Language Learners. As discussed previously there is a disparity
between the proficiency rates between Carolina Herrera Elementary School, the
experimental school, at 23 percent compared to the state average of 44 percent. The
data specifically examining the overall performance in the area of Language Arts
shows that only 24 percent of Latinos compared to 58 percent of Anglos score in the
proficient proficiency band. As a result Carolina Herrera Elementary School is not
meeting their Annual Yearly Progress (AYP).
Carolina Herrera Elementary School was analyzed using these specific
lenses: (1) curriculum and instruction, (2) research-based strategies, (3) expectations
for student learning, and (4) data-driven decision-making. Only after taking an in-
depth analysis of the current practices occurring at Carolina Herrera Elementary
School, is there the possibility to take proactive steps to close the achievement gap
for all students (with a focus on the ELL population). The actions taken will occur
within a systematic framework. The possible solutions being proposed in this
section hopefully will encourage the eradication of the observed gaps discussed
earlier.
26
In 2002-2003 the Superintendent purchased Accelerated Reader (AR) a
Renaissance Learning Inc. program to be utilized with the goal of improving reading
and comprehension. Renaissance Learning Inc. states that if instituted properly a
students can make a gain of as much as two years worth of growth in one academic
year. Each school site was then left to determine implementation. The CST also has
a Federal component that determines whether a school and district is achieving
academically. Since Carolina Herrera Elementary School was struggling to meet its
proficiency target which is set by the federal government in the area of English-
Language Arts, the administration placed a great emphasis in 2007 on the use of AR.
This particular move left the teachers with the impression that AR was the core
curriculum instead of an intervention to be used collaboratively with the core
English-Arts program. Therefore a pre-post independent group design was used to
compare the current second through fifth grade test scores with the last year’s second
through fifth grade test scores utilizing the California State Standards Test Scores
(CST) of “far below basic, below basic, basic, proficient, and advanced” to help
determine whether Accelerated Reader, an standards based English-Language Arts
intervention has had an effect on English Language Learners meeting grade level
proficiency as measured by the California Standards Test Score.
27
Chapter 2: Review of the Literature

Introduction
The goal of this chapter is to provide a review of the existing literature
pertaining to English Language Learners (ELL). This sub group is held accountable
to the proficiency requirements outlined by the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB).
Presented is a five-perspective outline that will achieve the goal of academic
proficiency.
First, an examination of how NCLB effects the ELL population will be
reviewed. Secondly, careful consideration of the validity of utilizing standards based
assessments to evaluate achievement for ELL students will be examined. Third, the
external factors that affect the academic achievement of ELLs will also be examined.
Fourth, the factors that impede academic growth in the area of reading achievement
will be reviewed. Lastly, an in depth discussion will be centered around the
intervention of the Renaissance Learning reading program known as Accelerated
Reader. The discussion will evaluate its effectiveness of promoting academic
achievement as evidenced by scores on the California Standards Test.

Implications of the No Child Left Behind Act on English Language Learners
In the United States, 19 percent of those children who are of school age speak
a language other than English as their primary language. While in California, 24.9
percent of all those students who are enrolled in the public school system are
28
classified as an ELL. The California Department of Education defines an ELL as a
student, “who is not proficient in English” (California Department of Education,
2006). The problem in defining language “proficiency” lies, according to Abedi
(2004), in the lack of a common definition that is shared consistently between states,
let alone through the nation. However, according to the tenets of the NCLB Act an
English Language Learner is defined as any student who:
(a) being 3 to 21 years of age, (b) enrolled or preparing to enroll in
elementary or secondary school, (c) either not born in the United States or
speaking a language other than English, and (d) owing difficulty in speaking,
reading, writing, or understanding English, not meeting the state’s proficient
level of achievement to successfully achieve in English only classrooms.
(Abedi, 2004, p.4).

The consistent fact that needs to help define an ELL is that he/she is unable to
achieve academic proficiency as mandated by the state in an English-only learning
environment. Hence, by definition an ELL student will be unable to meet grade
level proficiency along with the requirements defined by NCLB. It then can be
concluded that an ELL student is challenged to meet grade level proficiency as
determined by the CST, particularly on the English-Language Arts section of the
test.
The demographics have shifted over the past few years in both California and
the United States. No longer are public schools filled with students whose primary
language is English. Instead, there have been increases in the number of students
who have entered the public school system that speak Spanish or a language other
than English. Public Law107, also known as The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001,
29
requires “minimum, proficiency on challenging State academic achievement
standards and state academic assessments” (Public Law 107-110, p.1439). It then
becomes imperative that the needs of this growing population be addressed in order
to meet academic proficiency as defined by NCLB. In order to evidence a minimum
level of proficiency, each state was given the latitude to select a standards based
assessment tool to measure a student’s academic growth. In California a student’s
academic achievement is assessed using the California Standards Test (CST). The
ultimate goal is to ensure that all students receive an equitable education regardless
of socio-economic background or language.
When using the CST each year every school district is required by the federal
government to a specific standard of proficiency, this is known as the adequate
yearly progress (AYP). In order for a school district to meet the minimum AYP
2006-2007 school year, the percentage of students required to perform at the
proficient or advanced levels in English-Language Arts and mathematics were 24.4
percent and 26.5 percent (California Department of Education, 2007). In order for a
school district to meet its AYP goal it is necessary for 24.4 percent of students to
perform at or above the proficient level in the area of English-Language Arts, while
26.5 percent of the students must perform at the proficient or advanced levels in
mathematics as determined by the CST for the 2006-2007 school year to meet the
AYP goal. In addition to making these percentage gains another requirement that
contributes to achieving the annual goal is that 95 percent of every “significant
subgroup” must be included in the test cycle (California Department of Education,
30
2005, pg 1). As defined by the California Department of Education (2005) a
significant subgroup is a minimum of 100 students who are enrolled in the school on
the first day of testing and are able to produce at minimum 100 test scores. This
statement of fact is of great significance because ELL students are an identified
subgroup that is required to participate in the CST.
In the 2006-2007 school year 28.6 percent of the Mountain Unified School
District student enrollment was identified as ELL. In the 2006-2007 school year
Carolina Herrera Elementary School, a school within the Mountain Unified School
District, identified approximately 46 percent of its student population as ELL.
Approximately 87 percent of the 848 students who participated in the CST
performed below the proficient level. Carolina Herrera Elementary School therefore
did not meet its 24.4 percent federal goal for the ELL subgroup, because only 16
percent of this population met the proficient or advanced proficiency bands. This
clearly establishes that there is an achievement gap that exists for ELL students who
participate in standards based assessments like the CST. This gap is critical because
accountability is linked to student achievement that is driven by a standards based
tests that measures academic proficiency. Lachat (2004) asserts that when utilizing
standards based assessments there should be a “push toward higher levels of
learning, they drive demands that schools verify that all students, including students
who are not fully proficient in English, are achieving at acceptable levels” as
compared to the students who are English proficient (p. 18).
31
As we continue to monitor immigration trends, it is apparent that all states
will be facing the challenge of having to educate those students who do not speak
English as their primary language—while the state of California has had the largest
number of non-English speaking students to educate (Lachat, 2004). A noteworthy
characteristic of an ELL is that he/she resides in high-poverty areas and
neighborhoods that are segregated because of their array of socio-economic
problems. Often times this group is the recipient of the prejudiced feelings that
school personnel may feel towards this disenfranchised group pf immigrants, ethnic
minorities, and poor people (Lachat, 2004). This then creates an environment that is
not conducive to learning making it almost impossible for most children to overcome
and learn.
In addition to the many obstacles that are faced by the disenfranchised, they
also face the very material obstacle of learning a new language while working
towards mastery of grade level standards. Lachat (2004) states that there is a distinct
difference between an ELL and his/her peers because he/she is expected to learn a
greater amount of information that extends beyond academic standards. As if this
problem was not already complex, it is compounded because there is not an exact
amount of time that it will take for an ELL to develop English proficiency and have
the ability and confidence to utilize these skills for academic learning. Many
researchers believe that it can take from five to seven years before an ELL is able to
transfer his/her use of English into an academic setting (Lachat, 2004).
32
Abedi (2001) postulates “English Language Learner students scored lower
than students who are proficient in English on the standardized tests of mathematics
achievement in elementary school (p. 220) when a portion of the test had a large
language component. Thus illustrating, that the computation aspect of the test was
not the major area of concern, but rather reading and comprehending what the
question was asking became the primary obstacle for the ELL. This occurrence is
also noted by Collier (1992) when noting, that language minority students who are
limited in English proficiency score at extremely low levels on standardized tests
that are English normed for native speakers. As Collier states, these tests are clearly
not appropriate the first couple years of development for an ELL. Such tests,
actually are then covertly testing the English language comprehension of the ELL
regardless of the content area.
Another contributing factor to the complex problem of comparing the
language proficiency of an ELL from year to year is the way the ELL students
progress and become reclassified to fluent English proficient (RFEP) speakers. The
California English Language Development Test (CELDT) is given annually to
measure an ELL in the areas of listening, speaking, reading, and writing in grades
two through twelve. The test is used to determine initial placement for a newly
enrolled student; while the annual results are used as a way to assess a student’s
developmental progress towards English language proficiency. If grade level
proficiency is met both on the CELDT (English language assessment) and CST
(academic achievement assessment) an ELL can qualify to be redesignated as an
33
RFEP. Consequently this student is not considered an ELL and will no longer be
included in the ELL subgroup. It is because of these aforementioned reasons that it
is difficult to compare the groups, because the reclassification occurs along with the
influx of students who perform poorly as a direct result of their lack of language and
academic competencies as related to the English language. Those students who are
not reclassified will remain in the ELL subgroup and continue to perform below the
expected proficiency rates as determined by the criteria established by NCLB.
“Members of the LEP [ELL] subgroup, by definition, will almost always be among
the low-performing group of students and will hardly make substantial progress”
(Abedi, 2004, p.6).

Utilization of Standards-Based Assessments to Evaluate English Language Learners
In 1993 according to the California Department of Education (2007),
California had an ELL population of 1,151,819 students and has grown in the last
twelve years by 38 percent. This growth is represented in the 2004-2005 school
years as 1,591,525 ELL. This growth represents 25 percent of the students that are
enrolled in California schools as ELL. Therefore, the accountability requirements of
NCLB call into question the validity of testing ELL who are required to meet grade
level standards while acquiring English Language proficiency to progress
academically.
California ultimately needs to examine how the CSTs are used to assess the
academic progress of the ELL subgroup. According to Butler and Stevens (2001),
34
past practices concerning ELL students meant not using standardized tests; therefore,
schools were unable to measure their growth over time. Hence, the ELL population
prior to NCLB were not required to measure and account for their academic progress
leaving no baseline foundation.
There is a rich body of literature regarding the discrepancies between the
performance of ELLs on standardized tests and their English speaking peers. It was
noted by Abedi, Leon, and Mirocha (2005) that “English Language Learners (ELL)
students generally perform lower than non–ELL students in reading, science, math,
and other content areas—a strong indication of the relationship of English
proficiency with achievement assessment” (p.2). The literature states clearly that
when the core curriculum is filled with language specific skills, the gap between
ELL and non-ELL widens. Abedi et al. (2005) explains the aforementioned as a
complex language requirement that is referred to as “language load” (p.2). It is
believed that this “language load” will threaten the validity of ELL students and their
achievement on standardized tests. “The difference between ELL and non ELL
student performance becomes the smallest in math, particularly on math items where
language has less impact, such as on math computation items” (p. 3). The area of
mathematics can be used as an illustration between ELL and non-ELL students
because the gap in performance can be minimized merely for the simple fact that
language is not critical when solving problems that are presented in a numerical
format as these numerical representations can be understood universally.
35
In a study conducted by Abedi et al. (2005) two school sites were examined
to compare the performance of the ELL students. The first site included grades
second through eighth during the 1999 school year. At the first site the Iowa Test of
Basic Skills (ITBS) was used to gather and analyze data from the reading and
mathematics subsets along with student background information such as race,
gender, birth date, and the number of years participating in a bilingual program. The
second site included data gathered from the state department of education for
students in grades second through eleventh during the 1997-1998 school year. The
data that was collected included results yielded from the Stanford Achievement Test
Series Ninth Edition (Stanford 9). Additional information that had been assembled
included information regarding gender, ethnicity, free/reduced-price lunch
participation, parent education, and student ELL status.
The results of the study corroborated the results of previous studies that had
been conducted. The data revealed that there is a direct relationship between the
level of English language proficiency and the overall performance on standardized
assessments. An achievement gap exists between the performances of ELL students
when compared to their non-ELL counterparts. Lastly, the achievement gap widens
as the demand for English language proficiency increases and this is also referred to
as “language load” (Abedi et al., 2005, p. 39). Language proficiency plays an
important role in advancing academic achievement in ELL students and it can be
concluded that whatever academic progress is made, it will generally be lower in
comparison to a non-ELL as stated by Abedi et al. (2005).
36
The contributions made by Butler and Castellon-Wellington (2005) concur
with the findings noted by Abedi in his 2004 study that stated that ELL students
perform lower than their non-ELL counterparts when given when given a content-
area subject test. In the Butler and Castellon-Wellington study they examined 778
third grade students and 184 eleventh grade students who took both the Stanford test
and the Reading/Writing portion of the Language Assessment Scales. Their study
concluded that, “there is a strong relationship between English Language proficiency
of ELL students and their performance on a content assessment” (p.75). It is
suggested by Butler and Castellon-Wellington (2005) that ELL students may have
lower proficiency rates as compared to their non-ELL peers due to their lack of
opportunity to learn (OTL) (p.75). The Opportunity to Learn is explained by
Marzano (2003) as a concept that student achievement is affected when a school’s
“intended curriculum” and “implemented curriculum” does not correspond (p.23).
Often times this disconnect can be attributed to the fact that ELL students receive a
differentiated curriculum, in which the primary focus is to become proficient in the
English language. When there are dual objectives, often times the content area
curriculum is watered down in an English-only environment in order to meet the
needs of both the ELL students and the non-ELL students. The reality that exists in
the classrooms that service ELL students is that the content area curriculum may not
be covered by the time the standardized assessments are administered. Bailey (2005)
states that typically an ELL student may be taught content curriculum at a slower
pace than what is occurring in a non-ELL classroom.
37
Utilizing standardized-based assessments to measure the academic progress
of an ELL student is problematic. It has been noted by Butler and Stevens (2001)
that the standardized assessments that are used to measure academic progress are
problematic because the assessments are designed with English-only students in
mind, therefore making it difficult, or at the very least, limit the utility of measuring
the content knowledge of an ELL student. Abedi, et al. (2005) has indicated that
“ELL students perform substantially lower than non-ELL students particularly in
content areas with more language load” (p.21). Unfortunately these specific types of
assessments do not help inform the classroom teacher on the necessary skills that are
needed to help an ELL student become academically proficient. Ultimately, given
such testing scenarios, the measure of the level of language load that an ELL student
can internalize was actually in opposition to an attempted assessment of the actual
content material that an ELL student has mastered (Abedi et al. 2005). One of the
greatest limitations that is faced in the educational system is not having a way of
gathering data that can inform educators on how much knowledge an ELL student
has acquired in school nor the amount of English an English language student is able
to speak.
Factors that Impede on Reading Achievement for English Language Learners
Reading and literacy are often times described in the literature as being
complex without taking into consideration the skills that an ELL student does not
possess. Therefore it is reasonable to believe that that the process of learning to read
and become proficient is more complex and challenging (Lachat, 2004).
38
In the state of Washington Buly and Valencia (2003) conducted a semi-week
study that included 103 elementary students who were in the fourth grade. The study
was conducted in an ethnically diverse population in what would be considered a
semi-urban school district. In order to determine deficiencies in reading and literacy
skills five methods of measurement were administered: the Woodcock-Johnson
Psycho-Educational Battery-Revised (WJ-R), The Qualitative Reading Inventory II
(QR-II), the Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL), the Peabody
Picture Vocabulary Test-Revised (PPVT-R), and the Comprehensive Test of
Phonological Processing (CTOPP).
Buly and Valencia (2003) determined that the students who scored below the
fourth grade proficiency level on the WASL overall and the skill sub-categories.
These results included word identification, phonemic awareness, comprehension,
vocabulary, rate/speed of reading, and expression was a result of being below fourth
grade proficiency. The aforementioned skill sub-categories did not indicate strength
in any of the individual sub-categories. Students were then clustered into
homogeneous groups based upon their performance on the measurement. The
students were then placed in groups that characterized their area for growth:
automatic callers, struggling word callers, word stumblers, slow and steady
comprehenders, slow word callers, and disabled readers. Each student was placed in
his/her group based upon a specific criteria.
Those students who are learning English as their second language and are
able to identify and maintain reading fluency at 60 percent, are identified as an
39
automatic word caller (Buly & Valencia, 2003). However, these students remain
challenged in developing meaning and comprehension of grade appropriate material.
The automatic word callers can be explained as the ELL student who has learned to
socialize and function at a superficial level, but continue to struggle when challenged
to demonstrate their English Language skill competencies in an academic setting
(Buly & Valencia, 2003; Lachat, 2004). Although the students who are identified as
automatic word callers function at a higher level than other groups, they too become
challenged when the length of a reading passage increases. A direct result of that
increase is that ELL students decrease the number of words they are able to identify
(Buly & Valencia, 2004). This decrease is a part of the process in developing
reading proficiency. When a lengthy passage is introduced to an ELL student, they
become overwhelmed because they have not been taught the necessary reading
strategies to use contextual clues to develop meaning for unfamiliar words and
concepts.
Slow word callers are students who are able to identify words, but lack
fluency when reading. Ironically these students seem to have better comprehension
than the automatic word caller (Buly & Valencia). The trait that explains their
English Language competencies is that they exhibit slow, stunted word identification
and struggle in reading text to create meaning and learning. A factor for
consideration in developing better comprehension is providing instruction in the ELL
student’s primary language. If an ELL student is given skills that are transferable in
his/her primary language, the ELL student will be able to transfer those skills and
40
help develop English language competencies (Thomas & Collier, 2002; Lachat
2004). Ultimately the ELL learner is faced with many contributing factors that
impede them from achieving academically.

Factors that Impede Academic Growth for English Language Learners
A student’s academic success is dependent upon the effectiveness of the
school (Marzano, 2005). Therefore, the findings from the Coleman report (1966)
stated that schools are able to control only 10 percent of a student’s academic
success. Marzano (2003) expounded on this report and ten other prominent studies
to determine that schools can control approximately 20 percent of a student’s
academic success. This was a somewhat better stance than was first provided by the
Coleman report in (1966). The study conducted by Rosenthal and Rubin (1982)
explicitly stated that if a school provided the necessary elements to facilitate the full
20 percent of a student’s success, the schools would benefit from their efforts
because they would be able to produce an additional percentage gain for students
who are meeting grade level proficiency (Marzano (2003) placed great emphasis on
the contributions made by Rosenthal and Rubin). If two schools were looked at as
one being an effective school and the other an ineffective school, it would be
expected that the effective school would have a higher passing rate than the
ineffective school—which would have a lower success rate. This example represents
how the contributions made by a school critically affect a student’s academic
success. Hence, if ELL students are given the necessary tools, they would find
41
greater success in meeting grade level proficiencies on standardized tests. Marzano
(2005) believes that schools have an obligation to promote the academic success of
its students by establishing “concrete goals for curriculum, instruction, and
assessment practices within the school” (p.50). It then becomes important that every
adult on any school campus is responsible for providing opportunities to explicitly
relay the message of working towards the goal of achieving academics success,
correspondingly, it is important that a clear goal is established. However, clear goals
are only the catalyst for the necessary changes in academic achievement for ELL
students, according to the National Research Council (2001). The next step is to
articulate a clear direction on how to accomplish the academic goals that have been
established. When working within a diverse group (which will most often be the
case in Southern California), the varying beliefs and values of the population in
question will effect the interpretations and reactions to the academic goals created
(Clark & Estes, 2002). Therefore, it becomes critical that site personnel have a
concrete understanding of the goals and direction that is being taken to improve
academic achievement for all its inhabitants and not waiver from this strategic plan
(Smuda, Kuklis, & Kline, 2004).
Student achievement can be dramatically impacted by a list of school factors
that remain at the top of the list such as creating clear and concrete goals and high
expectations (Lachat, 2004; Marzano, 2003; Marzano 2005; Smuda et al. 2004). It
not only becomes critical that high expectations are articulated, but extend into the
development lessons that promote multifaceted learning experiences that are both
42
engaging and challenging (Lachat, 2004). It is important for a school to embrace and
exemplify the need for high expectations as being a core value. Smuda et al. (2004)
state that it is the responsibility of every school to maximize student achievement,
and this should be a communal effort. Marzano (2003) states that in order for all
students to achieve academically, inclusive of the ELL subgroup, it is important that
high expectations along with a challenging and rigorous curriculum are
communicated directly by the teacher to the students.

Accelerated Reader and Its impact on Meeting Grade Level Proficiency
The No Child Left Behind Act and its need to measure student achievement
through standardized achievement has forced local schools to consider interventions
that will address the specific needs of the English Language Learner student. This
group will continue to be a part of the educational landscape and targeted
interventions need to be selected to help begin to close the achievement gap.
Therefore, this will lead to schools being able to meet the goals prescribed by NCLB
as they are related to meet reading academic achievement through the use of
Accelerated Reader. The teachers at Carolina Herrera Elementary School are
utilizing this intervention to address the needs of its ELL subgroup.
Paul, Swanson, Zhang and Hehenberger (1997) postulated in an essential
theory that as a student develops his/her reading abilities, he/she will be able increase
his/her comprehension. Therefore, leading to a more meaningful interaction with
subject content material. The premise being that if students are making deeper
43
personal connections it is a direct result of them being able to understand the content
material. Thus it is translated into improvement that will be evidenced on a
standardized assessment such as the CST.
Renaissance Learning, Inc., produces the Accelerated Reader (AR) program,
which is a standards based computer program that promotes reading skills and
comprehension. The program is based upon the premise that if a student is able to
read and comprehend what is presented to them, they will be able to achieve across
all academic areas (Renaissance Learning, Inc., 2007). In a study conducted by Paul
(2003), he utilized the records of 50,823 students. This information is documented
in a database called the Reading Practice Database (RPD) developed by the Research
and Evaluation Department of Renaissance Learning Inc., and states that the students
who have participated in the AR program have read more than three million books
from over 139 schools ranging from grades first through twelve during the 2001-
2002 school year. Paul (2003) asserts that using a systematic approach to reading
such as AR, regardless of a students reading ability, will develop both their reading
skills and level of comprehension.
The results yielded from this study were in favor of using “guided
independent reading (GIR)” (Paul, 2003, p. 6). The relevant points from Paul’s
(2003) study that can be related to the research at Carolina Herrera Elementary
School are: 1) carefully guided reading can directly lead to reading growth, 2)
increase reading growth regardless of individual reading ability can increase as a
44
direct result of GIR and 3) “teachers are the single most important factor in
accelerating reading growth” (Paul, 2003, p. 7).
Another research study conducted by Holmes and Brown (2003) supported
the positive effects of including the AR intervention program into schools. The
2,282 students that participated in this study were tracked over the course of three
years (Spring 2000-Spring 2002). Four schools were selected to participate while
only two school sites received the treatment intervention. Schools were selected to
participate based upon their similarities in the areas of percent of free and reduced
and reduced lunch participation, percent of majority students (White/Caucasian), and
geographic location. During the first year of examination (2000) the Iowa Test of
Basic Skills test was utilized (ITBS), and for the remaining two years (2001-2002)
the Georgia Criterion-Referenced Competency test (GCRCT) was used. Results
based upon the first year concluded that the schools that received the treatment
intervention maintained academic achievement and made gains the remaining two
years of observation. A Covariance (ANCOVA) was use to equate all three years.
The final results according to Holmes and Brown’s (2003) study is that schools
benefited from utilizing the AR program by outperforming schools that didn’t
participate in the treatment intervention. It was established that schools that were
“effective in raising the performance of these elementary schools” utilized the
treatment intervention.

45
Summary
The use of standardized tests to determine academic proficiency was required
by the NCLB Act and has required schools to look at all subgroups individually to
address their specific needs. What actually comes into question is the validity of
what is being measured when these tests are being administered to an ELL student.
Ultimately, there ends up being a disconnect between what exactly is being
measured. It needs to be determined if the current assessments are being used to
measure content mastery or how an ELL student has learned to manage the
“language load” (Abedi et al., 2005). Unfortunately, the assessment that the ELL
student is subjected to taking does not inform instruction or how to improve reading
and literacy. Therefore, an increased burden is placed upon the school in terms of
being responsible for contributing the aforementioned “20 percent” towards a
student’s academic success (Marzano 2003; Marzano, 2005).
It becomes critical to consider the rationale that is being used to utilize an
intervention such as AR to improve academic success for students who are not
meeting at minimum grade level proficiency—in particular the ELL student
subgroup. If the tool is used solely as the catalyst for change without including other
strategies of an effective school, the attempt may fall short and blame will be placed.
An extensive amount of student achievement data has been reviewed to help provide
an explanation for the importance of increasing academic achievement for the ELL
student. However, despite the rich body of literature available on this topic, it is
clear that there are deficiencies when discussing the academic achievement of the
46
ELL utilizing a standards-based assessment. It is the goal of this study to attempt to
supplement the rich literature on language arts programs aimed at helping the ELL
student to meet his/her full potential.
47
Chapter 3: Methodology

Design Summary
An independent group longitudinal design to determine the effectiveness of
the Accelerated Reader (AR) program in moving ELL at Carolina Herrera
Elementary School into the proficient and advanced bands was used to facilitate this
study. The information and the data utilized for this study was based heavily on
quantitative data (CSTs), but also included some qualitative data. The experimental
group includes all students enrolled in grades 2-5 who were identified as ELL in an
urban elementary school in the Mountain Unified School District. During 2002-
2003 school year Mountain Unified School District purchased Accelerated Reader
(AR) for all elementary, middle, and high schools. Although implementation
occurred in the 2002-2003 school year the 2006-2007 California Standards Test
(CST) data on the English Language Arts (ELA) portion of the test served as the
baseline data. The 2007-2008 academic year was selected as the baseline because it
was the final year that AR was used as the core curriculum of the school before a
change in administration.
It is of great consequence that the findings of this study are limited to the
external factors that are influenced by Carolina Herrera Elementary School. Given
the limited scope of this study, causation (positive, negative or neutral) cannot be
determined. The purpose of this study is to serve as a resource in determining
48
whether Accelerated Reader has contributed to an increase in academic proficiency,
specifically at the ELL population at Carolina Herrera Elementary School.
The design is based heavily on quantitative data (CSTs), but I also gathered
relevant qualitative data. Elijah Flores Elementary School was used as a comparison
group for this self-study. This will allow the study to be examined more in depth and
strengthen its findings through methodological triangulation (Patton, 2002).

Quantitative Evaluation Design
Data collection will be achieved by utilizing a mixed methods approach;
therefore the study was able to employ the use of both the summative and formative
research design. The proficiency levels of the total student population in English-
Language Arts at Carolina Herrera Elementary School used the summative research
design to determine the effectiveness of the intervention as measured by the
California Standards Test (CST). The research question that was used to direct the
summative discovery process was:
• Does Accelerated Reader, a standards based English-Language Arts
intervention have an effect on English Language Learners meeting grade
level proficiency as measured by the California Standards Test Scores?
The independent pre-post design was used to examine the findings from the
academic year 2006-2007 at Carolina Herrera Elementary School before the
interventions were implemented. This design approach considered if there was a
change as measured by the CST scores. An independent group t-test was used to
49
scrutinize the statistical significance of the scores, p<.15 and a Cohen’s d which
determined practical significance, d>.20. The rationale for choosing this design is to
assess the change that may have occurred as a result of the implemented
intervention.
Therefore, the 2006-2007 ELA data was used to measure against the 2007-
2008 students’ performance on the ELA portion of the test because the current
administration is implementing the program as an intervention program. The
summative portion of this study incorporated a pre-post nonequivalent control group
design with one dependent outcome and control group that made comparisons to
Elijah Flores Elementary School —the benchmark school utilized in the study. The
researcher measured the groups over time. However, the treatment was only
administered to the experimental group (Creswell, 2003). The experimental school,
Carolina Herrera Elementary School, is the only one using the standards-based
intervention (Accelerated Reader) and was compared to a similar school, Elijah
Flores Elementary School in the Arrowhead Unified School District. Selection of
the control group was determined by similarities in: 1) API scores, 2) grade levels
within the school, 3) percentage of students in school that participate in the free or
reduced lunch program, and 4) percentage of students categorized as English
Language Learners. The non-equivalent control group used Elijah Flores
Elementary School and Carolina Herrera Elementary School as the participating
groups. Elijah Flores Elementary School was the control group while Carolina
50
Herrera Elementary School was the experimental group. The CST score was also
used to analyze the groups.
Below, the design is written in scientific notation:
E 01 X 02
C 02
The experimental group is represented by the letter E, which in this case was
Carolina Herrera Elementary School: Pre (2006) X Post (2007). The control
group (C) is Elijah Flores Elementary School: Post (2007).
It is important that the results that are yielded by this study are limited to
Carolina Herrera Elementary School. Also, causation cannot be determined because
there was no random assignment selection.
As a direct result of the Leveled Accountability Modeling (LAM) tracking
and scoring mechanism, it became necessary to establish change in Year 1 and Year
2, therefore, students who had only been enrolled at the school for two consecutive
years could be included. It has been suggested by the California’s Public Schools
Accountability Act of 1999, that those students who have not been in a school less
than two or even three years are not considered valid in determining school effects.
This study compares the performance on the ELA portion of the 2006-2007
CST for English Language Learners who received minimum exposure to Houghton-
Mifflin to those English Language Learners who received Houghton-Mifflin as the
core curriculum and the AR program as an intervention to promote grade level
proficiency.
51
Baseline was determined by the percentage of students who were performing
at the proficient and advanced levels based upon the CST scores in the English-
Language Arts. Historical data for the 2006-2007 school year was used to determine
the percentage of students achieving at grade level proficiency or advanced and this
information was in turn used to establish to baseline measurements while the 2007-
2008 served as the year of implementation of the intervention.
A quantitative methods approach was used to evaluate the effectiveness of
the intervention for ELL meeting grade level proficiency. Teachers who were a part
of the faculty from 2006-2008 were asked to participate in informal and open-ended
interview about their change in implementation and practice in both the AR program
and Houghton-Mifflin. Teachers were interviewed periodically throughout the
school year to get feedback and to hear their overall concerns or changes that may
have impacted their overall teaching and student performance. The purpose and goal
of the interviews were to judge the level to which each teacher maintained their
fidelity to the AR program or the core sate approved curriculum.
The participants in this study included the total population at Carolina
Herrera Elementary School, a year-round multi-track, kindergarten through fifth
grade elementary school.

Participants/Sampling
Those who were identified as English Language Learners by the home
language survey and the California English Language Development Test (CELDT)
52
were included as well. All participants at Carolina Herrera Elementary School
participated in the school-wide intervention program, Accelerated Reader. This
study examined the overall effectiveness of the intervention program by utilizing the
percentage of students achieving at both the proficient and advanced levels on the
English-Language Arts portion of the CST. Their CST scores from the 2006-2007
school years measured the participants. The data that was collected and gathered
from the California Department of education STAR website. The participant data
included both the mean scaled scores and the percentage of students of in each of the
scoring bands Far Below Basic, Below Basic, Proficient, and Advanced on the CST.
Any specific school or student’s data was gathered from DATA Director a web-
based data warehouse and assessment management system for all students enrolled
within Mountain Unified School District.
The amount of time allotted to the study allowed for a significant benchmark
from the 2006-2007 school year because the implementation of AR met the year
mark and a new implementation under the tutelage of a new administration.
In addition to the students of Carolina Herrera Elementary School, forty
certificated teachers, support teachers, and three coaches who are on special
assignments support the school, administration, and district goals. These adult
participants agreed to share openly and candidly their beliefs regarding the
implementation of the AR and its impact on helping to increase grade level
proficiency for the students at Carolina Herrera Elementary School with a specific
focus on the English Language Learners. The rationale for including adult
53
participants was to collect information regarding implementation and its effects.
Therefore, all certificated staff members were not interviewed. When the
participants began to provide similar and repetitive data the sampling from the adult
participants ceased.
The setting in this study was Carolina Herrera Elementary School located in
the Mountain Unified School District. Bordering cities around the school include
Fontana, Colton, and San Bernardino. The school is a Kindergarten through fifth
grade, year-round, four-track school with an enrollment of approximately 848
students. The vast majority of students are comprised of 691 Latinos and 104
African-Americans. Out of the 848 students at Carolina Herrera Elementary School,
60 percent were classified as ELL. The number of students that receive free lunch is
616 students, while 83 receive lunched at a reduced rate. The number of students
categorized as socio-economically disadvantaged is considered to be significant at
Carolina Herrera Elementary School.

Instrumentation: Achievement
Achievement was measured by using quantitative data that had been
collected by the California Department of Education (CDE), specifically in the area
of English-Language Arts from the 2006-2007 administration of the CST. The
results also targeted the ELL subgroup and the number of these students who
performed at the proficient or advanced levels from the experimental school,
54
Carolina Herrera Elementary School, and Elijah Flores Elementary School the
control group.
According to the information provided by the California Department of
Education’s (2006) website the STAR program, the English-Language Arts portion
of the CST is broken down into three subparts for grades 2 and 3, and two parts for
grades 4 through 11. There is an additional part that required in grade 4 and 7 that is
called the Writing Applications. There are a total of 71 items tested on the English-
Language Arts CST for grades 2 and 3, 81 items for grades 4 through 10, and 96
items for grades 11.
The CST is a way of determining whether schools and districts are achieving
academically. The Academic Performance Index (API) rating is derived from the
scores collected from California’s STAR program. A number between 200 and 1000
represents the API score of each school. California’s goal for every school is to have
an API score of 800—at a minimum. If a school does not meet the minimum API
score of 800, the state will create a point goal that must be achieved each year until
the minimum score of 800 is achieved (EdSource, 2005).
The CST scores also have a Federal component that examines whether or not
a school and district is achieving academically. The No Child Left Behind Act of
2001 (NCLB) targets subgroups of students making sure that each one is meeting the
proficiency target that is set annually by the federal government in the areas of
English and Mathematics, called the Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP). In order for
a subgroup to be considered, 95% of the students in each subgroup must be present
55
during the administering of the test. Consequently if a school fails to meet their
AYP for two consecutive years the school will face consequences. Those
consequences may include change in the administration and teaching staff, providing
tutoring services, to the extreme measure of closing the school; all of these
consequences fall under the umbrella of Program Improvement (EdSource, 2005).
Therefore, the CST scores play a principal part in determining how a school is rated,
ranked, and perceived by the community.

Qualitative instruments
An informal interview process was utilized with teachers who had been
teaching at Carolina Herrera Elementary School during the 2006-2007 and 2007-
2008 school years. These interviews would not take place at any particular time, but
were conducted when grade level teams would meet. These interviews most often
took place with individuals but on a few occasions resulted in-group discussions in
the staff room. The questions were both open-ended as well as short
answer/response. Some examples of the questions asked, but not limited to, were as
follows:
1. How many school day minutes do you spend conducting AR?
2. Do you utilize the Houghton-Mifflin series to teach reading skills?
3. Is the ELA (Houghton-Mifflin) pacing guide realistic for those students in
your classroom?
4. Are your students reaching their reading goals set for AR?
56
5. How can the reading coach how support the implementation of Houghton
Mifflin?
6. Do you have any concerns with AR being used as an intervention
program?
57
Chapter 4: Findings

Introduction
The results for the summative evaluation portion included a pre-post
independent groups design and a nonequivalent benchmark group design using a
high performing school that has similar demographics. The nonequivalent group
design was used to compare the post-test results of English Language Learners in
Grade 2 through 6 at Carolina Herrera Elementary School (experimental group) and
Elijah Flores Elementary School (benchmark group). When beginning to embark on
the process of analyzing test data it was necessary to utilize the proficiency bands
that were used by the California State Standards Test Scores (CST) of “far below
basic, below basic, basic, proficient, and advanced.” These scores were then
converted to a numerical scale ranging from “0” through “4” which correlate with
the CST proficiency band scores. When creating the conversion table, “far below
basic” was represented with a numerical value of “0,” ‘below basic” is represented
by the numerical value of “1,” “basic” was represented by a numerical value of “2,”
“proficient” is represented by a numerical value of “3,” and advanced is by a
numerical value of “4.” Tables 2 through 10 reflect the analysis of Carolina Herrera
Elementary School, the experimental school in this study.

58
Effects on English-Language Arts CST Performance 2007 vs. 2008
Table 2 shows the mean performance changes for those students who tested
on the English-Language Arts CST. Second through fifth grades are listed with a
pre-intervention mean change in 2007 and a post-intervention in 2008 at Carolina
Herrera Elementary School. The last column explains the amount of change that
occurred from the pre-intervention mean (2007) to post-intervention (2008).

Table 2: Mean Statistics by Grade Level

Grade level Pre 2007 Post 2008 Difference
Second 1.72
(n=138)
1.98
(n=128)
+0.26
Third 1.53
(n=144)
1.61
(n=135)
+0.08
Fourth 2.18
(n=144)
1.96
(n=135)
-0.22
Fifth 1.92
(n=139)
1.90
(n=140)
-0.02
Total 1.83
(n=568)
1.85
(n=537)
+0.02

Table 2 reflects the positive means changes by both the second and third
grade levels at Carolina Herrera Elementary School. Overall, second grade
demonstrated the greatest growth change with +.26. Third grade was the next largest
at +0.08 over the one year period; while the fourth and fifth grade levels saw a
negative change. Fourth grade had the largest negative change at -0.22, and fifth
grade with a negative change of -0.02. Given the modest changes, both the positive
59
and negative changes in all grade levels, the intervention does not appear to be
making a considerable difference in the academic progress of Carolina Herrera
Elementary School. Second grade shows moderate change with a +0.26; however
the fourth grade level showed a negative change of -0.22, which is again marginal in
determining the effectiveness of the intervention. While the remaining grade levels
whether positive or negative, the results at best are deemed marginal in determining
the overall effectiveness of the intervention. In corroboration, the total mean
difference of all grade level combined resulted in a +0.02, which may be considered
small in scale when utilizing Accelerated Reader (AR) as a vessel for academic
progress.
Effect size estimates for the mean changes by grade level on the English-
Language Arts are displayed in Table 3. In order to derive the effect size it is
necessary to divide the difference from the pre-intervention (2007) to post-
intervention (2008) by the observed standard deviation of the pre-intervention (2007)
English-Language Arts CST categorization.

Table 3: Effect Size Estimates

2
nd
Grade 3
rd
Grade 4
th
Grade 5
th
Grade
Gain +0.26 +0.08 -0.22 -0.02
2007 SD 1.18 1.53 1.08 1.02
Effect Size -0.11 -0.04 0.11 0.01
***The effect size estimate was -0.009 for the total sample
60
Table 3 shows the effect size for every grade level at Carolina Herrera
Elementary School being small (less than +. 20). It should be noted that these effect
sizes might be attributed to sampling error.

Effects on English-language Arts CST Performance Rates: 2007 vs. 2008
The proficiency bands for the English-Language Arts CST are represented in
Table 4. Both pre-intervention (2007) and post-intervention (2008) performance
percentages are included. The percentage of change from pre-intervention to post-
intervention is also included. The last column of Table 4 reflects the number of
students who were tested at each grade level at Carolina Herrera Elementary School,
including the change in the number of students from pre-intervention (2007) to post-
intervention (2008) by grade level.
The first two rows of Table 4 show second grade proficiency band scores.
Second grade reduced in the ‘far below basic” proficiency band with a -5.4%,
“below basic” proficiency band score with a -1.7% and “basic” with a proficiency
band score of -2.2%. There was an overall change in proficiency band score
percentages in the proficient categories of “proficient” and “advanced” with +5.85%
and +3.5%, respectively.
61
Table 4: Performance Categories by Grade Level

Grade FBB BB B P A N
2
nd
2007 21.0% 18.8% 31.8% 23.1% 5.0% 138
2
nd
2008 15.6% 17.1% 29.6% 28.9% 8.5% 128
Pre-Post -5.4% -1.7% -2.2% +5.85 +3.5% -10 students
3rd 2007 22.2% 22.9% 43.0% 15.2% 1.3% 144
3rd 2008 19.2% 25.9% 32.5% 19.25 2.9% 135
Pre-Post -3.0% +3.0% -10.5% +4.05% +1.6% -9 students
4
th
2007 9.7% 11.1% 40.9% 27.0% 3.4% 144
4
th
2008 9.0% 17.5% 34.4% 21.4% 5.1% 154
Pre-Post -.7% +6.4% -6.5% -5.6% +1.7% -10 students
5th 2007 10.7% 18.7% 43.1% 22.3% 5.7% 139
5th 2008 14.2% 17.1% 37.8% 25% 5.7% 140
Pre-Post +3.5% -1.09% -5.3% +2.7% 0.0% +1 students
Total 2007 15.8% 17.6% 39.6% 21.8% 3.8% 568
Total 2008 14.8% 20.4% 35.0% 25.5% 5.7% 537
Pre-Post -1.0% +2.85 -4.6% +3.7% +6.6% -31 students

There was no consistency with third grade moving towards the “proficient”
and “advanced” proficiency bands. However, it is significant to note that the third
grade reduced the “far below basic” and “basic” proficiency band scores post-
intervention (2008) by -3.0% and -10.5%. Additionally, there was a +4.05%
increase in the “proficient” proficiency band scores post-intervention (2008).
Table 4 illustrates that fourth grade at Carolina Herrera Elementary School did
not move students positively to the proficient performance band categories of
“proficient” and “advanced”. Overall, fourth grade growth at best was marginal. It
62
should be noted that there was a slight increase in the advanced proficiency band
with +1.7%.
Fifth grade demonstrated decreased changes in “below basic” and “basic
proficiency band categories while there was an increase in the “far below basic” by
+3.5%. The “advanced” performance proficiency band category remained
unchanged with a 0.0% change in post-intervention (2008).
Overall, the proficiency band categories reflect that the students at Carolina
Herrera Elementary School are making changes in a positive direction towards the
“proficient” and “advanced” proficiency band categories. The last row in Table 4
indicates that the total student population decreased in proficiency band category
percentages for the “far below basic” and “basic” proficiency band categories with -
1.05 and 4.6% respectively. Additionally, the student population increased changes
in the performance categories of “below basic”, “proficient” and “advanced” with
percentages of +2.85%, +3.7%, and 6.6%. The basic conclusion that can be derived
from Table 4 is that Carolina Herrera Elementary School is making great strides in
moving their total student population into the “proficient” and “advanced”
proficiency bands. The school reduced the “far below basic” and “basic” proficiency
band scores while increasing their “proficient” and “advanced” groups of students.
Therefore, by moving these students towards these proficiency levels, it will meet
the requirements set by No Child Left Behind (NCLB).
63
Table 5: Proficiency Rates (Proficient and Advanced Levels) by Grade Level Under
NCLB

2
nd
Grade 3
rd
Grade 4
th
Grade 5
th
Grade
Proficiency Rates 2007 29% 14% 37% 27%
Proficiency Rates 2008 36% 22% 30% 31%
+7% +8% -7% +4%

The data being interpreted reflects both positive and negative proficiency
band changes that occurred at Carolina Herrera Elementary School based on the use
of AR as an intervention did not significantly raise the number of students who
moved to the proficient and advanced proficiency bands. Although the growth was
not statistically significant, it can be noted that there is practical significance for
second and third grade level because there was an increase in the proficiency rate
levels at Carolina Herrera Elementary School.

Pre-Post Independent Group Design
This design was selected to analyze change at Carolina Herrera Elementary
School (experimental group) from 2007-2008 (pre-intervention 2007 thru 2008 post-
intervention). The statistics that were used for the CST ELA proficiency band scores
are listed as: (a) an independent group t-test to determine the statistical significance
of the change (criterion for statistical significance = p<. 15), (b) Cohen’s d to
determine practical significance (criterion for practical significance = d > .20), (c)
raw change from 2007 to 2008 to determine practical significance = 10% growth),
64
and (d) percentage change to assess practical significance (criterion for practical
significance = 10% improvement).

Statistical: Nonequivalent Comparison Group Design
This design is comprised of an experimental group and one comparison group
that were not randomly assigned. Instead, the comparison group was chosen because
of it similarities in: 1) grade levels with the school, 2), percentage of students in
school that participate in free and reduced lunch program, and 3) percentage of
students categorized as English Language Learners. The comparison and
experimental groups were evaluated on the post-test CST ELA data. The
experimental group was the only one to receive the treatment. The treatment was the
utilization of the AR standards-based program as the core curriculum for grades
second through fifth. The experimental versus comparison group is a statistical
analysis that is descriptive rather than a conclusion drawn from evidence of
reasoning and focused on State and Federal accountability.

Statistical: Pre-Post Independent Group Results
Table 6 depicts the pre-post statistical test findings (p< .15) for the
experimental school (Grades 2 through 5) broken down by grade level and the
school’s English Language Learners (ELL).
65
Table 6: Pre- vs. Post- Intervention CST ELA Performance Band Differences:
Statistical Findings

Grouping Pre N
2007
Post N
2008
Pre M
2007
Post M
2008
Difference t-ratio Observed
Probability
School 568 537 1.83 1.85 +0.02 +.30 .764
Grade 2 138 128 1.72 1.98 +0.26* +1.78 .076
Grade 3 144 135 1.52 1.61 +0.08 +.64 .525
Grade 4 144 135 2.18 1.96 -0.23* 1.76 .079
Grade 5 139 140 1.92 1.90 -0.02 .164 .870
ELL 84 148 1.49 1.64 +0.15 +1.01 .312
***= p <.150

The results found in Table 6 row one indicate that the experimental school
did not have a significant increase in performance bands from 2007 to 2008, t
(670.54) = .051, p > .150. Two subgroups were determined to have statistically
significant results (p <.150). The students in the 2
nd
grade, made an observable gain
of 0.26 from 2007 to 2008, t (264) = 1.78, p<.15, but in contrast the students in the
fourth grade lost .23 points.
Sample size is highly dependent on statistical significance and very large
differences, and on a practical level can be statistically insignificant. Practical
significance of each difference was measured in three ways: effect size (Cohen’s d),
percentage change, and raw change. The raw change is defined as the change in the
post-test score minus the pre-test score. The ratio of the change from 2007 to 2008
was how the effect size was calculated. Percentage changes were evaluated by using
66
the ratio of the change from 2007 to 2008 to the pre-test mean. Results are shown in
Table 7.
Table 7 points out that the pretest means are almost between 1 and 2. In
2008, the vast majority of the students who were assessed using the English-
Language Arts CST were performing within, between or below the Basic Level. In
Grades 2 through 5 of the experimental school, 15.8% of the students were
performing at Far Below Basic, 17.6% were at Below Basic, 39.6% at the Basic,
21.8% at the Proficient level, and 3.8% of the students were at the Advanced levels
on English language Arts pre-intervention.

Table 7: Pre-versus Post Interventions CST ELA Performance Band differences:
Practical Significance

Grouping Pre M Pre SD Pre-Post Change Effect Size Percent change
School 1.83 1.10 +0.0202 -0.01 1.1%
Grade 2 1.72 1.18 +0.2598* -0.11 15.1%
Grade 3 1.52 0.99 +0.0796 -0.04 5.2%
Grade 4 2.18 1.08 -0.2250* 0.10 10.3%
Grade 5 1.92 1.02 -0.0209 0.01 1.0%
ELL 1.48 1.08 +0.1470 -0.07 9.9%
*** = effect size > .20 and % change > .10

Effect Size. Pre-Post change is the best indication of effect size .25 is one-
quarter of the proficiency band. These two groups exceed the pre-study standard of
67
.20, specifically, 2
nd
grade students (+0.2598), 4
th
grade students (-0.2250). The
effect side of both the 2
nd
and 4
th
grade students was marginal.
Percentage Change. Practical significance can be assessed by examining the
percentage change in the performance band scores from pre-test (2007) to post-test
(2008). The predetermined standard for practical significance was 10%. The last
column in Table 4 reveals that there was a 10% increase for two subgroups: 2
nd

Grade and 4
th
grade. However, for the increase among the 2
nd
grade students (25%)
and 4
th
grade students (22%) it needs to be noted that the pre-post test scores
impacted the results.

Benchmark School
The study was designed to utilize a benchmark school, Elijah Flores
Elementary School. This school was selected because they are similar in the
following areas: 1) grade levels with the school, 2) percentage of students in school
that participate in free and reduced lunch program, and 3) percentage of students
categorized as English Language Learners.
This study was designed to integrate the use of a benchmark school, Elijah
Flores Elementary School for benchmarking purposes. This school was selected
because it had a large ELL population with 60 percent of the students being
classified as English Language Learners. The experimental school and Elijah Flores
Elementary School shared closely the number of students who received free/reduced
lunch. They also did not participate in the pre-intervention (2007) Accelerated
68
Reader. English Learners as a cohort group were comparable in percentages
(benchmark school = 60% English Language Learners; experimental school = 50%
English Language Learners in grades 2 through fifth). While 32.9 % of the English
Language Learners in Grades 2 through 6 in the benchmark school met grade level
proficiency on the 2007 CST-ELA whereas only 21.6% of English Language
Learners in the experimental school achieved grade-level proficiency on the same
assessment, failing to meet the state targets of 24.4% by 2.8%.
Table 8 illustrates the comparison between the experimental and benchmark
school for the state accountability of API 2007 and 2008 school years. Table 9
describes the subgroup API for both the experimental and benchmark school for the
Hispanic or Latino, Socioeconomically Disadvantaged, and English Language
Learners. The range of API scores are from the low 200 to a high of 1,000. Every
school is expected to attain an API score of 800 by 2014.
A significant gain in API is illustrated for the Hispanic or Latino subgroup of
the experimental school (36 API points) over the benchmark school of (16 API
points). Both Table 8 and 9 explain that while the experimental and the benchmark
schools made API gains between 2007 and 2008, the experimental school
outperformed the benchmark school in the Hispanic or Latino, Socioeconomically
Disadvantaged, and English Language Learners subgroups.
Table 10 supplies information for both the experimental and benchmark
school concerning their Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP)--- a federal accountability
69
measure which was initiated under the accountability system under No Child Left
Behind.

Table 8: API School Wide Comparison, 2007 and 2008

School API 2007 API 2008 Gain
Experimental School 696 703 7
Benchmark School 763 788 25

Table 9: API Subgroups Growth Comparison, 2007 and 2008

Subgroup Carolina Herrera
Experimental School
MLK
Benchmark School
2007 2008 Gain 2007 2008 Gain
Hispanic or Latino 695 703 +8 762 786 +24
Socioeconomically Disadvantaged 697 702 +5 752 788 +36
English Language Learners 671 681 +10 742 777 +35

Table 10: AYP English-Language Arts for the Experimental and Comparison
Schools, 2008

Groups Experimental Percent
at or above Proficient
Comparison Percent
at or above Proficient
School Wide 30.6% 46.4%
Hispanic or Latino 30.9% 45.85
Socioeconomically
Disadvantaged
29.8% 46.4%
English Language
Learners
26.8% 41.2%
70
The focus of AYP is to determine the academic achievement of students from
significant subgroups within a school. Success is determined or measured by
increasing the percentage of students that score “proficient” or “advanced” on the
California Standards Test in English Language-Arts and Mathematics. Schools are
also responsible for testing at minimum 95% of their students within each subgroup
with consequences for those schools that fail to meet this requirement. Schools and
school districts that fail to meet AYP for two consecutive years fall into a process
known as Program Improvement.
In 2008 the AYP target for proficiency is 35.2% in English –Language Arts.
Table 10 shows the benchmark school surpassed the AYP target of 35.2%, while the
experimental group failed to meet the target. The Socioeconomically Disadvantaged
at the comparison group achieved the highest rate at 46.4%, whereas the
experimental group had a 30.9% growth for the Hispanic or Latino subgroup. The
benchmark school met its AYP indicating that they are making gains to close the
achievement gap. The experimental school did not make the AYP target for any of
the four subgroups shown in Table 10.
71
Chapter 5: Summary Discussion and Recommendations

Overview
The earlier chapters in this study have provided the underlying purpose and
results for the evaluation of a standards based intervention, Accelerated Reader (AR)
and its impact at Carolina Herrera Elementary School. This chapter concludes this
study by expanding on the relationship of the quantitative findings, interconnecting
conclusions drawn from the qualitative data, and providing recommendations for the
site studied as well as recommendations for further study.
The purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact (positive, negative, or
neutral) of AR, a standard based intervention, on the academic achievement of
English Language Learners meeting grade level proficiency at Carolina Herrera
Elementary School. Particularly, the percentage of change in proficiency bands of
the California Standards Test (CST) from pre-intervention (2007) to post-
intervention (2008) were analyzed by grade level for all students in attendance in the
experimental school, Carolina Herrera Elementary School.
The 826 students who attend Carolina Herrera Elementary School, a four-
track year-round Kindergarten through fifth grade school, were the participants in
this study. Approximately, 380 students are enrolled and identified as English
Language Learners (ELL). These same students also participated in AR, a school-
wide intervention program.
72
The support staff of Carolina Herrera Elementary School was included as an
additional group of participants. There were 42 certificated teachers and two site
administrators that participated in the study. The certificated staff members that
were interviewed agreed to share how AR was being implemented in their individual
classrooms and their perceptions on how the program impacted the overall academic
achievement at Carolina Herrera Elementary School. Every certificated staff member
did not participate in the interview process. The purpose of including these
interviews was to gather information regarding the implementation and effect on
achievement. When the data that were being collected became redundant and
similar, the qualitative portion of the study ceased to continue. In total, 19 informal
interviews were conducted Carolina Herrera Elementary School. The prior chapter
contained the quantitative data regarding the experimental school, Carolina Herrera
Elementary School.

Summary of Findings— Carolina Herrera Elementary School
The subsequent section provides evidence in answering the research question
that directed this study: Does Accelerated Reader, a standards based English-
Language Arts Intervention have an effect on English Language Learners meeting
grade level proficiency as measured by the California Standards Test scores. The
overall AR results depended upon the grade level and yielded mixed results in the
academic achievement for the students of Carolina Herrera Elementary School. Also
73
there was an increase in the Academic Performance Index (API) scores of the school
from 687 points, pre-intervention (2007), to 703 points, post-intervention (2008).
Based upon second grade findings, the second grade had +0.26 proficiency
band mean change. This is a consistent positive change in moving second graders
towards the proficiency bands of “proficient” and “advanced.”
A mean change of +0.08 was shown in the third grade. Although the change
is smaller, the third grade reduced the “far below basic” and “basic” proficient band
scores post-intervention (2008) by -3.0% and -10.5%, respectively, thus, there was
movement that indicated that third graders are moving towards the “proficient” and
“advanced” proficiency bands.
Findings for the fourth grade were not in the expected direction. There was
an overall mean change of -0.22 in the proficiency band score. Fourth graders
experienced a change in the “proficient” performance band level by -5.6%. It is
significant to note an increase in the “advanced’ proficiency band, although only a
+1.7% increase.
At the fifth grade level, the mean change reflects a -0.02 change in
proficiency band scores. There was an increase in the “far below basic” by +3.5%,
and the “advanced” proficiency band saw no growth and remained unchanged at
0.0% post-intervention (2008).
Carolina Herrera Elementary School saw an overall increase in the number of
students who moved into the “proficient” and “advanced” proficiency band levels
with +3.7 and +6.6% respectively. They also saw a decrease in the number of
74
students who fell into the “far below basic” proficiency band (-1.0%). The overall
growth that was made by Carolina Herrera Elementary School is reflected in the last
row of Table 4 in chapter 4. Table 4 is a display of the overall achievements of
Carolina Herrera Elementary School in moving students into the “proficient” and
“advanced” proficiency band scores. Table 4 also reveals how Carolina Herrera
Elementary School needs to continue to work in moving students from “below basic”
area into the higher proficiency band levels. The overarching goal at Carolina
Herrera Elementary School is to move all students to the “proficient” and
“advanced” proficiency band levels as required by No Child Left Behind (NCLB)
standards.
In addition to the quantitative findings, it is also of great significance to note
the qualitative findings. Out of the nineteen (19) informal interviews, teachers who
were interviewed agreed on the importance of AR’s implementation and use. The
AR intervention was used with great consistency and uniformity and this sentiment
was echoed in every interview.
The intended use for the Accelerated Reader (AR) intervention was to
improve reading by providing immediate feedback, motivation, and a way to monitor
the reading habits and growth of individual students. According to the informal
interviews teachers were instructed to provide a scheduled time for daily reading
practice using the intervention AR as the tool. The times would vary from 30-90
minutes depending upon the grade level.
75
Once a student had completed reading his/her AR book and was ready to test,
he/she was able to take a computer-based comprehension quiz that contain 5, 10, or
20 questions depending upon the number of pages that the book contains. Each
classroom was equipped with a minimum of four (4) computers in primary grades
(K-3) and four (4) to five (5) computers in intermediate grades (4-5) that could be
used to complete AR quizzes. Many teachers stated in their interviews that they like
the program because the students were able to get immediate feedback and monitor
their own progress. According to the interviews, many classrooms had systems set
up to reward students for reaching individual student goals.
The AR reading practice time supposed was not intended to impede on the
fidelity of the core curriculum Houghton-Mifflin and its explicit direct instructional
lessons. Many of the teachers stated in their interviews that they believed that they
had compromised the fidelity of the core curriculum Houghton-Mifflin to maintain
the goals and expectations that had been set by AR and the administration. In their
view, it was the AR goals that needed to be maintained. Teachers stated in their
interviews that they often found themselves relinquishing the need for direct
instruction and the use of the core curriculum to allow students to read their AR
books to maintain individual reading goals and classroom goals. This often meant,
according to those surveyed, that they were not teaching students the skills necessary
to read--- which is a skill often embedded in the core curriculum.
When teachers were questioned during the interview to voice any concerns or
weaknesses with using AR as the core curriculum, many of the faculty members
76
stated they wished it were treated as an intervention as it was originally intended.
They also stated that they hoped the emphasis at Carolina Herrera Elementary
School would move back to direct instruction so that specific skills could be
targeted. Many teachers also alleged during their informal interviews that students
often selected books that were fiction. Many of the skills and questions that are
tested in the state come from the non-fiction genre. Teachers believe not enough
emphasis is placed on having a wide range of experiences in reading both fiction and
non-fiction texts.
Staff members concurred that AR helped to motivate students to read and
develop reading comprehension in conjunction with the ELL coach, the onsite expert
who provides in-services with the implementation of research-based strategies that it
is hoped will move students up into the desired “proficient” and “advanced”
proficiency bands. Direct instruction explicit systematic instruction based on
scripted lessons also strengthens the implementation of the AR program as an
intervention.

Comparison School Results
Information on the relationships and effects on the experimental school,
Carolina Herrera Elementary School, at three levels are provided: (a) A school-wide
comparison for the Academic Performance Index, (b) the subgroups comparison for
the Academic Performance Index, and (c) the comparison of four categories (school-
wide, Hispanic or Latino, socio-economically disadvantaged, and English learners)
77
for the Adequate Yearly Progress for the experimental and the comparison schools, a
requirement of NCLB.
Table 9 displayed the data for the numerically significant subgroups for the
experimental and the comparison schools, all the subgroups (Hispanic or Latino,
Socioeconomically Disadvantaged, and English Language Learners) in both schools
made gains in the API between 2007 and 2008. The Socioeconomically
Disadvantaged subgroup outperformed the Hispanic or Latino and English Language
Learners at the experimental school, Carolina Herrera Elementary School. The
Hispanic or Latino and English Language Learners outperformed the
Socioeconomically Disadvantaged subgroup at the comparison school Elijah Flores
Elementary School. When contrasting the overall gains in API for the subgroups, the
comparison school made higher gains than the experimental group in the subgroup
categories studied, specifically, school-wide, Socioeconomically Disadvantaged, and
the Hispanic or Latino, and English Language Learners subgroups. Overall, the
benchmark group outperformed the experimental group suggesting Carolina Herrera
Elementary School needs further improvement.
Annual Yearly Progress (AYP), the results for federal accountability measure
under NCLB, were displayed in Table 10. The table displayed the number of
students “at” or “above proficient” for both the experimental and the comparison
schools. In 2008, the percent of students that need to be “at or above proficient”
was 35.2% according to the requirements of NCLB. The benchmark school, Elijah
Flores Elementary School far exceeded the target goal for all the subgroup categories
78
while the experimental school, Carolina Herrera Elementary School failed to perform
as well as Martin King Elementary School indicating that there is room for
improvement and growth for Carolina Herrera Elementary School.

Implications for Carolina Herrera Elementary School
At Carolina Herrera Elementary School, Accelerated Reader, a standards
based intervention, demonstrated mixed effects for the students. A collaborative
effort by both teachers and administrators worked together for the benefit of the
students to close the achievement gap, specifically for the ELL students. At Carolina
Herrera Elementary School it is evidenced that although AR is the intervention, it is
necessary to include other research-based strategies to improve on the academic
achievement of all students, but specifically, English Language Learners. A
discussion of the three of these research based strategies follows.
ELL Coach
Teachers believe that the ELL coach, an on site expert encouraged growth by
planning in-class demonstrations that meet the individual needs and expertise of each
teacher. The National College for School Leadership (2005) stated “through
increasing self-awareness of others and support” will help move student in to the
proficient and advanced bands. Many teachers expressed that the content of the in-
services strengthened their instructional program. This in turn helped them to move
away from the focus being AR and delivering instruction with a deliberate purpose
and goal of moving students into the “proficient” and “advanced’ proficiency bands.
79
Teachers welcomed the instructional feedback as they believed it was specific to
their individual or group needs. This helped to dispel the opposition that inservices
are not relevant or purposeful to the students that are found within an individual
classroom teacher’s classroom. Therefore, the teacher who needed a more
rudimentary approach could receive the opportunity to receive the necessary skills;
while the more seasoned teachers could either hone their skills or receive validation
for the current strategies being practiced in their classrooms. Most of the teachers
felt that they benefited from working with the ELL coach because she differentiated
her approach in working with each teacher by always keeping in the forefront the
competencies of the specific teacher.
CLOZE
The faculty at Carolina Herrera Elementary School believes in developing
reading comprehension, therefore, the cloze procedure was a part of the success of
the students at Carolina Herrera Elementary School. This was a technique that
omitted words of importance to be filled in by students so that they are able to
determine the appropriateness and usefulness of the inserted word or words. This
strategy allows students to pattern their language in a meaningful and purposeful
way encouraging higher-level thinking and enhancing overall language acquisition
(Mafi, 2006). The goal is to focus on providing corrective feedback of a strategy by
removing the focus on the individual who used the strategy (Clark &Estes, 2002).
Teachers stated that they felt that this strategy was able to check and develop reading
comprehension and that AR could support this strategy.
80

Direct Instruction
The staff members at Carolina Herrera Elementary School stated that
students were not receiving enough direct instruction. Direct instruction is both
explicit and systematic in its approach to learning. The goal is to increase on-task
behavior, receive instruction that is individualized, and providing positive feedback
when a correct answer is provided, and finally overall academic growth. It is this
“intended curriculum” which is outlined by the state, district and school that is being
taught both explicitly and systematically. Teachers stated that students were easier to
assist when they had incorporated flexible groupings into their learning environment.
Therefore, it is important to keep in mind the guideline created by Marzano (2003) to
have clear expectations of what information is to be learned while also considering
that enough time is set aside to accomplish this goal. Although teachers still saw a
slight change in student performance they understood that by adopting this approach
the change would occur over a period of time and not occur over night.

Site Recommendations for AR Implementation
According to Lachat (2004) learning to develop ELL academic proficiency in
the English Language Arts is more complex and challenging. Lachat states that there
are underlying differences between an ELL and his/her peers because he/she is
expected to learn a greater amount of information that often times exceeds academic
standards. Therefore, the current administration should continue to support the use
81
of the AR program as a research-based intervention and support the premise that a
teacher plays the largest part in increasing student achievement. The teacher and the
planning that occurs within the classroom needs to be both deliberate and planned in
advance to benefit the academic growth of all students, but particularly for the ELL
(Mafi, 2006).
Based upon this limited study, and taking into consideration the purpose and
results, the following recommendations are being made for the experimental school,
Carolina Herrera Elementary School. Accelerated Reader should continue to be used
as a research-based intervention to be used in conjunction with the direct instruction
for the core Language Arts curriculum, Houghton-Mifflin. It is recommended that a
structured approach be taken initially where students can develop their fluency by
participating in classroom read alouds and to develop prosody as well. It is
suggested that students participate in flexible ability groupings that are
predetermined by the teacher; these groupings will foster mastery of content material
and help the ELL work towards grade level proficiency. The approach can either be
a stand-alone intervention or part of a school reform. However, it needs to be noted
that the implementation of this reform it needs to be monitored carefully and teachers
need to be given immediate support and constructive feedback to guide their growth.
The students of Carolina Herrera Elementary School should continue to
receive a portion of the day devoted to independently reading AR books and taking
quizzes. The focus should be for students to receive a high quiz percent with a high
amount of points earned. According to Renaissance Inc., the makers of Accelerated
82
Reader, these two factors are accurate predictors of reading achievement in the
Accelerated Reader Program. AR assists in moving students up in their reading
abilities as evidenced by the gains associated with percent correct and points earned.
As a supplement to the instructional program AR can help the students of Carolina
Herrera Elementary School close the achievement gap and move towards grade level
proficiency.
The final site-based recommendation is in regards to the amount of money
that it costs to maintain and support the effectiveness of this research-based
intervention program. In a time of budgetary cuts the question begs to be raised is it
worth the investment? Throughout the interviews that were conducted teachers
referred to how much money is spent on paper and other motivational resources for
students. Additionally, the amount of time it takes for the librarian to maintain
circulation impeded the amount of books that are on the library shelves. Initially the
proper amounts of resources had not been allocated for the implementation of this
intervention. It appeared that purchasing the intervention program was the main goal,
not looking beyond its site-based implementation leaving it to each individual site to
manage. If monies were allocated to each site to assist in the complete
implementation schools could better utilize the intervention moving students along
the proficiency bands. Therefore, more resources should be allocated to the human
responsibilities of maintaining the program including librarians and computer
maintenance. The overall consensus by staff is that often AR was not functioning
83
properly because of a myriad of reasons and this was very frustrating for both
teachers and students.

Recommendations For Further Study
The present study focused on the effectiveness of the English Language
learners meeting Grade level proficiency utilizing the research-based intervention
Accelerated Reader. However, there are problematic issues in measuring the
academic achievement of ELL students using a standards based assessment that was
created to test those who are proficient in the language. The current measure for
assessing language facility of an ELL student is the California English Language
Development Test (CELDT). This test is administered annually, and assesses the
progress of these students in four areas of listening, speaking, reading, and writing.
However, the CELDT does not test students on grade level content material, instead
it focuses on their English language development. Further, research on the effects of
AR on CELDT scores might provide additional information on the efficiency of AR.
Further research is necessary to determine if the best way to determine grade
level proficiency for the ELL student population under No Child Left Behind
(NCLB) is by utilizing the proficiency bands of “proficient” and “advanced.” It has
been postulated that the proficiency band of “basic” should be considered grade level
proficiency.
Finally, Dufour and Bennette (2002) state that teachers need to understand
that deliberate and planned lessons can directly impact student achievement.
84
Therefore, substituting the core curriculum of Houghton-Mifflin for more AR time
and testing was compounding inherent problems regarding the acquisition of content
knowledge.

Limitations
There were limitations to this study; therefore, caution needs to be exercised
when generalizing the results. The use of a pre-post nonequivalent control group
design has an inherent internal validity limitation. A limitation of the pre/post
design is that all of the experiences that each student encountered could not be
controlled during the treatment year. Although some results yielded a positive gain,
there are many outside factors that could have contributed to or influenced the
outcome of the effects. These results may have been influenced by the skill and
ability of the teachers at the experimental or benchmark school during the treatment
years (2007-2008) affecting the outcomes. Also, since I am a teacher and leader at
the school site there becomes the issue of researcher biases that may effect my
interpretation of the overall outcomes of this study. Sampling variability is another
factor that should be taken under consideration. For example, the third grade class in
the pre-intervention (2007) school year is subsequently the fourth grade class during
the post-intervention (2008) school year. The overall interpretation can be altered
by a change in the sample population by the departure of higher performing students
and the addition of lower performing students. Finally, internal validity was
threatened by testing. Testing could be impacted because English Language
85
Learners could hone their test taking and English skills over the course of an
academic year and ultimately affect the study results.
A threat to external validity comes in the form of the implementation of the
intervention. There was no procedure or means of holding teachers accountable for
the implementation of the intervention to produce the desired results. Utilizing the
ELL coach, the on site expert, to help move targeted students who are at the cusp of
moving proficiency bands allows school sites to get “more bang for the buck.” This
strategy is known as the bubble effect and can serve to harm the lowest performing
students. A final limitation is that the expected achievement gains that students
experienced were not estimated in this study because the data were not organized
longitudinally.

Conclusion
The purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact (positive, negative, or
neutral) of Accelerated Readers (AR), a standard based intervention, on the academic
achievement of English Language Learners at Carolina Herrera Elementary School.
The school, Carolina Herrera Elementary School, was analyzed using these specific
lenses: (1) curriculum and instruction, (2) research-based strategies, (3) expectations
for student learning, and (4) data-driven decision-making.
The summative evaluation portion included a pre-post independent groups
designs and a nonequivalent benchmark group design using a high performing school
that has similar demographics. The pre-post design was used to access improvement
86
at the experimental school from the 2007 to the 2008 school years. The
nonequivalent group design was used to compare the post-test results of English
Language Learners in Grade 2 through 5 at Carolina Herrera Elementary School
(experimental group) and Elijah Flores Elementary School (benchmark group).
California State Standards Test Scores (CST) of “far below basic, below
basic, basic, proficient, and advanced” were converted to a numerical scale ranging
from “0” through “4” to correspond to the CST proficiency band scores.
Achievement at Elijah Flores Elementary School was also benchmarked. The school
was chosen as a benchmark school because it has a large Spanish speaking ELL
population yet has historically overperformed similar schools.
The information and the data utilized for this study was based heavily on
quantitative data (CSTs), but also included some qualitative data. The experimental
group included all students enrolled in grades 2-5 who were identified as ELL in an
urban elementary school. The 2007-2008 academic year was selected as the baseline
because it was the final year that AR was used as the core curriculum of the school
before a change in administration.
Quantitative findings indicated a statistically significant positive change from
2007 to 2008 in the 2
nd
grade and a significantly negative change in the 4
th
grade.
Overall, the change from 2007 to 2008 was both statistically and practically non-
significant. Teacher interviews suggested that while there were many positive
aspects to AR, it did detract from the amount of time spent on the core curriculum.
87
This study’s results suggest that the impact of Accelerated Reader standards
on ELL learner achievement is minimal, possibly because it did not allow sufficient
time for the core curriculum, Houghton-Mifflin. Further, the qualitative teacher
interview findings suggested that the intervention interfered with the core
curriculum, Houghton-Mifflin. While AR does lends itself to being a useful resource
to assist students into moving into the “proficient” and “advanced” proficiency
bands, steps need to be taken to make sure that sufficient time is devoted to direct
instruction in a core curriculum.
88

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Abstract (if available)

Abstract The purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact (positive, negative, or neutral) of Accelerated Readers (AR), a standard based intervention, on the academic achievement of English Language Learners at Carolina Herrera Elementary School. Carolina Herrera Elementary School, was analyzed using these specific lenses: (1) curriculum and instruction, (2) research-based strategies, (3) expectations for student learning, and (4) data-driven decision-making.

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Asset Metadata

Creator Gomez, Frank, II (author)

Core Title English language learners utilizing the accelerated reader program

School Rossier School of Education

Degree Doctor of Education

Degree Program Education

Publication Date 09/28/2009

Defense Date 04/16/2009

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag accelerated reader,CST,English language learners,OAI-PMH Harvest

Place Name California (states)

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Hocevar, Dennis (committee chair), Conklin, Dean (committee member), Gonzalez, Jean (?) (committee member), Reed, Margaret (committee member)

Creator Email fgom702545@yahoo.com,fgomezii@yahoo.com

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-m2607

Unique identifier UC1434809

Identifier etd-II-3212 (filename),usctheses-m40 (legacy collection record id),usctheses-c127-254839 (legacy record id),usctheses-m2607 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-II-3212.pdf

Dmrecord 254839

Document Type Dissertation

Rights Gomez, Frank, II

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Repository Name Libraries, University of Southern California

Repository Location Los Angeles, California

Repository Email cisadmin@lib.usc.edu