1

Ashley Carter
Professor Lisa Lund
Reading Makes Students Better Readers? Get Out! Close Reading with Skitch
MAT 737
12/07/2014

Reading Makes Students Better Readers? Get Out! Close Reading with Skitch
Intervention/Innovation and Background
PCM High school is located in Monroe, Iowa. My students are mostly farm kids,
with a few who live in town and have parents who commute to and from Desmoines for
office jobs. Our office referrals are low, and 92% of our detentions given are due to cell
phones. We have good kids, and a good school. The issue we do have is that some of
these kids have no plans for college. Many of them take over the family business or the
family farm and see high school as an obligatory stepping stone to get there. At our
school, I am the intervention specialist. A student is placed into intervention when they
arent successful in the classroom, but they are not in need of special education services.
Of the students I help, most have reading comprehension issues. I needed to find a way to
work with these students to boost their comprehension skills.
Area of Focus Statement and Research Questions
My Action Research question was Will implementing close reading using Skitch
by Evernote on a daily basis raise reading comprehension scores? This question was a
no-brainer to me. I am obligated to teach reading intervention and find a way to raise
reading scores. Close reading has been proven to be effective. I use MAZE testing once a

week to assess progress. Students were given a MAZE test (which entered them into
intervention). First hour, students spent thirty minutes doing close reads with Skitch.
Skitch is a tool that enables students to highlight, make notes, and write on documents
and pictures without using paper. It is an interactive tool they enjoy using and it helps
ease the pains of close reading. The close reads are appropriately lexiled reading
material. Every Friday, students are given a MAZE test. I tracked progress, and once a
student has three proficient tests in a row, they are exited from intervention. Before I
began implementation, I needed to know a few things. First, is close reading worth the
time? Close reading involves reading text for content and really analyzing what it says. It
is not a quick process and I wasnt going to start doing it with my students unless it
worked. Secondly, Why is close reading so effective?
Literature Review
Elder and Paul tell readers that The reflective reader does not always use all of
them (reading strategies) but chooses from among them given the purpose for reading.
Introducing students to each level and giving them routine practice in applying the
strategies included at each level is recommended. Through consistent practice, students
will eventually develop their abilities to construct ideas into their thinking, to accurately
assess what they are reading, and to think within the viewpoint of authors (even those
with whom they disagree). (2004) Close reading enables students to delve deeper into
their text to find purpose and meaning.
Two editors of the book Close Reading, assert that close reading works because
it isnt a new concept. Close reading is just analyzing literature, paying attention to
important details. It works because it is doing what we have always been taught to do;

read for detail and content. Close reading is just the catchy name that got associated with
a movement aimed towards taking reading back to its roots (Lentricchia & Dubois,
2003). This appeals to me as a teacher, because these editors simplified the reasoning and
pedagogy of close reading and why it is so effective. After hearing credited educators
praise this process, I was ready to try it out in my own classroom.
Data Collection and Analysis
My data collection process is simple. Students take a MAZE reading test (that
assess their fluency and reading comprehension). If they are not proficient, they are
entered into intervention. Once there, they are again assessed to determine what their
specific issue is (fluency, comprehension, paragraph shrinking). Students with
comprehension issues close read using Skitch every day. On Fridays, they are given a
MAZE test and their scores are recorded. After three proficient scores, they are exited
from intervention. The attached pictures are student weekly MAZE test scores. The
following are students who close read every day during intervention.

A.

B.
C.

C.
As shown, the majority of students are improving their scores. There is an occasional dip
(as seen on picture A), but I believe that this could be explained simply as a student
having a bad day. The top score are their fluency scores, and the bottom their
comprehension. Both boxes must be green or proficient three weeks in a row.
To me, this means that my Action Research has been successful. Close reading using the
application called Skitch in the classroom does, in fact, raise reading comprehension
scores. The thing I wasnt expecting was for close reading to also raise student fluency
scores. If one looks at picture there are a few instances where student fluency scores go
up weekly.
Action Plan
Given the success of my study, I plan to keep up my implementation of close
reading using Skitch with my intervention students. I have found several free recourses
for close reads and have even gotten to the point where I can make my own close reading
sheets. The students easily upload these into their Skitch applications and they enjoy the

process of using their laptops rather than writing on a worksheet. My curriculum

instructor and principal have both been pleased with the success of close reading with
Skitch and intervention as a whole.
Final Thoughts and Future Study
I am totally on board with intervention and Skitch for close reading. I am thankful
I learned about Skitch and made the association with close reading. Students (typically)
hate worksheets. While using Skitch is essentially the same concept, the application
masks the worksheet aspect and students enjoy using it. Close reading is a proven reading
strategy that pairs well with one of favorite computer applications. In the future, I plan to
keep using Skitch for close reading (and other activities in my classroom). I am excited to
use Skitch for my future research, finding ways to specifically raise fluency scores as
well as comprehension.

6
Works Cited

Elder, L. & Paul, R. (2004). Critical thinking and the art of close reading part 3. Journal
of Developmental Education, 28(1),
Lentricchia, F., & Dubois, A. (2003). Close reading: The reader. Duke University Press.
Purdue owl: Poetry. (n.d.). Retrieved from
https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/751/01/