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The Effects of an Advanced Grammar Graphic Organizer for Intermediate Level Spanish Students Action Research Project

Phillip Clark Ketcham

Samford University EDUC 429 Dr. Ralls

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I. Action Research Proposal Question The question in this action research project is How are teachers able to enhance the proper usage of grammar of their intermediate level Spanish students? Proper grammar use is one of the most important properties of comprehending a foreign language and teachers should investigate best practices for developing intermediate Spanish students grammar use fluencies. From talking with Spanish teachers at Vestavia Hills High School, upper level Spanish students practice grammar extensively. However, in Spanish II classrooms, students grammar activities are beginning to pick up. Spanish II generally involves many new grammar concepts for students, thus it is vital that the students master these new concepts in order to succeed in Spanish II. Some typical assignments or activities for students are assigned to produce responses to prompts or answer fill-in the blanks. Though these points and strategies are sufficient building blocks, more needs to be done in these areas. Something needs to be done to enable students to better respond grammatically and improve their fluency. In order to increase teachers abilities to develop students growth in this area, we should implement techniques and strategies for improving the grammar use of our Spanish students. During this action research project the researcher hopes to accomplish this task. He/she plans to implement grammar mini-lessons (15-30 minutes in length) that are centered on an efficient graphic organizer for conjugating verbs to assess whether the students in the Spanish II class improve their grammar fluency. Due to the technology advancements and overall cultural changes, students in todays society want to be entertained. Students want short bursts of instruction and interactive participation with the content that keeps them involved and interested in the content. From the first few observatory visits to Ms. Phillips classroom, the researcher

Ketcham 3 became aware that Ms. Phillips 6th period Spanish II class is full of bright, yet easily bored or distracted students. The responsibility to keep the students engaged on the content falls on Ms. Phillips and the researcher. The class is composed of roughly of 17 students. The vast majority of the students are sophomores, but there are a few juniors sprinkled in with one senior. The demographic breakdown of the classroom is 1 Asian male, 7 white females, and 9 white males. During the researchers conversations and observations with the classroom teacher, Ms. Phillips, the researcher discovered that the students struggle conjugating and writing verbs. The issue of students correctly conjugating verbs has been one of the most difficult processes for Ms. Phillips students to master. The researcher easily saw the struggle of the students in his/her preliminary observations of the classroom. With that being said, the researcher chose to research verb conjugation and grammar usage because of the students struggles and need to practice this skill. Problem Relevance This problem is an important issue primarily because proper use of grammar and verb conjugation is fundamental process for the acquisition of a foreign language like Spanish. Grammar is important because it is the language that makes it possible for us to talk about language. Grammar names the types of words and word groups that make sentences not only in English, but also in any language. Some scholars argue that students do not need to learn grammar, but the problem is of course, that you cannot speak a language well without doing it correctly, so in the intermediate to upper level stages in a students progress in a language, grammar starts to become much more important. In essence, it is difficult to communicate in a Foreign Language, if an individual cannot conjugate verbs and form sentences. Otherwise, the individual is left with memorizing short vocabulary phrases in an attempt to communicate in the

Ketcham 4 Foreign Language. Thus, intermediate Spanish students need to be able to properly conjugate verbs in order to communicate in Spanish. Grammatical structures like this can only become internalized if the learners are placed in a situation in which they need to use the structures for communicative purposes. For example, the researcher plans to teach the students grammatical structures (i.e. verb conjugations in a particular tense) and provide them with opportunities to converse with each other using the new grammatical structures. A specific example of this would be to teach the students the verbs ser and estar and provide the students opportunities to use these verbs explaining day-to-day activities or describing how they feel or the characteristics of someone else. Advanced Spanish high school programs aim to equip their students to use Spanish in as many meaningful contexts as possible. This type of program (Vestavia definitely has this type of language program) insists that students be able to properly conjugate verbs in Spanish. Proper activities for grammar use and verb conjugation would include writing short paragraphs, stories, dialogues, fill-in the blank exercise, verb charts, conjugation sheets, and roleplay situations. Learning to properly use grammar structures and conjugating verbs is important for learning a foreign language in its entirety. One of the ways students are assessed in their use of grammar is through writing and verb conjugation, which are vital in mastering a foreign language. Proper grammar use and verb conjugation helps students in all facets of learning a foreign language. As a result of this action research project, the researcher hopes to learn how to implement new techniques for fostering students growth in proper grammar usage and verb conjugation. By putting into effect better grammar and verb conjugation techniques, the researcher expects to improve students grammar use, verb conjugation skills, and ultimately students communicative competence. Along with this, a secondary goal is to make grammar interesting and make sure it seems logical and straightforward.

Ketcham 5 Definitions The following definitions are helpful to know when researching Foreign Language grammar use and verb conjugation: Action Research-a systematic inquiry conducted by teacher researchers to gather information about the ways that their particular school operates, how they teach, and how well their students learn. The information is gathered with the goals of gaining insight, developing reflective practice, effecting positive changes in the school environment and on educational practices in general, and improving student outcomes. Graphic Organizer-Graphic organizers are visual representations of knowledge, concepts or ideas. They are known to help: * relieve learner boredom * enhances recall * provide motivation Explicit Grammar Instruction- Involves directing student attention toward specific learning in a highly structured environment. It is teaching that is focused on producing specific learning outcomes. Implicit Grammar Instruction- Instruction that lies heavily on student-directed learning. The learner is able to understand what is being taught even though it is not directly expressed. Scaffolding- An instructional technique whereby the teacher models the desired learning strategy or task, then gradually shifts responsibility to the students. Communicative competence-refers to a language user's grammatical knowledge of syntax, morphology, phonology, and the like, as well as social knowledge about how and when to use utterances appropriately. FL-Foreign Language TL-Target Language Teaching Methods-the principles and methods of instruction Communicative Competence-the ability to recognize and to produce authentic and appropriate language correctly and fluently in any situation. Comprehensive Input-language input that could be understood by listeners despite them not understanding all the words and structures in it Interactive Lecture-lectures in which the instructor incorporates engagement triggers and breaks the lecture at least once per class to have students participate in an activity that lets them work directly with the material. Review of Literature Currently, there is a lack of research involving teaching methods that employ graphic organizers within a Spanish class for teaching students proper verb conjugation, but many researchers agree that there are numerous benefits to grammar instruction. According to Shrum and Glisan (2005), how to teach grammar is an issue that few researchers seem to agree on. Most of the research found on the topic deals with the traditional bottom-up approach versus a topdown approach to teaching grammar or the explicit grammar instruction methods versus implicit grammar instruction methods controversy for teaching grammar in a Foreign Language

Ketcham 6 classroom. Grammar graphic organizers fall within those categories. Shrum and Glisan are researchers that studied extensively on the traditional bottom-up approach to teaching grammar. According to Shrum and Glisan (2005) Foreign Language classrooms have been historically taught by means of students analyzing and learning grammar structures (verb conjugation) and vocabulary, and then practicing later on in communication. Another researcher Rivers (1983) described this dichotomy by using the terms skill getting and skill using. Skill getting describes how students learn grammatical structures (verb conjugating), but with skill using, students apply learned grammatical structures to focus their attention on meaningful interactions with the Target Language. On the other hand, skill getting can be divided into 3 categories: 1) mechanical- complete control by teacher and only one correct response; 2) meaningful- teacher still has control of the response, but there may be more than one response as long as the learner understands the stimulus; 3) communicative-learner- this provides new information and there is no right or wrong answer except in terms of grammatical correctness. According to Littlewood (1980) Skill using suggests that meaning receive more focus in the instruction of grammar and it can be divided into 4 stages: 1) primary focus is on form; 2) focus is on form and meaning; 3) focus is on meaning and form 4) focus is on meaning entirely. The problem that many researchers have with the bottom-up approach to teaching grammar is that it does not allow the students to engage the Target Language in a meaningful way, but places too much emphasis on the teacher as the sage on the stage instead of the guide on the side. Fortunately, the top-down approach to teaching grammar reduces the teaching of a Foreign Language as word lists, strict verb conjugation memorization, discrete grammar points, or isolated linguistic elements (2005). Through the top-down approach, learners are presented with a whole text (poem, song or story) and are guided to comprehend its concepts and explore these concepts through interacting with

Ketcham 7 their classmates and the teacher. According to Shrum and Glisan (2005), this approach enables students to communicate in the Target Language by using higher-level skills. Many researchers have debated in favor or against the explicit versus model for teaching grammar. In Explicit Instruction: Effective and Efficient Teaching by Archer and Hughes (2011), these researchers champion the practice of explicit grammar instruction because explicit instruction is characterized by using scaffolding as a teaching method, which guides the students through the learning process. Scaffolding presents the content in clear statements about the purpose and rationale for learning the new skill, clear explanations and demonstrations of the instructional target, and supported practice with feedback until independent mastery has been achieved. The explicit approach stresses the importance of teacher explanations of grammar rules followed by repetitive grammar activities to reinforce the new rule. Most textbooks present grammar in the explicit model, but many researchers debate whether this approach relates to learners authentic concerns in learning a Target Language. Researchers and theorists debate that these repetitive practices are useless to the learners because the students fail to interact with the content in a meaningful way. The implicit model of teaching grammar argues that learners can acquire language naturally if they are provided with sufficient comprehensible input from the teacher. Nevertheless, explicit style shows better results in early stages of learning, whereas implicit style proves to be more effective in a more advanced stage of learning. Since beginning students' lack of vocabulary limits their inferring ability (Zimmerman, 1997; Coady, 1997) Researchers like Krashen (1985) and Terrel (1977) argue that if learners are exposed to a sufficient amount of language that interests them and is globally understandable to them, they are eventually able to induce how the structures of the language work. According to Shrum and Glisan (2005) both forms have had proven success in teaching grammar to students. In their

Ketcham 8 opinion, it is best to combine the two models. This action research project will take the approach of allowing students to analyze and explain the grammar concepts for themselves through meaningful interactions within the classroom while providing a grammar graphic organizer for guided participation and teacher explanations (explicit) of grammar and verb conjugations. Hypothesis If Ms. Phillips 6th period Spanish II students partake in a grammar intervention strategy that engages students with high-energy grammar mini-lessons, centered on a graphic organizer and accompanied by meaningful exercises, the students mean scores on the grammar quizzes administered by the researcher will increase by 10%. The researcher expects students to be able to conjugate verbs correctly in various tenses (present, past, simple future, present-progressive, and commands), communicate in short dialogues with each other recounting day-to-day life and descriptions of people, places and things. Students will increase in their ability to compose grammatically sound sentences involving translation. Other activities could involve, but are not limited to grammatical exercises that prompt free response writing in the Target Language, activities that compel students to engage in dialogues with classmates, interactive lectures, and writing stories. Anticipated student behaviors include increased student confidence in communicating in the Target Language, increased accuracy in intermediate grammatical practices within the Target Language. Lastly, if the students exhibit the behaviors previously stated, the researcher estimates students overall confidence in their ability to communicate (orally and written) in a grammatically correct fashion will grow exponentially.

Ketcham 9 II. Description of Method/Data Collection Outcome Measures This action research will measure the progress of intermediate level Spanish students proper usage of grammar in the Target Language. Their grammar skills will be demonstrated on the quizzes administered by the researcher at the end of a grammar topic within a two-week unit. In order to measure this, the researcher will collaborate with the mentor teacher. The researcher will begin by collecting from the mentor teacher 1 set of the students scores on the grammar section of a quiz from early in the school year. Each quiz has a grammar and verb conjugation section in which the students are asked to conjugate verbs and demonstrate their knowledge and comprehension of verbs and grammar topics discussed during the unit. The classroom teacher will grade the students quizzes for the researcher. The grammar section of the quiz is worth 20 points. The grammar section of one of the first quizzes of the school year will be used to measure the intervention that is implemented in the action research project along with 1 grammar quiz administered by the researcher prior to starting his/her intervention strategy (this is called baseline data). By comparing the students scores on the grammar quizzes prior to the implementation to the ones after, the researcher will be able to determine if any improvement occurred from the intervention. In addition to the quantitative measurement, the researcher will be monitoring students behavior for qualitative data on the effectiveness of the intervention. The researcher will be monitoring the students during classroom observations for how they feel about the effectiveness of the intervention on improving their grammar skills.

Methods Design This action research investigation will consist of weekly classroom interventions and measurements on the unit tests. After discussing with the mentor teacher, the researcher and

Ketcham 10 mentor concluded that the research would direct grammar mini-lessons during the last 15-30 minutes of every Thursday (some variations may occur). Throughout these times the researcher will lead the class in developing their grammar skills and will have complete control of classroom instruction. The activities will be designed to improve the grammatical structures/themes covered in the unit. The instruction will be centered on a graphic organizer for conjugating verbs, but the instruction will gradually progress in level of difficulty as the action research project closes in on the end of the project. The activities will also be focused on the grammar portions and activities for the unit test and quizzes. During the grammar mini-lessons, the students will be asked to conjugate verbs to the correct subject pronoun and answer questions from the researcher and classmates using correct grammatical structures in the Target Learning that would be required for the unit test or quizzes. In order to prepare for the introduction of these grammar mini-lessons, it is essential to first collect baseline data. The researcher will ask the mentor teacher to provide him/her with significant information on the students scores such as the number of points earned out of the possible 20 points on the grammar section of their first unit quiz. The researcher will be allowed to view the first quiz, but due to confidentiality issues, he/she will not be allowed to publish students actual names. After gathering the necessary baseline data, the researcher will find out the upcoming grammar themes/topics to be taught in the following units. Once the researcher has been made aware of the topics, he/she will be able to design implementation activities for the grammar minilessons. Once he/she has formulated the implementation activities, he/she will present them to the class in a variety of ways. His/her initial activities will include reminding students of certain verb tense endings and subject nouns and how this ties into correctly conjugating verbs in particular tenses in the target language. Most activities will be focused around the proper

Ketcham 11 conjugation of verbs in the present, past, simple future, present-progressive tenses as well as formal/informal commands. Along with these activities, students will be assigned small translation tasks during classroom instruction/interactive lectures and on the unit quizzes. The researcher will steadily develop the activities, with each implementation including less and less assistance and direction. On the final grammar mini-lessons before each grammar quiz, the researcher will permit the students to practice the content learned during the unit through grammar games and worksheets comparable to the grammar quiz. The grammar mini-lessons will conclude with the students receiving personalized feedback on their grammar quizzes. See Figure 1 to view a sample grammar mini-lesson activity. The sample is an activity that instructs the students to conjugate verbs into the preterite or present tenses by paying close attention to context. The implementation of these grammar mini-lessons will commence on October 3rd and will finish on November 21st. Figure 1 Grammar Sample Activity
I. Complete Ud. los prrafos con la forma correcta del pretrito del verbo indicado. Escriba Ud. las respuestas en una hoja aparte. A. Mi hermana me 1. (decir) que su amiga Carlota 2. (ir) al cine anoche con su familia. Ellos 3. (ver) un pelcula cmica muy divertida, y despus, (ellos) 4. (pasar) por el centro y 5. (comer) helados. Por eso, ella no 6. (tener) tiempo para llamarme. B. - Ral, quiero saber por qu t no 7. (limpiar) el bao. --- Lo siento, Mam; yo 8 (tener) que colgar la ropa primero. Entonces, Pedro 9. (llegar)y l y yo 10. (hacer) sndwiches. Pedro 11. (cortarse) con el cuchillo, y yo le 12. (dar) una venda. Despus, l 13. (poner) los platos en el fregadero, y nosotros 14. (querer) lavarlos. Pero, en ese momento Raquel 15. (llamar) y me 16. (invitar) a su fiesta el sbado. Yo le 17. (decir) que s. Pedro 18. (salir), y yo 19. (volver) al bao. (Yo) 20. (recoger) una toalla sucia, y entonces t 21. (entrar).

Ketcham 12 Data Collection The first quantitative data collected for this action research will be the unit quiz (mentor teacher). The mentor teacher will record the students data and provide the data to the researcher. After the mentor teacher grades the quiz, she will make a copy of the scores of each student on the grammar section. See Figure 2 for an example prompt from a grammar section of one of the unit quizzes. Often times the grammar section will include several sub-sections ranging from A-E with each sub-section having different point values, but the sub-total will add up to 20 points. The data will consistently be out of a possible 20 points. The students will receive credit depending on whether the students chose the right verb, conjugate the verb into the proper tense, and conjugate the verb to the appropriate subject pronoun. The mentor teacher will give the researcher a copy of the students score the next time he/she comes to the mentor teachers classroom. The quantitative data used to measure the effectiveness of the intervention will be composed from the 3 grammar quizzes administered by the researcher that the students take during the period of this action research project. After the third and final post intervention grammar quiz is administered, the researcher will gather his/her daily journal observations of the students feelings about the effectiveness of the intervention on improving their grammar skills (qualitative data). Figure 2 Example Grammar Section D. You are describing a typical Saturday at your house. Read the paragraph and then fill in the blanks with the correct form of tener, pensar, or gustar. (5pts) Es sbado! Necesito comer pronto porque (1)______ hambre. Luego, mis amigos y yo (2) _______ ir al parque para montar en bicicleta. Me (3) _______ mucho. Por la noche, juego al ajedrez con mi familia, pero a ellos no les (4) ______ jugar conmigo. Ellos nunca (5) ______ suerte con los juegos de mesa!

Ketcham 13 Schedule The approximate dates that the researcher gathered baseline data were quizzes on September 5th (mentor teacher quiz) and October 3rd (researcher quiz). Quantitative data was gathered on October 22nd and November 7th and November 12th, the dates of the 3 grammar quizzes. The dates and the topics of grammar mini-lessons are given below. Some of the days formal data was gathered occurred on dates the researcher was teaching a mini-lesson, but other times the researcher asked the students to complete certain grammar specific activities to assess their comprehension and improvement. 10/3 10/10 10/18 10/24 10/31 11/7 11/12 11/14 11/19 11/26 Conjugating the verbs Saber & Conocer and knowing the contexts for each verbs usage. Watching 3 short documentaries on the significance of Columbus Day and the discovery of the new world. Conjugating the verbs Ser & Estar and practicing their different usages in two teams with the fly swatter game. Quiz over the usages and conjugations of Ser & Estar. Corrective feedback on the quizzes over Ser & Estar with an introduction to regular Preterite verbs. Mini-lesson on regular preterite verbs. Mini-lesson on irregular preterite verbs part 1 Mini-lesson on irregular preterite verbs part 2 Corrective feedback on the quizzes over the irregular preterite verbs. Using formal commands to give directions in the Target Language. Student survey collected.

Data Analysis In order to organize the data from this action research project, the researcher used descriptive statistics. By computing the mean, range, and mode of the scores from each quiz, each score denotes the assortment of all the individual data. The data was categorized in a chart that shows the mean, range, and mode of the scores on the grammar quizzes for each of the 5 quizzes. See Figure 3 to view this chart. The chart allows the viewer to see the increase/decrease of the students scores throughout the intervention period.

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Figure 3 Test Analyses

20 18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2 0 Mean Range Mode Quiz 1 Quiz 2 Quiz 3 Quiz 4 Quiz 5

In addition to the chart, a table that gives the exact numerical mean, range, and mode for each quiz is included. See Table 1 to view this data. The viewer can note the rise/fall in quiz scores between each two-week unit. The hypothesis of the action research project was that if Ms. Phillips 6th period Spanish II students partake in a grammar intervention strategy that engages students with high-energy grammar mini-lessons, centered on a graphic organizer and accompanied by meaningful exercises, the students mean scores on the grammar quizzes administered by the researcher will increase by 10%. An analysis of the data in Figure 3 and Table 1 revealed conclusive data that the students mean scores on the grammar sections of their tests failed to improve by 10 % from the grammar intervention strategy and that the range and mode had varying results as well.

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Test # Mean

Quiz 1 82.95% (16.59)

Quiz 2 78.1% (15.62) 9 19

Quiz 3 80.15% (16.03) 8 17

Quiz 4 94.12% (18.82) 6 20

Quiz 5 86.47% (17.29) 6 18

Range Mode Table 1 Average Test Scores

6.52 17.35

In Table 1 Quiz 1 and Quiz 2 represent the baseline data. Table 1 revealed that the students mean scores on grammar Quizzes decreased -4.85% (-0.97 points) from Quiz 1 to Quiz 2 (during baseline data collection time period) and increased 2.05% (0.41 points) from Quiz 2 to Quiz 3 following the initiation of the grammar intervention. The students mean scores increased 13.97% (2.79 points) between Quiz 3 and Quiz 4, but during the implementation of the grammar intervention the students mean scores dropped -7.65% (-1.53 points) between Quiz 4 and Quiz 5. The inconsistent data poses a problem for forming accurate conclusions upon the effectiveness of the intervention. By evaluating the students mean scores through a linear approach, the intervention obviously proved unsuccessful in reaching the hypothesized 10% improvement because the students mean scores (post intervention) failed to increase in a consistent manner climaxing at or above 10%. In the linear approach, one instance of achieving the 10% increase occurred when an increase of 13.97% between Quiz 3 and Quiz 4 exceeded the desired goal of improving students means scores by 10%. However, the intervention only minimally improved students mean scores when the data is examined from start to finish. But by comparing (baseline) students mean scores on Quizzes 1 & 2 separately to students mean scores on (post

Ketcham 16 intervention) Quizzes 3, 4, & 5, several more conclusions can be made about the effectiveness of the intervention strategy. Students mean scores dropped -2.8% (-0.56 points) from Quiz 1 to Quiz 3, increased 11.17% (2.23 points) from Quiz 1 to Quiz 4, and slightly increased 3.52% (0.7 points) from Quiz 1 to Quiz 5. From this comparison of data, the intervention appears to have positively impacted students mean scores less than the linear approach. However, students mean scores increased 2.05% (0.41 points) from Quiz 2 to Quiz 3, increased 16.02% (3.2 points) from Quiz 2 to Quiz 4, and increased 8.37% (1.67 points) from Quiz 2 to Quiz 5. By this breakdown of the quantitative data, the intervention appears to have succeeded in improving students mean scores to a greater degree. By comparing Quizzes 3, 4, & 5 to just Quiz 2, students mean scores were greater every time in comparison to Quiz 2, but still fell short of achieving the 10% goal increase in students mean scores on the quizzes. The qualitative data for the action research project was gathered through the researchers classroom observations of apparent student positive/negative reactions, behaviors, and attitudes towards the intervention. Students positive/negative reactions were difficult to recognize, but the researcher noticed that the students at first reacted negatively towards the graphic organizer and techniques for organizing verbs because they were unaccustomed to the new techniques. Nevertheless, as the action research project developed during the course of the semester, the researcher witnessed students gaining confidence and understanding of the new techniques as they became more accustomed to the strategies. Students were never overtly divergent or disrespectful towards the researcher and the intervention, but lacked a great deal of enthusiasm in interactive lectures and other instructional activities. The researcher detected students appearing distracted, bored, uninvolved, or uninterested during instructional time. Even when the researcher divided the classroom into teams for verb games designed to encourage group

Ketcham 17 participation and interest, several students still seem uninterested and uninvolved in the games. During these times, the researcher was wary of keeping students on task and participating in the classroom activities. The researcher noticed that the mentor teacher struggled with experience similar behaviors during her instruction of her content as well. The general consensus of the researchers observations indicated that the mini-lessons centered on a graphic organizer failed to increase student motivation to learn and apply the grammar content to the desired effect described in the hypothesis. Throughout the whole duration of the action research project, students seemed as if they were looking for an incentive to learn the material through the new activities and mini-lessons and frequently asked if the activities or quizzes designed by the researcher counted towards their grade in Ms. Phillips class. The mentor teacher decided to give homework and participation points for the quizzes and classroom activities in order that more of the students would study for the quizzes and participate in instructional activities. If they had been given the opportunity, several of the students would have checked out from applying themselves. Additionally, students regularly asked the researcher questions during the middle of instruction on new material over previously instructed grammar concepts/content, resulting in delays in the instruction of new concepts/content or activities. The researcher anticipated higher levels of student comprehension of the material discussed in class, but classroom observations of students behavior (during practice activities) indicated the inconsistent effectiveness of the intervention to foster higher levels of student comprehension. Through conversations and interactions in the Target Language with students, the researcher realized that the grammar intervention proved inadequate in cultivating the estimated level of student confidence in their communication skills. Furthermore, the researcher perceived through student-to-student conversations and students body language during instructional time that many students

Ketcham 18 expressed indifferent attitudes towards the activities implemented in the intervention. Compared with the activities and methods for learning content, the students displayed little preference (if any) towards the new activities and ways of learning the content introduced in the intervention. III. Report of Findings & Reflections Interpretation The breakdown of the quantitative data exposes the interventions inability to reach the hypothesized 10% increase in students mean scores on the quizzes. The perceived qualitative data of classroom reactions, behaviors, and attitudes indicate more negative reactions, unmotivated behavior, and indifferent attitudes in the majority of the students towards the effectiveness of the intervention. When placed in comparison with the mean scores of the baseline data, the mean scores of Quizzes 3, 4, and 5 failed to increase by 10%, but a further analysis of the amassed data reveals that the mean of students quiz scores in fact increased by 6.35%, the average range of the post intervention quizzes decreased by 1.09 (5.45%), and the average mode of the students quizzes increased slightly by .15 (0.75%). See Table 2 for the data. An analysis of the baseline and quantitative data reveals the intervention misses the mark to confirm the hypothesis that if Ms. Phillips 6th period Spanish II students partake in a grammar intervention strategy that engages students with high-energy grammar mini-lessons, centered on a graphic organizer and accompanied by meaningful exercises, the students mean scores on the grammar quizzes administered by the researcher will increase by 10%.

Ketcham 19 Data Mean Range Mode Baseline Data 80.55% (16.11) 7.76 18.18 Quantitative Data 86.9% (17.38) 6.67 18.33

Table 2 Average Test Scores of Baseline Data and Quantitative Data Despite the obvious letdown, students mean quiz scores increased when compared to the baseline data. Quiz 4 and Quiz 5 show the most marked improvement of the quizzes inferring that the intervention positively impacted to several degrees the students comprehension levels of the content and grammatical concepts taught in this action research project. The researcher expected students to be able to conjugate verbs correctly in various tenses (present, past, simple future, present-progressive, and commands), communicate in short dialogues with each other recounting day-to-day life and descriptions of people, places and things. The researcher designed activities involving these skills for each implementation of the intervention as well as designing the unit quizzes assessing students abilities to perform these skills. A threat to the validity of all the data is the fact that the scores are inconsistent (i.e. the Quiz 1 scores are higher than the scores of Quiz 1 & 2; the Quiz 4 scores are significantly higher than the scores of Quiz 3 & 5). If the intervention worked in an ideal sense, the scores of each subsequent quiz would have steadily increased from Quiz 3-Quiz 5, but the inconsistent scores could be attributed to a variety of variables outside the mini-grammar lessons. The likely changing levels of difficulty for each grammatical concept/theme instructed through the units and mini-lessons is one of the main possible threats to validity. The changing levels of difficulty of each grammatical concept/theme could skew students mean quiz scores because their individual scores (rather high or low) could

Ketcham 20 be due to the level of simplicity or difficulty to master the grammatical content/theme of the quiz rather than the positive influence of the grammar intervention. The validity threat of likely changing levels of difficulty of each grammatical concept/theme could manifest itself in the inconsistent students mean scores on the quizzes of this action research project. Considering the big difference among Quiz 3, 4, and 5, it is quite possible that this validity threat was present during the action research project. Future research in this area should seek to eliminate this threat to validity to future applications of the experiment. The researchers observed qualitative data on the students reactions, behaviors, and attitudes provides thought-provoking insights into whether the inconsistency in the students mean quiz scores is linked to the high-energy grammar minilessons, centered on a graphic organizer and accompanied by meaningful exercises. The researcher observed various forms of negative reactions, behaviors, and attitudes that revealed that the students did not benefit from the grammar intervention as the researcher intended originally. But, the researcher only provides general empirical statements on the students feelings and attitudes about the intervention from classroom observations. Due to the fact that no student surveys or questionnaires on the effectiveness of the intervention were administered to the students, the researcher fails to provide numerical data from student responses that could be analyzed to fully grasp the students feelings and attitudes toward the intervention. Perhaps if given more time each period, there would have been significant increases in the students mean scores. If the intervention strategy is implemented in another situation, a time increase each period should be considered. Also, if the intervention strategy had lasted a full school year instead of part of one semester, a significant increase in the students means scores could be greater. If this were the case, the researcher would have more class time to instruct his/her students on the content and develop the intervention strategy more thoroughly to better suit the

Ketcham 21 needs of his/her students. As the students proceeded through the semester the content/material increased in level of difficulty could be another reason for the students mean test scores failing to increase to the desired percentage. Despite the apparent failure of the intervention strategy, the outcomes of the action research project were still important and significant to the field of foreign language action research. This study reveals that dedicating class time to concentrate on students proper use of Spanish grammar structures and verb conjugations may have some beneficial effects (some increase in the mean of students quizzes transpired), but should not be the primary focus for teachers who are wanting to create meaningful interactions with the Target Language for their students. Though not factual, the researchers observatory data gives the impression that the focus of this research topic struggles to spark student interest and smothers student motivation to learn grammar. Therefore, teachers must find new and interesting teaching methods to instruct the grammar content of their respective Spanish courses. With the ever evolving and changing of the field of foreign language education, teachers should research best practices for teaching grammar. Teachers and administrators need to figure out what level of importance grammar has in teaching foreign languages in a modern day high school. Practice Decisions On the basis of these findings, further research and study by action researchers could be done in the area of grammar instruction, but a different hypothesis and strategy regarding students proper usage of grammar should be employed than those applied in this intervention. To improve the learning of grammar structures and concepts in a Foreign Language classroom, teachers and researchers ought to focus on developing teaching strategies that create meaningful interactions and connections for their students with the Target Language. In order to maximize

Ketcham 22 productivity in the action research studies, the focus should continue throughout the study of the language, not just a limited amount of time. The conclusions of this project suggest various different directions for future research in the field of Foreign Languages. A rather different topic to research in the area of grammar instruction is to discover whether proper grammar skills can develop naturally without specific grammar instruction or if the acquisition of proper grammar skills necessitates specific grammar instruction. Action research in the field of foreign languages is lacking and any topic would be valuable to the field, but Stemming from the qualitative data collected in this research project, students seemed uninterested or unmotivated to learn the content. Research needs to be done in the areas of stimulating student interest and motivation. Creating strategies and classroom management procedures to keep students interested and motivated will be key for the future of instruction, especially in the area of grammar instruction. Lastly, research into whether there is a connection/link between the method a student learns grammar in a Foreign Language and the method that student learned grammar in his/her native language. If there is a connection between the two manners, discovering a technique to instruct grammar in the Foreign Language could become easier for teachers and students alike. Ultimately, teachers and administrators in our secondary schools need to figure out what level of importance grammar has in teaching foreign languages in a modern day high school. Recommended strategies to be used include: gradually progressing the difficulty level of instruction, classroom activities, and student independence, repeated writing practice in the Target Language with corrective feedback from the teacher, and opportunities for students to communicate orally in the Target Language.

Ketcham 23 Bibliography

Archer, A., & Hughes, C. (2011). Explicit Instruction: Effective and Efficient Teaching. NY: Guilford Publications. Coady, J. (1997). L2 Vocabulary Acquisition: A Synthesis of Research. In J. Coady & T. Huckin (Eds.), Second Language Vocabulary Acquisition (pp 273-290). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Coady, J., & Huckin, T., (1997) Second Language Vocabulary Acquisition: A Rationale for Pedagogy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Glisan, E., & Shrum, J. (2005) Teachers Handbook: Contextualized Language Instruction (3rd ed.). Boston: Thomson & Heinle. Krashen, S.D. (1985). The Input Hypothesis: Issues and Implications, New York: Longman. Littlewood, W. T. (1980), Form and Meaning in Language-Teaching Methodology. Modern Language Journal, 64: 441445. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4781.1980.tb05220.x Terrell, T.D. (1977). "A natural approach to the acquisition and learning of a language". Modern Language Journal, 61: 325-336. Rivers, W.M. (1983). Communicating naturally in a second language: Theory and practice in language teaching. New York: Cambridge University Press. Terrell, T.D. (1977). A natural approach to the acquisition and learning of a language. Modern Language Journal, 61, 325-336. Zimmerman, Cheryl Boyd. "Historical trends in second language vocabulary instruction", Second Language Vocabulary Acquisition. 1st ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997. 5-19. Cambridge Books Online. Web. 10 December 2013. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139524643.003

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Appendix A A-1 Figure 1 A-2 Figure 2 A-3 Figure 3 A-4 Table 1 A-5 Table 2

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Figure 1 Grammar Sample Activity

I. Complete Ud. los prrafos con la forma correcta del pretrito del verbo indicado. Escriba Ud. las respuestas en una hoja aparte. C. Mi hermana me 1. (decir) que su amiga Carlota 2. (ir) al cine anoche con su familia. Ellos 3. (ver) un pelcula cmica muy divertida, y despus, (ellos) 4. (pasar) por el centro y 5. (comer) helados. Por eso, ella no 6. (tener) tiempo para llamarme. D. - Ral, quiero saber por qu t no 7. (limpiar) el bao. --- Lo siento, Mam; yo 8 (tener) que colgar la ropa primero. Entonces, Pedro 9. (llegar)y l y yo 10. (hacer) sndwiches. Pedro 11. (cortarse) con el cuchillo, y yo le 12. (dar) una venda. Despus, l 13. (poner) los platos en el fregadero, y nosotros 14. (querer) lavarlos. Pero, en ese momento Raquel 15. (llamar) y me 16. (invitar) a su fiesta el sbado. Yo le 17. (decir) que s. Pedro 18. (salir), y yo 19. (volver) al bao. (Yo) 20. (recoger) una toalla sucia, y entonces t 21. (entrar).

Figure 2 Example Grammar Section D. You are describing a typical Saturday at your house. Read the paragraph and then fill in the blanks with the correct form of tener, pensar, or gustar. (5pts) Es sbado! Necesito comer pronto porque (1)______ hambre. Luego, mis amigos y yo (2) _______ ir al parque para montar en bicicleta. Me (3) _______ mucho. Por la noche, juego al ajedrez con mi familia, pero a ellos no les (4) ______ jugar conmigo. Ellos nunca (5) ______ suerte con los juegos de mesa!

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Figure 3 Test Analyses

20 18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2 0 Mean Range Mode Quiz 1 Quiz 2 Quiz 3 Quiz 4 Quiz 5

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Test # Mean Range Mode Table 1 Average Test Scores Data Type Mean Range Mode

Quiz 1 82.95% (16.59) 6.52 17.35

Quiz 2 78.1% (15.62) 9 19

Quiz 3 80.15% (16.03) 8 17

Quiz 4 94.12% (18.82) 6 20

Quiz 5 86.47% (17.29) 6 18

Baseline Data 80.55% (16.11) 7.76 18.18

Quantitative Data 86.9% (17.38) 6.67 18.33

Table 2 Average Test Scores of Baseline Data and Quantitative Data