Using the iPod Touch to Increase Reading Test Scores in EL Students

Teaching in public schools today is certainly a challenge. There are many factors that go into teaching and many standards that need to be met. There is a growing English Learner population in Central Minnesota. Standardized tests are given many times a year to measure that students are learning the content at a specific grade level. For some of the EL students it may be the first time that they have entered a school. Other EL students were born in Minnesota and speak a different language in the home. Some of the students live a life of poverty and some do not. All of the EL students are placed in the grade that correlates with their age and they may not have had the proper foundational skills taught to them in reading. In the school in this study the test scores have continually went down over the past several years. District teachers and administrators wanted to try a piece of technology in the classrooms that could help improve the reading skills. Technology is also a tool that the schools have used to improve reading skills and test scores. In this study the EL students had access to a device called an iPod touch. Technology is rapidly changing in the schools and it can be costly to the school. This study focused on a fifth grade class and compared test scores from two years earlier. Schools have been driven in many directions from these mandated test scores. There can be penalties for failing and rewards for passing. This study showed that technology used one hour a week had no statistical significance on student achievement

The Effects of Verbal Reinforcement on Three Subtests of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale

A verbal conditioning study was conducted in order to assess the effect of positive verbal reinforcement on the examinees\u27 verbalization output and/or the individual scaled scores of the Vocabulary, Comprehension, and Similarities subtests of the WAIS. Twenty-seven female volunteer Ss were assigned to either a contingent reinforcement group, a random reinforcement group, or a non-reinforcement control group. A mixed design A.O.V. revealed no significant differences between treatment groups on the individual scaled scores of the subtests. An analysis of covariance for the composite of the three subtests scaled scores was also nonsignificant. A mixed design A.O.V. for the amount of verbalization to these three subtests revealed a significant treatment effect (P \u3c .001), a significant subtest effect (P \u3c .001), and significant treatmentxsubtest interaction on verbalization (P \u3c .01). A Tukey test indicated that the contingent reinforcement treatment produced significantly more verbalization than either the random reinforcement treatment or the non-reinforcement control treatment (P \u3c .05). Another Tukey test showed that the Vocabulary subtest yielded significantly more verbalizations than either the Comprehension, or the Similarities subtest (P \u3c .05), and that the Comprehension subtest yielded significantly more verbalizations than the Similarities subtest (P \u3c .05)