A View Into Kindergarten Classrooms: Data Use Practices Within the Context of Literacy

• In Event: 14.032 - Data Use for Improving Teaching and Expanding Opportunities to Learn: Implications for Policy and Practice

Abstract

Purpose and Framework
Although a common mantra in U. S. educational systems is “data-driven decision making,” little is known about what teachers actually do with data and whether data occupy a central or peripheral part of their daily routines. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to focus at the classroom level to understand teachers’ beliefs about and practices of data use. Specifically, we examined how kindergarten teachers’ beliefs about assessment shape the ways in which they: (1) recognized, considered, and collected literacy data for instructional planning; and (2) made meaning from literacy data for actionable instructional steps.

Our framework builds on Gullo and Hughes (2011), who posited three principles for kindergarten assessment as a process that should be: (a) continuous, (2) comprehensive and involving multiple formats yielding information on diverse learning, and (3) integrated with learning goals. In other words, teachers should use continually use data to measure students’ learning over time and should not limit assessments to only certain points in time.

Methods
We employed a multiple-case study design within the context of eight school settings, nested in four districts using a variety of data sources. Observations of formal teacher meetings, formal meetings with school leaders, classroom observations of whole- and small-group reading instruction, and Think-Aloud interviews with teachers and administrators were the primary data sources.

Results
The following teacher beliefs and practices emerged from data analysis:

Belief 1: “I know my kids.” Without exception, Kindergarten teachers recognized the importance of developing their students’ literacy skills and that their learners came to school with varying levels of reading readiness. Consequently, this belief of “knowing my kids” took priority over other forms of data and was influential in teachers’ subsequent interpretations and daily actions.

Belief 2: “Real” data come from formal assessments. All schools participated in voluntary use of Phonological Assessment Literacy Screening (PALS) for literacy screening. Because the use of PALS is common in the state, and the history of its use longstanding, the resulting data reports were in the forefront of teachers’ minds when they considered literacy data at the exclusion of other types of data.

Belief 3: The main use of data is to reveal student deficits. Teachers’ translation of building-level policies was shaped by their beliefs about the assessment’s purpose. Discussions of assessment were infused by beliefs that data revealed only deficits in student progress and that their work was to detect what was missing in students’ profiles that prevented them from moving forward. These beliefs shaped how teachers recognized, considered, and collected literacy data in consistent ways.

Significance
If policies regarding data use are intended for instructional improvement, attention should be given to the fact that:
1. Most teachers limit data to interim or summative assessments, which are not designed to inform instruction;
2. Most data systems only report student performance rather than providing insight to how or why; and
3. Few supports exist to guide teachers’ understanding of how to make instructional sense of data within the context of a content area (e.g., reading).

Authors

• Tonya R. Moon, University of Virginia

• Marcia A. Invernizzi, University of Virginia

• Catherine M. Brighton, University of Virginia

• Jordan Buckrop, University of Virginia