Description Candidate's Planned Reflective Practice
As students participated in the research intervention, I recorded observations of students and reflections of my practice. Anecdotes included the most popular and engaging apps, student progress, ideas for future instruction, possible future research areas related to my study, observations of student behavior and engagement, and constraints observed during the study.
Description of Planned Outcomes
I had hoped that iPad applications would assist in the development of students’ phonemic awareness, as well as their automaticity of letter naming, letter sound identification, high-frequency word recognition, and nonsense word reading as measured by the Marie Clay Observation Survey; AIMSweb Letter Naming, Letter Sound, and Nonsense Word Fluency subtests; and Qualitative Reading Inventory–5 Word List. I had projected a possible outcome that using an iPad to practice reading subskills would be highly engaging and motivating for students and make learning fun. With the capacity to differentiate instruction through the use of multiple application choices, the iPad would promote independence among struggling readers and encourage positive attitudes towards learning. Results from this investigation suggested the use of iPad applications to be a successful means of literacy instruction that fostered the development and automaticity of early reading subskills to set a foundation for fluent reading success in the future. I gained experience using a new technological intervention for students who had shown some difficulty acquiring early literacy subskills. Conducting this research project helped me to gain an insight of how educational research is conducted and provided the foundation for a future career in the field.