Weekly Journals
Week of August 8, 2009 - August 14, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: The AECT conference is coming up and so is the deadline to complete and turn in our preschool paper. School is also staring soon so we need to get the paper finished soon. Teresa took on the methods section and one of the result questions while Amy took on the last questions of the result section. When they completed their portion of the paper, Bude advised them to send it to me. I complied all the sections and included the abstract, introduction and reference page. Once I do this I will send it to Bude and Cathi to look over and edit. Sometime next week we will go over the whole paper and decide what needs to be changed. We also have plan our trip to Kentucky for the AECT conference. UROC is a grant program through our University who is going to sponsor the traveling expenses for the conference. This will be a great end to the paper and a good opportunity to present our accomplishments.
Teresa Sundholm: This week we were asked by our sponsors to provide a two page report on the entire project and our participation in it. It was a nice opportunity to look back over the project and see all that we have accomplished. Each of use wrote a report and sent it to our faculty advisor to be compiled before being sent to the sponsors.
I completed the game features ranking scale, after revisions for clarification of some terms requested by our advisor. We met to ensure that all of our findings from the pre-school study were correct and ready for publication. I also completed the methods section revisions and will add the results of the game features scale to this section. This week I registered for the AECT conference that we will be attending in October. It will be exciting to present our work at the conference.
Amelia Weigant: This week I wrote my 2-page reflection letter for the MRO-W project. It asked me a few questions that I never really considered during the project. It is hard to believe that we are already near the end of this project. I eagerly look forward to attending the AECT conference and presenting the results with my teammates. We are trying to finish up the pre-school portion of the research paper, so I am doing a lot of writing this week.
Week of August 1 - August 7, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: Now that the boys and girls club is finished we are focusing our time on the preschool paper. We did finish the t-test results so now we are going to interpret these results to go along with our research questions. I was in charge of question number, which is analyzing if there is a significant difference in literacy skills between the two games? We found that AOL Learn Your Letters was more effective in increasing the preschooler’s literacy skills. This was quite shocking to us because we thought that the Starfall was going to more engaging and more effective in teaching literacy skills. In addition to the results section, we wrote our part in the discussion section. The literature review is still going smoothly and is just about finished. It took longer then I expected but the end result is going to be every informative and a great piece to our paper. Teresa made a list of the game features for each of us in the group to fill out about AOL Learn Your Letters and Starfall. This will help answer question number two in the results section in the paper.
Teresa Sundholm: This week we met as a group to discuss our initial t test statistics from the pre-school study. Our faculty advisors helped us to use Excel to perform more detailed data analysis on the pre and post tests. We discussed our findings, in particular we were surprised that the AOL game that was not very engaging, had improved test scores in letter naming fluency. We thought that one of the reasons could be that the students had exposure to more letters in the amount of time they played the AOL game vs the students who played Starfall.
I continued working on the methods section of our paper. I also worked on the list of game features we had previously identified and turned them into a ranking scale that each of us will fill out to more accurately pinpoint which features each game had.
Amelia Weigant: This week we covered excel spreadsheet data about the pre-school. The preliminary results are in and it appears that the AOL learning letters game may in fact be a better learning tool. Students who were exposed to this game were very bored but managed to learn a great deal more than their peers who played a different game instead. We are preparing T-test results which will show us exactly how different the two groups of students were.
Week of July 25 - July 31, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: This week was the last days at the boys and girls club. Monday was their last day on the computers and on Wednesday we will be having an ice cream party along with testing them again. We are you using the same test as the pre-test and we are also going to have them fill out the attitude surveys again. This will let us know if any of the student’s attitudes toward math have changed since this program begun. On Wednesday we met as a group to go over our plan and then I rushed over the store to purchase the ice cream bars. I was also in charge of all the paper work. About 11 children showed up on Wednesday for the post-test. We were missing 5 children so we decided to go back on Thursday to see if any other children would show up. On Thursday about 3 more children came so Teresa and Amy tested them. I graded both portions of the test and recorded the data into an excel worksheet along with their pre-test scores. Teresa and Amy gathered the attitude survey’s to also put into an excel worksheet. Also this week we individually wrote a 2 page final paper to our sponsors to show them our progress and some of the final results we concluded. Our next step is to work on the first draft of the final report for the preschool.
Teresa Sundholm:This was the final week of the Boys and Girls club portion of our study. I was at the club on Tuesday for the last day of playing the games. The kids were very bored and agitated. Most did not want to play the games and the ones who did got stuck on some of the problems. Two girls from the other group asked to make up days that they did not come and I allowed them to play the other game away from the other kids. The kids were excited about getting their ice cream. We held the post tests on Wednesday and I returned on Thursday to test two more who were not there on Wednesday.
I continued to work on the first draft of the final report. I sent it to my advisor for feedback and will be working on a revised version this week. I completed my first attempt at doing the T-test and will be meeting with my fellow student researchers this week along with our advisors to begin to compare our results. I am also writing a 2 page report on the project for our sponsors as well as meeting with campus representives regarding our plans to travel to the AECT conference in October to present our results.
Amelia Weigant: In our last week of the Boys and Girls Club study, all of the research members showed up to give the kids their post-test. We had a surprisingly large turnout for the post-test, which will help our study this week. Two students will require makeup tests, we had anticipated a much larger amount of children would miss the post-test date. The ice cream party incentive helped this weeks' attendance. Some of the children seemed sad that the project was over. Overall, we don't have any official data compiled yet, but at first glance, it seems like the children were able to answer many more problems at the end than they did at the pre-test. Next semester, I will personally be doing a very similar program, but without the research elements. Many kids were excited about this project, and others were very regretful that they didn't sign up in time. I look forward to working with the kids and giving them more educational opportunities at the club.
Week of July 18 - July 24, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: At the boys and girls club things are starting to slow down. The students do not seem as engaged as before. The summer at the boys and girls club is very crazy with students coming in and out with no real direction. This is the last full week at the club and the next week we will be doing the post-tests. Also this week I compared the preschool results from the t-tests with the other group members. We found out that we didn’t use the correct program in excel so we have to go back and revise the results. In addition to the t-tests I have been making good progress on the literature review. Our original plan was to get literature on preschoolers for both mathematics and literacy skills but now of course we are just focusing on literacy skills. Now because of this change I have to go back and get more literature and current research on preschool literacy skills with computers. Teresa and Amy have already wrote two or three paragraphs on literature they have reviewed so I am also finding ways to incorporate them. The four areas I am concentrating on is literacy learning (computer) games and preschool children, features of learning games (computer) used with preschoolers, teacher perceptions of literacy learning (computer) games with preschoolers, and lastly learning (computer) games and student engagement of preschoolers.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I was at the Boys and Girls club on Tuesday. The kids are getting very bored with the game and keep asking to play the other one or when the time is up so they can leave. Some of the children are disruptive and must be disciplined. The staff is being more conscious of this and helping with the kids.
This week we also started reviewing our data from the pre-school. I have not taken statistics before so this is new to me. Our faculty advisors gave us material to read to help us perform the statistical tests on the data. I am also working on the first draft of the methods section of our final report. I am in the last two weeks of my first masters term so my time is stretched pretty thin. I will be able to refocus my energies completely on the project after my term is completed. I am looking forward to seeing what the results are of the pre-school study.
Amelia Weigant: We continue to have disciplinary issues with the children, and attendance numbers have recovered slightly. Some of the Boys and Girls Club staff are helping us with keeping the kids in line. Aside from that, things have been progressing like usual. The kids move onto harder and harder math problems. Some of the kids are so concerned with beating the game that they're attempting math problems that are far beyond their level, and rely heavily on the hint buttons without understanding the underyling concepts. I have encouraged them to return to math problems that are more appropriate for their grade level, and to master those first.
Week of July 11 - July 17, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: This week at the boys and girls club I only went on Monday and as a group decided not to come on Wednesday because the club will be closed on Thursday due to the Salinas rodeo. Four students showed up on Monday and I made sure to make the announcement to not come Wednesday but to be sure they are their next Monday for the last day on the computers and next Wednesday for the post-testing and the ice cream party. On Monday I was in charge of talking to Mark the director of the boys and girls club about some issues that were arising. My first question was about how on Tuesday and Thursday's the technology room teacher, Loren, leaves Teresa by herself. This is not good because sometimes the students will act up or not follow the rules and Teresa does not know how to handle it by herself. Also I needed at ask Mark about the ice cream party and if he would be providing the room and the ice cream to the students or if we had to. But unfortunately Mark was not there on Monday so I was unable to ask him these questions. Uziel, a boy in the program finished the whole game, but as I looked at his results of each level I noticed some as low as 65%. I told him to go back to each level where he scored less than 85% and redo them for a higher score. This week I also was in charge of buying new prizes for the prize box so I went to the 99-cent store and bought about 15 dollars worth, which I thought would last us enough for this week and next week.
Teresa Sundholm: This week the boys and girls club was closed on Thursday as this is rodeo week in Salinas. The club is located right behind the rodeo grounds so they close it down for the duration of the rodeo days. Since we do not want one group of children to have more time on the computers than the other, we shut down the program on Wednesday as well. We will be wrapping up the computers next week and doing the post testing of the children.
I went to the club on Tuesday and we had about 7 or 8 kids show up, but two left early when their parents came to pick them up. The kids still complained about playing Math Essentials. Some of them did seem to enjoy the game and were running up to me to tell me how far they had gotten in the game. Unfortunately, the child who was disruptive, was having problems behaving this week as well. I ended up not giving him his toy prize at the end of the hour because he was not doing what he was supposed to do. I told him if he came and played the game next week without misbehaving, then he would get his toy. It seems to be more difficult for the children to stay engaged in this game. They often asked me when time was up and that seems to indicate they are getting bored with it.
Amelia Weigant: We are starting to have disciplinary issues with the children. They are becoming even less engaged with the game, and it's becoming distracting to other members who are trying to play the game and learn. There were about the same amount of kids this week as last week. We are going to refill the prize box with new prizes to help incentives stay high. We keep reminding the kids that they will get an ice cream party if they complete the program, but they seem more motivated by short-term incentives. The reward system in both Math Essentials and Math Detectives is not rewarding enough to hold the children's attention. So far, nobody has been able to unlock the incentives in Math Detectives because the standards are sent too high. I have begun to learn about performing T-tests, and I feel confident enough to attempt the T-tests for the preschool data.
Week of July 4 - July 10, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: On Monday at the boys and girls club only 4 children attended today. Taylor and Ariel are two girls who have been very consistent in attending on Mondays and Wednesdays. A lot of the children want to print out the certificates they earned while playing but Loren informed me that the printer is not working. But knowing that the children want to print these certificates lets me know they are proud of their accomplishments and progress throughout the game.
For the preschool data, I have studied Bude's statistics slides, took notes and attempted the 6 t-tests. Bude and Cathi want all three of us student researchers to perform the tests individually so we get the experience and for us to compare our answers. I also am working on the literature review for the preschool research paper. I am going through all of our literature and filtering all the literature into two sections, one for the preschool paper and one for the boys and girls paper. This organization will help me in a couple weeks when I start writing the final literature paper.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I returned to the preschool one more time to retest one of the children. I had made an error when I tested her last week and I went back to retest her so our data is accurate.
I also worked at the boys and girls club on Tuesday. My fellow researchers and I have become concerned about how few children are coming, especially on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I announced on the loud speaker that they need to come to the tech center, but only about 6 kids came. Also, two of the boys were very disruptive and it made it hard for the other children to concentrate. They were told by me and by the staff of the club that they would have to leave the computer room if they continued to misbehave. The children still do not seem to like the Math Essentials game. Two kids even asked me if they could play the other one. I said no, as we need them to play this game for our study.
During our weekly meeting, we divided up tasks for analyzing the preschool data. Our faculty advisors gave us information on how to do the statistical analysis so we could read it over and get ready to begin this part of our work. We have set up spreadsheets with different parts of the raw data in them and will be running statistical tests on that data. I am also working on the final report, putting together our methods and procedure sections.
Amelia Weigant: Today attendance has dropped off drastically, and we're worried if we'll have enough kids for the project. If our sample group shrinks too small, the data will be less reliable. The kids seem to be growing bored with Math Essentials, and request to play Math Detectives instead. Our prize box is running a little low, the children are complaining about the low selection. It seems as though rewards through playing the game is not good enough. The external rewards are a stronger incentive than I originally thought they'd be. We are beginning to analyze the preschool data, and we have the pre- and post-test results compiled and entered into Excel. We will continue to work with these numbers over the next few weeks and run T-tests to measure the integrity of the data.
Week of June 27 - July 3, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: Post testing at the preschool took place this week. I went on Wednesday to test the last 3 children who were absent on Monday and Tuesday. The post-test is very similar and has the same format to the pre-test so all of us were familiar with it. We choose as a group to only two tests, which are the sound fluency and the letter naming, because the third test seemed to be too difficult for three through five year olds. I also noticed 4-5 children dropped out, which is always disappointing but there is nothing we can do now. Amy and Teresa are in charge of inputting all this data and the data from the teacher surveys into excel so we can start making tables. We are doing 6 t-tests for the preschool. Bude has sent us some of her statistics lecture from past classes she taught, so it is important we teach ourselves this information. I have taken a stats class my freshman year in college so for me it is just a little refresher course. Once the boys and girls club is over we will also be using the t-test format so it is important that we familiarize ourselves with this.
On Monday at the boys and girls club six children showed up to play math detectives. Some of the children were complaining about playing the same game each day they come. I explained to them we couldn't play the other game because it is not in the consent forms they signed and their parents signed at the beginning of the program. After I told them this they were fine and began playing. When I was observing them I heard a lot the children expressing excitement when they completed a level or scored high. "Yah I passed this level with a 100%!" Cody yelled out. Most of children ask for a pencil and a scratch paper to use while they play the game. A lot of the questions asked in Math Detective are word problems so the children use the scratch paper to write down important numbers and equations.
At the boys and girls club on Wednesday I was in charge of filling the prize box with more prizes. The children seemed a little more interested in coming this week because of the prize box incentives. Most of children at the boys and girls club are getting more familiar with the routine and stay on track the whole time. Today I saw George and Osman helping each other with a question. I told them that it was okay to help each other out as long as they are not sharing answers.
Teresa Sundholm: This week we conducted the post testing of the children at the preschool. Some of the children did seem to do better on the tests while others were not able to answer the questions. It will be interesting to see the results once we analyze them.
This week I did not work at the boys and girls club as the other researchers were assigned to it. I worked on updating the website and reviewing the literature review in preparation to write our final report. It has been challenging for me to work on the research project as I am working on my masters as well. I have found that the research project is helpful in my masters work since I am studying instructional technology and the research methods are sometimes similar.
Amelia Weigant: The kids continue to play the games this week. Attendance has dropped off by about 25% from last week, but luckily we've had a few new members who are eager to join the project. We will be giving them the pre-test this week. At the club, the kids seem to do their own things, so it's difficult to focus on them on a math game with other distractions around. Some kids seem to have forgotten about the project, and need to attend make-up sessions. In the math games, the kids are progressing onto more difficult equations, and they are now relying more on the games' tutorials and hint assistance.
Week of June 20 - June 26, 2009
Cassidy Bennett:This week was the first real week at the boys and girls club. All the children were quite engaged in both of the games but the students outcome was not what we expected. The majority of the children didn't show up and many new children wanted to sign up. This was confusing and unexpected but we managed to get through it. The boys and girls club is a free place where the children are able to go in and out of rooms and choose activities as they please. The club is anything but structured so trying to get the assigned children in a place at the right day and time is almost impossible. A lot of the children forget, which does not help us in our research. As the weeks continue, we hope to get the children in a routine.
This week I was also in-charge of gathering and correcting the student's pre-tests at the boys and girls club. The pre-tests consist of 2 test; the first is 5 minute addition, subtraction, multiplication and division test and the second is a 10 minute test consisting of word problems and picture questions.
At the preschool things don't seem to be getting any better. The children are refusing to play on their assigned computer, while others just sit and observe their classmates playing on their desired computer. The post-test for the preschoolers is set up for next Monday and Tuesday so hopefully we will see some positive results.
This type of research is so new to me and I have learned a lot that will help me in the teaching profession. All the obstacles we have injured throughout our project will only help us in future researches I do.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I stopped by the preschool twice to check on the final week of computer use. One day almost all of the kids said no to playing either game. The other day was a little better with more kids choosing to play. Often the kids on the white computer would stop playing and watch the game on the black computer instead. We will be conducting our post test next week and I am interested to see if the children improved their letter skills during the study.
I also worked at the boys and girls club on Monday and Tuesday this week. On Monday the children seemed very engaged with the game and were excited to print our there certificates as they reached each level. They asked for scratch paper and pencils to work on the word problems and seem focused on the math problems in the game. They looked forward to getting the tokens so they could play in the arcade part of the game. They needed to get the problems at least 75 percent right to get the tokens. On Tuesday, it was less successful. Only a few of the children who were signed up came and they did not seem to be as engaged with the Math Essentials game as the Monday group was with Math Detectives. We need to try to find ways to make sure enough kids are playing both games so that our data results will be useful.
Amelia Weigant: This week the boys and girls club members began playing the computer games. The first day, members were very excited. But the second day, many members complained and wanted to play a different game. The members seemed engaged in the games and were excited to progress through levels, and they're eager to show me their progress. It seems like they take pride in the progress they're making, and brag about how good their math skills are. It seems like the kids are getting positive feelings about math because of this.
Week of June 13 - June 19, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: Pre-testing and the students first day on the computers began this week at the boys and girls club. On Monday before we headed over to the boys and girls club to pre-test, Cathi taught us how to properly test the students. We didn't use the original pre-test because it was not going to be sent to us in time so instead we used a different one Cathi borrowed from a friend. The pre-test was pretty straight forward and easily constructed.
At the boys and girls club on Monday and Tuesday we pre-tested all the students but the outcome of the students was definitely not what we expected. Only about 7 of the 25 students who committed and returned their consent forms showed up. This was quite disappointing. Luckily new students at the club were interested so we signed up another 13 students. This really saved our research. There is no telling why 18 out of the 25 students did not come but besides this the pre-testing went smoothly.
On Wednesday and Thursday we began the students on the computers. About 11 students showed up on Wednesday and about 5 students showed up on Thursday. All the students who were there were very engaged in the games and did not cause any trouble. We are hoping more students showed up on Tuesdays and Thursdays but it is kind of out of our hands now. We have tried our best in recruiting. At the boys and girls club the students are free to come in and out and do whatever they please so it is very hard to control and get all the children we need at the specific times.
Since the original list of student's names needed to be changed, I made a new list for the children to sign in at every time they arrive at the technology room.
Teresa Sundholm: This week we began the math games at the boys and girls club. It was chaotic at first with trying to figure out which kids were signed up and having some new kids wanting to sign up. The first two days of the week we completed the pre-testing and then began with the kids playing the games. Some kids enjoyed the math detective game while others felt it was too difficult. The other researchers were there when the math essentials game was used so I can not yet say which game was more engaging. The kids were really excited about the prizes and club dollars. It keeps them with us for the whole hour if they know they are getting something at the end of each session.
I also checked in with the pre-school this week and observed the kids playing the games. The first day I went the staff did not have the kids on the computers and since this had happened before when I had come, I was concerned that the kids were actually playing the way we wanted them to. The head of the staff informed me that she needed to know exactly when I was coming to make sure the kids were on the computers when I was there. I wasn't sure what to expect from the kids when I finally was able to observe them playing. I was pleasantly surprised to see that they did seem to have learned how to play the games better than when they first started. There is still more interest in the game on the black computer than on the white computer. It did seem that the kids were getting the right amount of time with the games and were understanding them better.
Amelia Weigant: This week we have completed the testing of the children and we have had our first two days of letting the children play the math games. The mon/wed slot is devoted to Math Detectives, and the tues/thurs slot is devoted to Math Essentials. The children seem to be very intrigued by the games and play them readily and without complaint. However Math Detectives seems to be a punishing game and this may result in students dropping out of the program due to a lack of interest. Math essentials is a much more rewarding game according to student reactions.
Week of June 6 - June 12, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: This week we did another recruiting period where we went to the boys and girls club to sign up more students. We got about 20 consent forms so far but we are hoping for another 10 or so. A couple days after the recruitment, I went to Marks office at the Seaside boys and girls club to compile, organize and make copies of all the consent forms. I left the originals with Mark and I kept the copied ones. With these I made a list of all the students names that signed up and the date they signed up for on a Microsoft document and sent it to the group. At this point we had 25, which was not too bad. This list is going to be helpful for next week when we pre-test the students. As a group we also wanted to make a math attitude survey for the students to fill out before and after the program. This will hopefully help us better understand the researched children and see their progress.
Teresa Sundholm: This week we prepared to start the data collection at the boys and girls club. Cathi got us the assessment tests for the pre-testing and I put together a math attitude survey for the students to take. This will help us to know before the kids begin using the math programs how they feel about their math skills and how much they like or dislike math.
Also, this week I went to the pre-school to check on the progress of the data collection there. I found that the staff was checking off which kids were playing the game each day and that many of the kids on the white computer did not want to play the game. The staff confirmed this as well for me. I am going to go back to the pre-school twice a week for the last two weeks of our data collection to observe the kids on the computers and confirm that procedures are being followed the way we want.
Amelia Weigant: This week we are starting data collection at the Boys and Girls club. We have decided to use one survey about feelings, and two different timed tests on math. The first test is a series of basic arithmetic problems of increasing difficulty. The second test is on math reasoning skills, including graphs, visual data and word problems. The children will be given unlimited time to complete the survey, 5 minutes to complete the arithmetic, and 10 minutes to complete math reasoning. At the end of the timed period we will reward them with small daily prizes to encourage attendance.
Week of May 30 - June 5, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: After our meeting on Friday the girls and I went to the boys and girls club to recruit more students. Mark took our advice from last time to put all the 4th- 6th graders in one room to talk to them one on one about the math program we will be conducting over the summer. During the recruiting we were able to pass out a lot of parent consent forms that we would hopefully receive back. The children and the staff at the boys and girls club seemed excited and motivated to help recruit. This was great. Also this week I made a weekly calendar for the group showing the days we needed to be at the preschool and at the boys and girls club. This will hopefully keep the group a little more organized.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I continued my search for more articles for our literature review. I was able to find a few more, but also came across many that we already have found in the past. I was also pleasantly surprised at how my experiences with this research project are helping me with my master's program. I was working with a group member on an assessment needs document and she commented on how well I was doing with it. I realized that it was because I had already formulated something similar to this for the research project. It was nice to see that this project will help me with future projects in my career field. Also this week we found out that we will be starting the boys and girls club data collection on June 15. All three researchers will be going to the club tomorrow and on Monday to help recruit more students to the study.
Amelia Weigant: This week I helped edit our calendar documents. Cassidy created a rough draft of our schedules and I contributed my available hours. We have officially decided that we will begin data collection at the boys and girls club on june 15th. I have drafted up parental surveys which will help us collect data on how the childrens reactions to math have changed because of our study. We are mostly focusing our research on how children can grow positive feelings about math by being exposed to learning games.
Week of May 23 - May 29, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: This week we were all very busy with graduation and the last days of school, so we decided not to meet as a group and instead do individual work. I found good articles for our literature review on 5-6th graders, math games, and effects of learning games on engagement, satisfaction, and learning outcomes in general. More research the group can compile the better and stronger our bibliography gets. Also by doing literature review we get to explore what other researchers have done and found throughout their studies. We also had to sign up for the CST 397 independent study class for over the summer.
Since we changed the start date for the boys and girls club we needed to change the cover letter of the consent forms. We did not feel like the original one Mark designed met all of the research aspects so we designed them a little differently. I was in charge of the Spanish one.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I began looking for more articles for our literature review. This time I am focusing on 4th-6th graders and also on studies involving math games. It is slow because I am not finding a lot of studies that focus primarily on these elements. I am also beginning my master's program in instructional technology this week so my attention will again be divided between the project and my school work. I am a little concerned about the results of the day care study since we are no longer observing it everyday. I am looking forward to the post testing to see what the kids have learned. I also hope that the boys and girls club will result in good data collection for our study.
Amelia Weigant: We have completed recruiting at the Boys and Girls club. We held a presentation at a "club meeting" where all the members attended. For the most part, all the interested children had already signed up. We were able to remind the members to attend the meeting times though, so the recruitment was a success. We currently have 21 signed up members, and we are hoping to attract even more.
We are continuing the literature review, narrowing our sources down to mainly pre-school and 5th grade studies. We are having a small amount of success but we are gradually collecting a large amount of studies on this age group.
Week of May 16 - May 22, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: Since we were unsuccessful in recruiting enough students at the boys and girls club we decided as a group to begin the program in the summer. This gives us two more weeks of recruiting and more time to install the math programs on all the computers. Starting the program during the summer also minimizes the student dropout rate because some of the students only attend the boys and girls club during the school year and not during the summer. I also went to the preschool on Wednesday again and monitored the children. This time not as many children were distracted by the computers but the daycare teachers felt our presence at the daycare was overwhelming and distracting to the students. The daycare teachers also said this to Teresa. At the meeting we choose to only make fidelity checks at the preschool instead of going in everyday and monitoring the children.
Teresa Sundholm: This week we were told by the day care center that our presence was distracting to the children with us coming in to observe everyday. They requested to run the computer time with the children themselves. We developed a fidelity checklist and I went to the daycare center this week to check that everything was being done correctly for our study. This week also marked a delay in starting the research at the Boys and Girls club as we needed to recruit more participants. We decided to push the start date back to the club's summer program in hopes of recruiting more kids.
Amelia Weigant: This week we were forced to move the Boys and Girls club starting dates back another week because we are having difficulty recruiting enough members. Hopefully when we return in person and give a presentation to the kids, they will be more eager to sign up. The preschool has requested that we discontinue visits, as it is disrupting to the children there. The children have also formed a deep dislike of the game "AOL Learn your Letters" and are refusing to play it.
Week of May 9 - May 15, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: On Saturday Teresa and I attended the boys and girls club orientation in Salinas. This two-hour event informed us about the club, their mission statement, goals and gave us a tour around the building. We are really focused only on the technology room because this is where the program is going to be taking place in. The technology room is a nice big room with about 20-25 computers stationed around the walls. We were also informed that the computers are set on a program where the children can only access educational websites and no facebook or myspace will be allowed nor cannot be accessed on the computers. There are also specific rules for the technology lab that Teresa and I made ourselves familiar with.
On Monday I and the other two student researchers went back to the club and started to recruit students for our research. We stood at the front and asked both students and parents if they would be interesting in participating in a fun math program. If they seemed interested we talked to them about the program and gave them a form they needed to fill out and give back to club asap. It was hard to pick, choose and sometimes guess the students who were in 4th, 5th or 6th grade. After most of the children cleared out for the day, we asked Mark if maybe next time we came to recruit he could put all the correct aged students in a room to talk to. He liked our idea so in the next few weeks we decided to return and recruit more students.
Teresa Sundholm - This week Cassidy and I attended the orientation at the boys and girls club. I was impressed with the size of the center and the work that is done there with the local kids. Also myself and the other two student researchers went to the boys and girls club to talk with the kids about joining the math program research. We had expected to talk to kids and maybe parents all at once in a room. Instead we found out that we had to recruit them by walking up to them and talking with them. This was challenging as we had to find out how old the children were and also track down as many as we could. We did give out a good amount of forms and will wait to see how many sign up. If we do not get enough then we will push the data collection at the club back to the summer program and hope for more students to sign up by then.
This has been a very challenging week for me to work on the research project as I am preparing for my final capstone presentation on Friday as well as commencement on Saturday. I hope we can resolve some of these issues with both the daycare and the boys and girls club soon so that we have a good idea of the schedule for our research over the summer.
Amelia Weigant - This week was filled with challenges. I and the other 2 student researchers went to the Boys and Girls club in Salinas to give our 15 minute presentation and attempt to get children to join. When we got there, it turned out that we would have to go around and approach roaming students one by one, a process that took nearly 2 hours. We also ran out of forms halfway through the recruitment and had to wait for more copies. It was challenging but we were able to distribute approximately 30 to 40 forms. If even half of those forms are returned then we will have enough students to begin the project. This week we will check back in with Mark and see how many signed forms we have collected so far.
Week of May 2 - May 8, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: Wednesday I attended the preschool and monitored the students 2nd day on the computers. I got there a little early to turn on the computers and set each computer up with the correct program. When I called the first 2 children up at the computers, I noticed all the other children were engaged in watching their classmates play on the computer. This was very distracting to both the children playing on the computers and for me. Their teachers did finally come and helped me move the other children away from the computer desks but however it didn’t stop them from peeking through furniture to get a glimpse of the computers. This was only the second day with the computers for the children, so it is still all very new and exciting. I also noticed a couple of the children who were on the white computer did not know how to use a computer mouse. They were having trouble trying to choose their answers. I did later find out that these children were the youngest children in the bunch, so it don’t not surprise me that their computer skills were lower than the other children in the class.
Also this coming up week Teresa and I are going to attend a 2-hour boys and girls club orientation meeting in Salinas. Mark the director for the boys and girls club thought it would be beneficial if we get familiar with the club and its faculty.
Teresa Sundholm - We began the data collection at the daycare center this week. I found it very stressful and difficult to manage so many small children at once. Because the computers were right next to each other, it was impossible to keep the children who were not supposed to play one game or the other away from the other computer. Especially, since the kids wanted to help each other play the games. Some children would not leave the computer when we asked and the daycare center workers had to help us get the kids away from the computers. The next day I went for the first time on my own and it was a little better as the daycare workers tried to keep the children occupied so that only a few kids were over by the computers. It was still a challenge to keep the kids on the correct computer though. I think we need to discuss what we can do differently and also how this affects our data collection with the younger kids. Cassidy and I have also signed up to go to the orientation at the boys and girls club this Saturday.
Amelia Weigant - This week power was restored to the pre-school so we were finally able to continue the data collection. We have also ordered the pre- and post-tests for the Boys and Girls club, which should be arriving soon. We adjusted the date of our Boys and Girls club research recruitment day and changed it to next week. It should be a short and simple 15 minute meeting where we speak to a group of children and parents and we will attempt to get at least 15 to 20 more signed up kids. We will also be delivering the second software for the club to install on their computers. We hope to begin the pre-test on May 17th.
Week of April 25 - May 1, 2009
Cassidy Bennett - The group and I started to write in the final results from the pretest at the preschool. Cathi was there so we were able to write in the correct results. The preschool schedule was set for this week and last week but of course another delay occurred. The wall where we connected the computers went out, so no electricity was available for the computers. This set us back a week and a day. After the electrician came I was able to go into the preschool on Monday to reconnect the computers and get the paper work ready for Teresa and Bude on Tuesday. I will return again to the preschool on Wednesday to perform the second day of testing.
As for the Boys and Girls club, Teresa and I signed up for the orientation on Saturday May 9th and filled out our background information. The head director for boys and girls has been out of town so we hope to get in contact with him next week to go over the last details of our research. Bude and Cathi ordered the math pre/ posttest for 5th graders, so we should have this by next week in order to start testing the children May 18th. We decided the study is going to take 5 weeks (4 weeks for the actually testing and 1 week for the pre and post tests).
All of us student researchers have been quite busy and stressed out with the semester coming to an end. We should have a lot more free time in the next 2 weeks to spend more solid time on the project.
Teresa Sundholm - This week we were supposed to start the children playing the games at the day card center and begin our observational research. Unfortunately, there was a power problem in the walls of the center and it has to be fixed before we can start.The delay is frustrating for our group, but for me personally it is welcome as I am graduating and completing my capstone project over the next two weeks. I feel my attention is divided at this point which makes it hard to put my full energies into the research project.
Amelia Weigant - This week we encountered more issues at the preschool. The power went out in all of the electrical outlets on the side of the room where the computers are. We had to delay the data collection while we wait for an electrician to come by and restore power. We are also having several scheduling issues, because myself and the other student researchers are heading into finals week and capstone soon. It is difficult to balance the research project with our finals but it is very rewarding. After finals week is over we will be able to devote 100% of our effort into this project during the summer.
Week of April 18 - April 24, 2009
Cassidy Bennett - For the past two weeks we have been attending the preschool and performing their pre-test based on the DIBELS worksheet. We finished this but we had to wait for Cathi to go over the answers to make sure we added all the children's scores correctly. Some of the sub tests went better than others. I noticed that a lot of the children didn't understand what I was asking them to do, so they guessed, which not give us actuate results. But once we talk to Cathi I am sure it will get all cleared up. The preschooler's will started their 10 minutes periods on the computer Monday.
Our next assignment was to talk about our schedule for the boys and girls club. We had an over the phone conference with the director and he answered many questions we had. Each of us will have to complete a back-round check form and an orientation to be certified to attend their organization. I believe the 5 of us will attend this orientation next week in Seaside. We are also still deciding if we can finish the research at the club in a 4-week period rather than 6 weeks, but the only dilemma is that the children only have a 2 hour period Monday, Wednesday and Friday to work on the assigned computers. The computer lab has 12 computers so we hope to research a total of 48 to 56 children between the grades of 4 through 6th grade.
Teresa Sundholm - This week we had a conference call with the director of the boys and girls club in Salinas. We discussed the procedures for the children using the games. We talked about the schedule and asked him his opinion on doing our study over four weeks or eight weeks. He told us we all need to fill out a form for a background check to be done and that we need to go through an orientation with him. We also came up with a schedule for each us to observe the day care children playing the games during the next two weeks.
Amelia Weigant - Next week we are going to the Boys and Girls club to recruit extra members to our project.We are hoping to get all of the 4-6 graders and possibly some parents into a room so we can present to all of them at once, but this is unlikely to happen. Mark Wilson, the Boys and Girls club technical director, is going to print out copies of the sign-up forms in English and Spanish and we will distribute them to the children. Right now we have about 30 kids signed up but ideally we would like to have 40 to 50.
Week of April 11 - April 17, 2009
Teresa Sundholm - This week we conducted the pre-testing of the 3, 4, and 5 year olds at the daycare center. It was an interesting experience for me and I found it challenging not to correct the children during the testing per the instructions. The children seem very eager to learn. I think it was helpful for us to know how many of the children had language/reading skills and how many did not. Many of the children were unable to do the tests well so I think it will be a good outcome of the project to see whether the computer games increase their knowledge. In about two weeks we will start the computer instruction with the children and we will be attending the sessions to insure that the project is being conducted according to the needs of our project.
Amelia Weigant - This week I met with the other student researchers to discuss our progress and compare notes. I spoke about my software-testing work at the boys and girls club and we decided it was very important to begin the Salinas permission slip and pre-testing process soon. The workers at the boys and girls club are very helpful and supportive about our research, while we have been met with some resistance and miscommunication at the pre-school facility. Regardless, the pre-school data collection has already begun.
Week of April 4 - April 10, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: At this weeks meeting we went over the assessment test we will be doing to the preschoolers on Monday and Wednesday of this week. The assessment we are using is DIBELS for preschoolers. Cathi is familiar with DIBELS so she trained us on the format of the test and how to correctly perform the test on the preschoolers. We each have our individual folders containing all the test materials so when we get to the preschool each of us will test one child at a time. The test takes about 2-3 minutes for each child and a portion of the test is timed so the children will only have a certain amount of time to complete certain sections. As for the boys and girls club Amelia is going there on Tuesday to install the other math program into their computer. We decided to use math blasters, which is very visual and interactive and then another math program, which is just the opposite very informative but not so interactive and visual. So then when the results are done we will have two different games to compare and contrast.
Teresa Sundholm: This week we began to prepare for the pre-testing of the children at the CSUMB daycare. Cathi ran through a practice one to show us how it needed to be conducted. I studied the long form instructions and practiced the testing myself. Next week we will do the pre-testing and make sure that all the computer equipment is installed and ready to use.
Amelia Weigant: This week I went over to the boys and girls club in Salinas and installed the game software on their computer to test it. The title we chose is "Math Detectives". The game worked well and the workstations are even equipped with headphones so the students can utilize the audio without bothering others. The game has very reasonable system requirements but it was a necessity to make sure that it would work. The IT director at the facility accompanied me and helped me log into the machines and gain administrator/install access. It appears that only one copy of the game is required to work on all of the machines, rather than having to buy 20 copies. This will help us conserve our research budget.
Week of March 28 - April 3, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: I was unable to meet with the group on Friday because my class I attend before our meetings went way over the time. Even though I didn't meet with the group I have been still researching math assessments we can use at the Boys and Girls club.I was unsuccessful trying to find the Key Math or the Woodcock Johnson assessments Cathi wanted us to look for because she has easy access to these test. Instead found two really good journals that used their students performances in the prior Pennsylvania System of School Assessment (PSSA). Then the post-test they used was a 30 multiple choice question “Game Skills Arithmetic Test (GSAT)” that was constructed based on the PSSA. Another journal similar to this one used the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills Exit Level Mathematics Test. I wonder if there are any assessments we can use from the California state standards of mathematics for 4th and 5th graders? I know this will be difficult to get our hands on but it might be the best option.
In addition to finding assessments, I have been working on strengthen our bibliography. We have lots to talk about in our next meeting and hopefully we can get everything started soon.
Teresa Sundholm: This week we continued looking through our literature review articles for examples of math assessments that we could modify for our research. We visited the day care center to check on the status of the computer. We determined that we need to meet with the day care center staff again prior to the children using the computer so that they understand how our study needs to be conducted. We each were given the dibbels assessment instructions to become familiar with how it works. We hope to install another computer at the day care center and begin that phase of the research very soon.
Amelia Weigant: This week I looked back through the articles to find math tests we can use on the Boys and Girls club members. It was very difficult finding math tests in the materials section because most of my articles were academic in nature and weren't actual experiments.
I am excited to begin work at the Boys and Girls club and I hope we can begin testing soon. We discussed that it will be much easier to complete the testing before summer break begins so we can make sure to keep all of our students enrolled in the program.
Week of March 21 - March 27, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: After the week off from Spring Break we discussed the dibels website, which we be using for our posttest for the preschoolers. The test itself will only take about 10-15 minutes for each child but before we get started we need to get all the consent forms from the parents of the children. As I mentioned before the preschool faculty and staff has completely changed so some children are new to the preschool and some did not return. This has caused a great delay for our research. We are all kind of apprehensive on the new staff at the preschool also. We are not so certain that they are going to follow through with the proper procurers we are going to assign for them. This worries all of us. As for the boys and girls club we have it all set up but we just need to find a good posttest. Amelia, Teresa and I are going to look back into the research papers we reviewed and find which posttest other researchers have used for their studies. For myself I am in the process of gathering more studies to strengthen our bibliography. As of now my research has been successful and I have found a lot of new studies to add, but I need a couple more days to research a little more.
Teresa Sundholm: This week we discussed how we would be pre-testing and post-testing the children during our research. This week I will be visiting the day care center to check on when the children are scheduled to be on the computers so that we can be present to oversee that they are playing the correct games. I will also be looking through ten of our literature review articles to find examples of the math assessment tests that can be used for our math game research at the boys and girls club.
Amelia Weigant: This week we worked on strategies to gather all of the consent forms required for the preschool center. We are almost finished gathering all of the consent forms and will soon start testing. We discussed different options for testing the children on their current knowledge about letters and we all agreed on the same testing method. We are also investigating testing methods for the children at the Boys and Girls club of Salinas.
Week of March 7 - March 20, 2009
Spring Break
Week of Febuary 28 - March 6, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: This week we brought in our list of features we complied from our research. All three of us made separate lists so Bude photocopied them and give a list to each of us. Then we split into 2 groups to analyze the computer games we will be using for the preschoolers. The first group studied the star fall program and the second group studied the AOL learning letter game. Looking at each of the lists and studying the computer game, we put a check mark on which attributes the game had and also adding attributes to the list we didn’t have. I studied the AOL learning letter game, which was a slight easier than the star fall game. When we were finished playing the games and marking each attribute we came together as a group to compare and contrast the attributes of each game. It was interesting to see these similarities and differences and this will also be very helpful to our research results. After this was completed I showed the group an example of a multimedia attitude test I found in a journal, Digital Gaming As a Pedagogical Tool Among 4th and 5th Grade Students, they used for their research. I thought would be a good tool use for our research also.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I finished the re-design of our website. We will be taking photos of the team to add to the site in the near future. Also this week, I re-read the ten articles I was assigned from our literature review, this time looking specifically for features of the games to add to a master list. We will use this list to narrow down the features of educational computer that we want to document as we begin our observational research. I also looked for and found a confidence survey that we can modify for our research. We visited the preschool and met the new staff. We are also waiting for additional computer equipment to be installed.
Amelia Weigant: This week we met together to identify aspects of the computer games that we can measure. We created a list of 30 attributes to study, and we broke into teams to study the two different games for pre-school children. I studied the AOL Learning Letters game and worked through the list, marking which attributes the game had, and which it lacked. This was more challenging than I thought it would be. After we were done analyzing the games, we came back together to compare each others lists. My list matched my teammates' closely, but it wasn't perfect. We discussed the discrepancies and formulated a final list of attributes.
Week of February 21 - February 27th, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: Friday during our meeting we discussed the information compiled from our research on the 10 bibliographies. Since we wrote our notes freely on a paper Bude thought it would be best if we combined all the information onto a typed paper and submit it on ilearn. We also want to go back into the research papers and try to find a satisfaction, confidence and engagement surveys to give to the parents at the Boys and Girls club. The group members and I are meeting on Monday March 2nd at the Preschool to talk to the faculty and staff about what our research is going to entail. The faculty at the preschool has completely changed so getting the new faculty informed will be very important in conducting and collecting data to our research properly. Amelia visited the Boys and Girls to ensure our project will begin in April. The data collection will last about 4-6 weeks in both the Boys and Girls club and at the preschool. The preschoolers will be working everyday for about 10 minutes and the older children will have computer time 30 minutes for 2 days every week. This will equal to about an hour a week for each of our data groups. The pre-tests for the preschoolers will take about 15 minutes for each child but for the older children the pre-test is going to take 30-40 minutes per child. I can't wait to get started!
Teresa Sundholm: This week we met to make preparations for starting the observational part of the research at the CSUMB daycare center. I am continuing with the design and updating of the project website. I continued to read through the articles assigned to me and began to determine which features of the computer games were the most effective in previous studies. This is done so that we can compare our results with those found in our literature review. This week I will compile a list of features mentioned in the articles I re-read. Then as a group we will compare our findings. Also this week we will meet with the new staff of the daycare center and discuss with them how we will conduct our research.
Amelia Weigant: This week I attended the Boys and Girls club orientation in Salinas. The orientation lasted 2 hours and we read through a large orientation manual that explained the requirements to become a volunteer. I got a tour of the facility, including the computer lab where I will help the children while they play the learning games. The children at the facility seemed to be primarily male and from low-income households. The Salinas facility serves the entire Monterey Bay area, reaching as far as Soledad. Later in the week, I also reviewed articles that we have collected and tried to determine features in the games that we can study.
Week of February 14 - February 20th, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: We decided as a group to go back into our annotated bibliography and re-read important aspects in each. We a have a good compile of 30 researches so the three of us took 10 each. For next week we want to examine the two math programs we are using for the Boys and Girls club and compare and contrast between the two while using information from our research. Some features of the games we want to focus on are the visual characteristics, if they use positive reinforcement and the possible engagement points. We are also trying to still figure out the password and the Internet access for the pre-school computer. The pre-school is changing their faculty in mid March but we definitely confirmed that nothing will be altered through our research with their faculty change. Bude Su proposed our MRO-W research project to AECT and we chose Amelia to represent us in the conference in October. Our next meeting is this coming Friday to discuss our work and review the computer programs.
Teresa Sundholm: This week we began to prepare for the next phase of the research at the CSUMB daycare. We each were assigned ten of the articles that we had found during our literature review to re-read and find all of the features of computer games that we mentioned in previous studies. We decided that a re-design and update of our website was needed to provide a better online presence for our research data. I am studying web design and technology so I will do the re-design of our website this week.
Amelia Weigant: This week I visited one of the research sites, the Boys and Girls club. I spoke with the office about setting up an orientation so I can begin research there in the spring without any difficulty. There is an orientation program for all CSUMB volunteers so I will attend that. I look forward to working with the kids.
Week of February 7 - February 13th, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: We got together this Friday and discussed how we are going to use two literacy programs for the preschool and two math programs for the 4th and 6th graders. Teresa found another online literacy program called learn your letters on aol. After we explored the new program we went over to the preschool and talked to the director. The preschool had their computer in but we were unable to login so Cathi is going to talk to the IT department. I am going to work on getting more literature review in regards to literacy.
Teresa Sundholm: This week we decided on a second game for the day care center. We will use two literacy games for the day care center and two math games for the boys and girls club. We still need to make final choices for the math games. After visiting the day care center and learning that the staff will be changing, we are going to wait for a bit before beginning the observational part of the research. In the meantime, I will continue working on the article organization and updating the website.
Amelia Weigant: This week I worked on revising the CPHS form to authorize our research team to expand into a second testing location. This form is important because we need to notify the proper oversight group so they can continue to allow us to research. Our second testing location is the Salinas Boys and Girls club, which is scheduled to start some time in March.
Week of February 2 - February 6th, 2009
Cassidy Bennett: I am proud to say I am the newest edition to the group and very excited to get started. In our first meeting of the New Year, I introduced myself to the group and then we talked about the plan for the next few weeks. We are waiting for the computers to arrive at the CSUMB preschool and we are going to start at boys and girls club as soon as possible. As for me, I am in the process of taking the SDSU IRB Tutorial test and complying current studies for our annotated bibliography.
Teresa Sundholm: This week we continued to search for other games that could be used at the day care center for our research. I began sorting through the articles to determine which are more centered on pre-school age kids and which are more centered on older kids.
Amelia Weigant: This week we continued to go over our learning game selection and are beginning to narrow it down. We also learned about some staff changes that will soon occur at the preschool. I contacted the Boys and Girls club in Salinas one more time to confirm that the research will begin after spring break.
Week of January 26 - January 30th, 2009
Teresa Sundholm: This week we met to discuss our plans for conducting the research at the CSUMB pre-school. We discussed how testing would be conducted and continued to look for additional software programs for our study. We welcomed Cassidy to the team and we will be starting the next phase of our research as soon as computers are set up at the pre-school.
Amelia Weigant: Today we went over the different ways we can test the preschoolers and determine how much they already know. We will give the preschoolers a pre- and post-test to help us measure how much they have learned due to the games. We discussed the possibility of using three different types of tests. We decided on using a test that was geared towards children aged 3 to 6. The test featured questions about colors, vocabulary, and letter and number recognition. We will begin testing the students in the near future.
Week of November 29- December 12th, 2008
Teresa Sundholm: This week I received feedback on my literature review section. I will be making revisions and sending it back to my advisors for further review. In our last meeting before the semester break, we discussed what the next parts of the project would be and what we could do during the break to prepare for the next stage of the research.
Amelia Weigant: This week I finished up and submitted my literature review. Writing literature reviews is a completely new experience for me so it was quite difficult. However I believe I created a strong paper. We will get our revised literature reviews back within the next 1-2 weeks so we can submit a final version.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I sent the first draft of my section of the literature review to our advisors for feedback. I believe it is a good first draft. It was difficult to write as in our research I was unable to find much detail about the actual features of the games being studied, just the learning outcomes of the students. I hope that in our study we are able to include more about the features of the games themselves.
Week of November 15- November 21, 2008
Amelia Weigant: This week I went to Salinas Boys and Girls Club to tour the facility and speak with the program coordinators about the research we plan to conduct there. I also worked more on my portion of the literature review. I used Patryse's helpful outline to guide my article choices. We will be compiling the different parts of the literature review tomorrow. After the different parts are assembled, we will edit them as a group to make a single, strong literature review paper.
Patryse Brownstephens: I reviewed more material for the article, mentally organized a possible approach. I still feel confident that we have enough information to construct a great report.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I struggled to narrow down our research to the section that I am writing for our literature review. I am going to take more time to focus on making sure that what I am writing about pertains directly to our research and that it is focused on computer games rather than other forms of learning. Once I feel that I have gathered the correct sources then I will be able to write my section.
Week of November 8- November 14, 2008
Amelia Weigant: I received my sections of the research paper and have begun to collect the appropriate articles. The requirements of the paper are very straightfoward. I will work on the rough draft so I can submit it for approval.
Patryse Brownstephens: We have distributed the sections of the research paper that each of us will cover. I look forward to writing the research paper. Writing is my field of expertise; this is where I desire most to contribute to the research. We discussed, last week, the requirements of the paper, answering all questions. I think we will proceed with confidence; we were initially a little concerned about the complex subject matter and wondered how to extract our information from such technical and lengthy documents.
Teresa Sundholdm: This week I began re-reading articles for our literature review. I will be writing a section of our review pertaining to the technical and design aspects of computer games and how these elements affect learning when children use them. I will need to narrow down all the information gathered to just the parts that pertain to my section and that will take some time.
Week of November 2- November 7, 2008
Amelia Weigant: This week we received the Literature Research outline and I looked over it carefully. Each student was assigned different portions of the outline. Teresa and I are working on the technical portions and Patryse is completing the non-technical portions. The Literature Research outline rough draft will be completed in roughly 2-3 weeks. I have begun outlining my sections and rereading the articles that we have compiled.
Patryse Brownstephens: This week, I reviewed the outline for the literature review. I contemplated new sub topics that we can cover in our review. We are going to need the guidelines from Cathy (previously discussed) to ensure that we are gathering the necessary information for the paper. I look forward to writing the paper. We need to discuss the outline and gather our input before we can proceed.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I created a web banner for our web site to reflect our research on computer games and learning. I also reviewed Patryse's work on the literature review outline in preparation for our discussion of it at our meeting this week.
Week of October 26- November 2, 2008
Amelia Weigant: This week I helped collaborate with Teresa to finalize a list of questions for the teacher survey. We are also continuing to review the different game selections. We are awaiting the installation of computer hardware at our first research site. Once the hardware is installed we can begin collecting research data at the preschool.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I worked on the first draft of our Teacher survey. I combined my list of questions with Amelia's and sent the draft to our advisors for review. I sent the finished survey, teacher consent form, and the final answers of the questions to Dr. Lieberman, who is overseeing our research for MRO-W. I discussed options for different games to be used in our research with our advisors and the other student researchers.
Week of October 19-26, 2008
Amelia Weigant: This week I collaborated with Teresa on compiling a list of questions for the game effectiveness questionnaire. We are continuing to review games that would satisfy the requirements of this project. We have discussed more than one option, including writing the game ourselves, purchasing a retail game, or using free web-based games.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I worked with my faculty advisor to answer questions we received about our Human Subjects application. We discussed the questions and worked on answering them in a clear and detailed way. I also continued my article research, but did not find any articles I thought were relevant this week.
Week of October 11-18, 2008
Patryse Brownstephens: I am still discovering new terms that will be useful in my topic searches. I feel that I was just getting into a routine and gaining a better understanding of how to search - just as it is time to move forward to another part of the information gathering task.
This week marks the end of searching out material and moving onward to reviewing the material that I've gathered.
Amelia Weigant: This week I narrowed down my research to specifically focus on the effects of learning games on very young children. We are going to begin our study at the preschool very soon so this newly focused research will help provide us with valuable tools. I read three new articles this week that dealt specifically with preschool and kindergarten aged children. It appears it is harder to test the effects of learning on young children because they tend to make more mistakes in answering questions. I went to the library to try new methods of searching, because I have exhausted the list of online articles I found through Google. The librarian helped teach me about the university's article system and I was able to find many relevant results.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I continued looking for articles to support the literature review. I also reviewed two websites on how to write a literature review, as I have never done one before. We are currently waiting on the installation of a computer at the day care center so we can begin the observation part of the project.
Week of October 3-10, 2008
Patryse Brownstephens: This week, I found a search term that brought up much more information: Early Childhood Education, Software. I found this term in the description column of another article. Thus far, the ECE, Software has been the most successful in bringing up pertinent material. I also utilized a citation from one of the documents I located under the ECE, Software search. It led to one great source. This week was the fastest my search has gone.
Amelia Weigant: This week I worked on the project's website, and read more articles. I changed the look and feel of the site, and collected bios from my fellow researchers and posted them online. I have read 5 articles documenting the effects of learning games on children and adults, but only 3 of the articles were relevant. Next week we will visit the daycare center that we will be conducting research at. We cannot begin collecting data this week because we are waiting for the chilrens' permission slips to be returned to us.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I was more successful in my search for articles. I narrowed the focus down to pre-school age children. I found more articles, both on Google Scholar and in the Eric database. The search terms I found to be most successful were a combination of: computer assisted instruction (learning), pre-school, and early childhood education. I am interested to see how our research progresses once we start observing the children at the daycare center. I am curious to see what our findings will be in comparison to the studies I have read about so far.
Week of September 26-October 3, 2008
Patryse Brownstephens: I worked with a librarian to locate information that fit within our search terms. She suggested that I truncate certain words (shift + 8) to bring in more results. It didn't help much. However, I did find that some key words did yield more information within the Eric Database. Last week, the group recommended that I use the Eric Database rather than the Elite Database. That recommendation also yielded more results.
Amelia Weigant: This week I spent roughly 6 hours working on the research project's official website, which is nearly ready to be published. I read several articles highlighting different aspects of learning games for children. I tried to focus the chosen articles on the effects the games have on the childrens' test scores and what methods the researchers used to measure the increased learning. Reading the articles and writing the synopsis took up the rest of my time working. Tomorrow I am going to a nearby preschool to help investigate and take notes on the location. We are hoping to find that this site will be an ideal research location.
Teresa Sundholm: This week I read two articles and wrote summaries for them. I also wrote the first draft of the Parental Consent forms for signature of the parents of the children participating in the CSUMB day-care center part of our research. I am continuing to gather articles for the literature review.
Weeks of September 1-26, 2008
Amelia Weigant: I learned how to conduct literature reviews. I read several articles but only 3 of them applied to the project. I am slowly becoming better at narrowing down my searches. I also completed the Human Subjects Research Certification from San Diego State University. It was challenging to complete but I was successful on my first try. I learned a lot about appropriate research conduct while working on the certification, and I will be sure to apply what I've learned in the coming months.
Teresa Sundholm: Over the first few weeks of the research project, I took the online certification test, met with our group and discussed how the research would be conducted, worked with a librarian on how to do research for the literature review, completed rough drafts of the Human Subjects Application and the Parental Consent Form for my advisors review, and gathered articles with summaries for the literature review.
As I have never done a research project before, it has been an interesting and overall enjoyable experience. I liked working on the Human Subjects Application as it gave me a good overview of our project and clarified all the research questions we are going to be working on getting answers to. It has been informative to read about the studies that have been done before and I look forward to seeing any similarities and differences in our study by comparison.