Using the tool, Constructed RESPONSE, to increase student proficiency in answering constructed response questions
The action research project, “Using the tool, Constructed RESPONSE, to increase student proficiency in answering constructed response questions,” was conducted by a fourth and fifth grade writing teacher at Mountain View Elementary in Leslie County. The project focuses on increasing proficiency in constructed response question answers with fifth grade students.
The teacher found that many of the students were struggling to answer constructed response questions proficiently. Even though the students were using the RACE strategy to answer questions, students were still not reaching a proficient level with their responses. The students struggled particularly with citing evidence to support their answers and explaining their answers.
The teacher added the strategy, Constructed RESPONSE, with the RACE strategy, to teach students a different step by step process to answer the question. Each week, students completed a constructed response question for a formative assessment. For the study, students’ scores were tracked for 7 weeks, the first week was considered the pretest and the last week was the posttest.
Significant improvement was shown throughout the study. The number of proficient and distinguished increased significantly from the pretest to the posttest. The number of novices also decreased dramatically from the pretest to the posttest. There was also a 100% improvement from every student. The preassessment and post assessment survey also showed that students’ confidence in answering constructed responses also improved significantly.
The findings suggest that using the tool Constructed RESPONSE, along with the RACE strategy will improve student’s constructed writing responses.
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