Planning  Your  Research  Study

 

Name: Kevin White

 

  1. Tentative research topic:
    Explore the connection of learning style and teaching style alignment to the end of grade mathematic scores of 8th grade students.
  1. Research question:
    Does teaching and learning style alignment improve the math performance of 8th grade students in North Carolina Middle Schools?
  1. Significance (Why is this an important question to investigate):
    Research and published accountability in the     United States reflects lowering mathematic performance of students in our public schools systems. In the emerging global arena there is a need to improve the performance of the American education system to obtain new levels of proficiency.
  1. Operational definitions:

    2. Independent variable
          Matching teaching and learning styles

    Dependent variable(s)
      Student end of grade math scores

  1. Possible instrument(s) to be used to measure outcome variable(s):
    Teaching style survey
    Learning style survey
    End of grade test scores
  1. Hypothesis
    Eighth grade students whose learning style matches the teaching style of their instructor score higher on the end of grade math tests than those students whose learning style does not match their instructor’s teaching Style.
  1. Key words to be used in literature search:
      Learning Style
       Teaching Style
        End of Grade Test - Mathematics
  1. Titles of three related journal articles read (& journal name):
    A.     Teaching to students’ learning styles: approaches that work. Frontiers in Education Conference, 1999, Vol. 2, 12C1/7-12C114
    B. Graphing Calculators and Learning Styles in Rural and Non-Rural High Schools. Appalachian Collaborative Center for Learning, Assessment and Instruction in Mathematics, Working Paper No. 23
    C. Johnny might not be math-challenged; his problem could just be that he's an auditory learner. The Mathematical Association of America, http://www.maa.org/devlin/devlin_1_00.html
  1. Possible research design to be used: Causal-comparison

 

LINK TO PROPOSAL