From the beginning, I knew that while most of this research study would be in my control, there were plenty of outside uncontrollable forces that could make it necessary for me to pause in my research process. This question always remained whether this pause would come from in-person or virtual reasons or if and when it would happen.
This question has finally been answered.
After completing both units of the traditional teaching method vocabulary, one complete unit of the Augmented Reality (AR) teaching method, and pre-testing and teaching the final unit of AR vocabulary, this is where the journey got slightly bumpy. As most everyone knows, in the current state of the world, COVID vaccines are a hot topic. Teachers have been approved and vaccine administration in waves has begun. My district's vaccination wave falls on Wednesday, and it was decided that both Wednesday and Thursday will be changed to 100% asynchronous days for students in order for staff to receive their vaccinations if desired. With an ordinary schedule, this might not have been an issue. However, my district is still operating on a hybrid A/B day schedule with Friday remaining asynchronous. This shift in two asynchronous days makes it so that the B cohort of students does not come into the building at all next week. When learning this information, I had already done the pre-testing and teaching part of the final AR unit with students. This left me with some options:
Only use the data from Unit 1 (traditional) and Unit 2 (AR) and toss the rest
Toss my current pre-test data from Unit 4 (AR), wait about a week until I'll be able to see both cohorts again, and start with a fresh AR unit
Toss all of the data from B cohort and keep only the data from the A cohort students because I will still see them next week and could post-test Unit 4
While I could use my data as is through option 1, I really want to carry out all four units of this process so I can see if the positive preliminary findings I have from the first round of traditional vs. AR teaching methods are a fluke or if more of a pattern will form after completing all four. I could push on with option 3 and keep only the data from A cohort students I have collected thus far, but it cuts my data in half. This option also forces me to put all of my hope in each of the A cohort students coming to school next week. Plus, I would really hate to throw out half of what I've collected so far. Even though it means I need to pause and rewind in the study and creating more work for myself, I decided to go with option 2. I feel as though taking a pause in the data collection process in order to be able to collect as much data as I can from students will give me a better sampling to see more realistic results. As it is, I've already dropped from my original 37 students in the study down to 25 due to absences, quarantining, and students deciding to stop using the headset. In the event more of this happening, I feel better having an overall larger sample size to pull data from.
Furthermore, a lot of buzz has gathered in the halls around my study with my students, colleagues, and administrators, so I feel as though I owe it to both the integrity of the study as a whole and everyone invested to gather as much data as I can. My students, both officially in the study and not, are interested to see their personal results as well as the overall outcome. My colleagues are intrigued because no one in the building has really attempted teaching with AR before or has utilized virtual field trips. My administrator has become invested as well after her observation and is very fascinated in learning the outcome. We've even had conversations of how other content areas could take advantage of immersing students into their own AR worlds, pros and cons of implementing more VR in the classroom, and if it would be worth purchasing a set of VR headsets for each department. Personally, I am also interested in finding out if student reactions to the post-testing process will be the same as it was after the first AR unit and to find out the overall outcome of this study.
Thankfully since I started so early in my data collection process during the college semester, I have plenty of time to take this time to pause to rewind this last unit in the study. In order to do this, I first deleted all of the pre-testing data I had collected from students and scrapped their pre-tests. I then needed to assemble a new list of 10 words that will be used with a new VR field trip through Nearpod. After deciding on my list of words and where students will take their virtual trip, I wrote out my teaching script for the the unit so all students will get the same instruction across the study. Finally, I made the new pre- and post-assessment for this unit.
I am very excited to see how the final round of this study plays out and to see the results. It has been amazing to see it all come to life in the classroom so far. In my next post, I hope to discuss the data analysis after all four vocabulary units have been completed. I continue to look forward to sharing my research through this internship journey. Feel free to contact me through the comments, this site, or email me at mtyson2@ycp.edu.