Blog Topic #14

. Present pre-VTS baseline data

. Present formative “post VTS” data (Korean based Test)

. Analyze and discuss pretest and posttest results. Do you see evidence of the following?

 . More elaborate narratives?
Yes. Students’ responses in posttest were much more elaborate and profound than those in pretest. Having experienced VTS lessons, students have become interested in making up their own narrative based on their own experiences and even tiny little things in the image.

. Greater word count?

As the posttests’ result showed, they all wrote much longer interpretation and thoughts this time. The responses are twice as long as those of pretest and, needless to say, the words were used twice as many as those of pretest. I think this result was caused because of their strong interest in VTS (They love VTS instruction so much!) as well as their development. They were distracted and didn’t want to pay attention to the pretest.  

. Increased use of adjectives?

Adjectives also significantly increased twice or three times as many as those of the pretest. Since the length of writing got longer, it naturally got to has more adjective. Especially when wanting to use detailed expression or explaining about the evidences they found, the students used adjectives.

. Assertions with evidence?

At first, the students tend not to give any evidences for their assertions. Most students only arranged the simple facts even though two students were already good at making casual relationship and reasons at that time. In the posttest, however, every student found at least little evidence for their assertions and thoughts.

. Use of conditional language?

As the class went by, I found the students unintentionally imitated the way I use conditional language. At the end of the semester, almost all students got used to using conditional language. Especially this tendency was frequently founded in older age and among girls. In this posttest, I could find most students put conditional expressions in their writing even though they were not good enough compared to actual VTS discussion.    

. Suggesting various possibilities?

I believe my students have gotten more benefits from VTS than students in school classes because the class was only composed of 5 students so they can easily take turns speaking without any hesitation. How much are students interested in VTS, I believe, are also strongly related to the number of the class. Small class environment can motivate students to be fully engaged to the lesson and, needless to say, the more they can participate, the more interest they will have. And the more interest they have, the better achievement will come out. I think the 20 minutes class with around 20 students could not be considered as an ideal VTS class because of too little time to take turns. 

Interpret these preliminary findings

Even if the VTS class didn’t take place very often but the educational results were surprising. First, I could find students’ thinking skill is more improved than I expected. Their expressions were getting elaborate and it has casual relationships, guesses, imaginations, reflections and analysis in it. The experiences with VTS discussion must have effectively influenced on their thinking skill. Of course, there are complex reasons such as getting used to the requirements of VTS, recognizing there’s absolutely no answer and having interest in the learning style of VTS etc. One thing I was a little disappointed was that this test didn’t reflect well on amazing changes because the test was primarily writing. Without interaction, I think, the answers are less creative than any actual VTS discussion. And few children have better skill to speak than to write so their result wasn’t so great. I am wondering if there is any way to assess children in actual class by using video recording.