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Running head: VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM

THE EFFECTS OF VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION ON LETTER-SOUND RELATIONS

IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM

A Research Project
Presented to the
Faculty of the School of Education
Viterbo University

Catherine G. Bell-Robertson, Ph.D.


Research Advisor

Susan R. Hughes, Ed. D.


Coordinator of Educational Research

In Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the Degree
Master of Arts in Education

by

Marisa Bauer

July, 2017
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 2

Abstract

This paper examines the use of visual phonics instruction in the kindergarten classroom. I was

concerned that my students were not able to fluently produce the primary sound for each

consonant letter. The purpose of this action research study was to examine the effectiveness of

implementing visual phonics on student knowledge of letter- sound relation for my kindergarten

students. The participants in this study were 20 kindergarten students who attended a Pre-K

through 6th-grade elementary school in a Midwestern Iowa school district. This descriptive

mixed-methods action research study was implemented from the beginning of September

through December, 2016. The student participants completed a bi-weekly letter-sound

assessment, a pre-and post- intervention phonetic writing assessment, and monthly student

writing samples were collected. Parent participants completed pre-and post-intervention surveys

via email correspondence and Google Forms to help examine their perspective of the use of

visual phonics on their childs letter-sound knowledge. The results from this action research

study found that implementing visual phonics increased students letter-sound knowledge.

Students writing was also positively impacted by the use of visual phonics. The results in the

parent survey indicated that using visual phonics helped their child with learning their letter

sounds and in their writing. Overall, I look forward to implementing visual phonics in the future

to help all students be successful in their reading and writing.


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The Effects of Letter-Sound Relations in Kindergarten Classroom

Introduction

The start to a new school year is always an exciting time of year for both parents and

students. Students file into freshly organized, prepared classrooms as parents wish them well for

the first day back. In kindergarten, the start of a new school year may look different from other

grades. Parents nervously drop off their child, sometimes holding back tears, as this may be their

baby who they cannot imagine is already old enough to be starting school. As the first few

days of school get underway, I meet with parents for a short amount of time after school which is

known as input conferences. During this time, parents lead the conference to discuss strengths or

concerns that I may need to know about their child as a student and learner. While talking with

parents, they often times wonder and ask, What will my child learn in kindergarten this year?

Letters and numbers? This at one time, prior to Common Core State Standards, was an

effortless question to answer.

As I have found while teaching kindergarten for the past six years, our youngest

elementary students were coming into kindergarten with a wide variety of backgrounds and

skills. Some students may have attended pre-school, others may have not. Some students may

have practiced writing their name prior to school, others may have not. As one can tell, not all

students entering kindergarten have the same academic experiences. Often times, what other

students may find easy, such as learning and remembering letter sounds, can be difficult for

young children, especially for those who are just beginning kindergarten with little or no pre-

school experience. Skibbe, Hindman, Connor, Housey, and Morrison (2013) found that students
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 4

who attended prekindergarten before starting kindergarten in the fall had higher early reading

and phonological awareness scores than students who had not attended prekindergarten.

The past 2015-2016 school year held true to that, as I had many students who struggled

with identifying letters and producing letter sounds throughout the year. After reviewing

numerous letter sound assessments, I became very anxious and concerned because in order for

me to teach reading and writing, I needed the foundational piece of the alphabetic principle in

place well before the end of kindergarten. I knew I needed to have a plan to help my students

become proficient and with mastery meet the Common Core State Standard to produce the

primary sound for each consonant, including the long and short sounds for the five major vowels.

I shared my worries with co-workers on my team and we all were feeling the same

weight. What can we do to help our students learn their letters, especially their letter sounds?

And, once they have them learned, retain them in order to begin reading and writing words? This

was an all too familiar conversation we were discussing over and over again. Around the time

we were talking and thinking of a plan, I received an e-mail from our schools speech language

pathologist wondering if we used any kind of visual phonics program in our classrooms. She was

working with a hearing impaired pre-school student and wanted to add visual phonics symbols to

help her with learning letter sounds, but did not want to introduce something different than she

might learn in kindergarten. Immediately, I was interested in learning more about visual phonics

and the impact it would have on students learning of letter sounds.

I have found that many of my students learn and retain much more if they are able to

see it, hear it, and move to it in a multisensory type way. I thought if I were able to provide

students with a visual and kinesthetic hand cue, also known as visual phonics, for learning the

alphabet sounds, this may help students to recall and master letter sounds fluently. I continued to
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keep thinking then of the next skill that would build upon this letter sound knowledge, such as

beginning to write strings of letters to form words, and to understand that those words carry

meaning. With the wide variety of student needs, I looked for additional teaching strategies that

I could use to help my students learn and master their letter sounds accurately and fluently.

Problem Statement

I observed that many of my kindergarten students throughout the school year had a

difficult time learning and retaining letter identification and letter sounds, which could put them

behind in their learning. It is essential for students to be able to accurately identify and produce

letter sounds. Students rely on letter-sound relations to help them read unfamiliar words in texts

and begin the emergent writing process. Cabell, Tortorelli, and Gerde (2013) stated Each

childs writing provides teachers with a window into what that child knows about print and

sound (p. 652). When I thought about my struggling learners and the difficulties they

encountered with writing, it truly sheds even more light on the problem. It became a rewarding

accomplishment for students when they are able to bridge that gap between knowing letter

sounds in isolation to writing words with accurate sounds. I found that I needed to investigate a

better way of teaching students their letter sounds so they were able to be successful in their

learning.

Purpose Statement

The purpose of this action research study was to examine the effectiveness of

implementing visual phonics on student knowledge of letter- sound relation for my kindergarten

students. Because I was concerned that my students were not able to fluently produce the

primary sound for each consonant, including the major vowels, I studied the effectiveness of

using visual phonics to support my reading instruction.


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Research Questions and Sub-Questions

Based on the problem that was identified, I designed an overarching question that guided

my action research study: What were the effects of visual phonics instruction on the

identification of letter-sound relations for kindergarten students? In addition to the primary

question for the study, I also identified sub-questions that included: (a) how did using visual

phonics instruction transfer to students writing? and (b) what were the parent perspectives of

visual phonics instruction used in the kindergarten classroom?

The independent variable was the implementation of using visual phonics symbols in the

classroom. The dependent variables were the letter-sound fluency, writing and parent

perspectives.

Definitions

For the purpose of this paper, certain terms were defined. First, visual phonics was

defined as a multisensory strategy that represents all of the sounds of English with a hand-shape

cue and a corresponding written symbol (Montgomery, 2008). In this study, I used the synthetic

visual phonics program Jolly Phonics. Jolly Phonics is a program that teaches students hand

movement actions for all 42 sounds in English. Second, letter sound fluency was the ability to

correctly produce 80% of the letters taught with a three second wait time until given the correct

answer.

Limitations

As with many research studies, there were limitations that may have affected the results

from this study. First, the participants for the study were part of a convenience sample and were

not chosen at random. Second, the time allowed for the study may not have been sufficient to

adequately assess my students growth using the new strategy. Third, my students attendance
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was unpredictable and it may have impacted their ability to achieve mastery of the new strategy.

Lastly, this was my first time carrying out an action research plan in my classroom.

Review of Literature

Introduction

Learning to read is easily developed by many children during their early years. This

complex process occurs when optimal learning conditions are present. These conditions include

strong language skills. However, it can become an overwhelming process for some young

children, especially those who are identified with special needs such as deaf or hard-of-hearing

(DHH) students (Narr & Cawthon, 2011). Students enter school with various levels of pre-

reading skills; therefore, it is often challenging for teachers as they struggle to meet the needs of

their diverse learners (Cihon, Gardner, Morrison, & Paul, 2008). For beginning readers, students

must understand the alphabetic principle in which sounds are represented of letters from the

alphabet and that letters are used to represent these sounds. Letter sound knowledge is the ability

to produce the sound(s) associated with a particular letter. It is the nearest relationship used in

order to decode, or sound out words (Huang, Tortorelli, & Invernizzi, 2014).

The intent of this study was to examine the effectiveness of implementing visual phonics

on student knowledge of letter- sound relation of kindergarten students. Based on the literature

that was reviewed, there were a number of literacy areas that could be impacted from the use of

visual phonics with kindergarten students. The literature in this review was divided into three

sections, including (a) impact of visual phonics instruction on letter-sound recognition, (b) letter-

sound recognition in students writing development, and (c) parental perspectives and

involvement of childrens education. Each of these sections was focused in this literature

review. After reviewing the literature, I believe that further investigation of the impact of visual
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 8

phonics instruction on student letter-sound relations would be beneficial. Much of the research

found the effects of using visual phonics with deaf or hard of hearing students, however, there

was limited amounts of research involving hearing students.

Letter-Sound Knowledge

Narr and Cawthon (2011) found through a national survey of 200 teacher participants that

using visual phonics as a reading instructional tool increased phonemic awareness, decoding

skills, vocabulary, and reading comprehension for students with or without special needs. The

purpose of this study was to investigate the teachers perspectives of using visual phonics with

their reading curriculum through the completion of a mixed-methods survey. The survey was

composed of checklists, multiple choice, Likert scale, and open-ended questions designed for

participants who had completed the visual phonics training. The results of the study found that

the majority of teachers used visual phonics with elementary-aged students who were DHH or

had other disabilities, but was not limited to this population. Nearly fifty-seven percent of the

participants were teachers of deaf or hard of hearing students, twenty-two percent were special

education teachers and thirteen percent were elementary general education teachers all varying in

the years of experience using visual phonics. Overall, participants agreed strongly or somewhat

that visual phonics improved phonemic awareness, decoding skills, vocabulary, and

comprehension skills. Outcomes from this study suggested that teachers tend to have a difficult

time knowing when best to implement visual phonics into their everyday reading instruction.

Also, teachers at times struggled with learning the system and found they would benefit from

workshops or more resources on how to effectively implement visual phonics.

Visual phonics instruction was used with a wide variety of diverse students. In 2008,

Cihon, Gardner, Morrison, and Paul found that the use of See the Sound/Visual Phonics
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(STS/VP) intervention in the general education kindergarten classroom could be successful for

hearing students who were at-risk for reading difficulties and were falling behind. The purpose

of this preliminary study investigated the effectiveness of STS/VP with these students. This

study consisted of twelve teacher recommend participants. From those twelve, the lowest five

participants from the DIBELS, 6th edition assessment, of initial sound fluency, letter naming

fluency, phoneme segmentation fluency, nonsense word fluency, and word use fluency were

selected for the intervention. The intervention took place from late March to mid-May. During

the intervention, students were shown the hand sign to teach each letter sound that the majority

of participants were unable to produce. Students were also taught the written symbol for each

letter sound that was representative of the hand sign. The small group intervention that consisted

of two to four students was fast paced and met at least three times per week for the duration of

the study. During the intervention, revisions were made as participant data displayed low levels

of retention. The results from this study indicated that visual phonics was an appropriate

intervention to use with children who were falling behind with the general education curriculum.

At the time of this study it was suggested that STS/VP should be further investigated and that it

should not replace existing reading curriculums.

This study built on the previous findings from Cihon and colleagues (2008). In 2013,

Gardner, Cihon, Morrison, and Paul researched an additional study that found the use of visual

phonics instruction to be beneficial to hearing kindergarten students who were deemed at- risk of

reading failure. The study took place in a general kindergarten classroom that consisted of

eleven participants. Prior to the implementation of the study, students were assessed using the

DIBELS 6th edition, on letter-sound fluency and letter identification fluency. Additionally,

students were assessed after learning each letter-sound in the general education classroom.
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Students who were unable to correctly identify given letter-sounds entered Tier 2 intervention for

additional instruction. Over the course of the study, there were five students who consistently

remained in intervention. During the intervention, students received instruction through the

STS/VP reading instructional tool. Students watched and listened as the researcher said the letter

sound and demonstrated the hand sign. The written symbol of the hand sign was also drawn

under each letter to help students remember what sound the letter made. The results from this

five month study indicated that visual phonics was beneficial to at-risk kindergarten students

letter-sound knowledge and that letter-sound knowledge is sustained over time.

While the focus of Chion and colleagues (2008, 2013) investigations were dedicated on

the effects of visual phonics with hearing kindergarten students, Smith and Wang (2010) studied

the impact of visual phonics on the phonological awareness and speech production of a deaf four

year old preschool student who had a cochlear implant. This study focused on using visual

phonics together with a modified version of the Fountas and Pinnell phonics curriculum. During

the intervention, visual phonics hand cues were used to represent beginning and medial sounds

whenever a target sound or word was meant to be heard or said. Modified Fountas and Pinnell

Kindergarten Phonics curriculum mini lessons were also used. The beginning weeks of

intervention focused on naming the letter and sound of beginning consonants. As the intervention

progressed through the fourth, fifth, and sixth weeks, the focus was on learning medial vowel

sounds and eleven new words. The findings indicated that that when visual phonics was used

together with a phonics-based curriculum, phonological awareness and speech production

increased.

A similar study researched by Wang, Spychala, Harris, and Oetting (2013) looked at the

effectiveness of using a phonics-based intervention in part with visual phonics for deaf or hard of
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hearing preschool students. Many of these studies presented similar findings for the use of visual

phonics with deaf or hard of hearing students to increase phonemic awareness skills needed for

reading. This study focused on three preschool students who were deaf or hard of hearing. The

intervention consisted of individual or small groups that used the reading program Reading

Mastery 1, Smart Board technology that used starfall.com and visual phonics. Early intervention

lessons consisted of instruction on individual sounds. As lessons progressed, they became more

difficult. Students were expected to orally, or use the visual phonics hand signs, to say the sound

of letters to blend a given word. Through repetition and mastery of the visual phonics hand

signs, students blended and segmented words quickly. At the completion of this 40-week

intervention (50-week in one case), all participants phonemic awareness and phonics skills had

increased. These skills sustained throughout early elementary school as well.

Unlike the previous studies that involved preschool or kindergarten participants, this

next study used visual phonics for ten deaf or hard of hearing kindergarten through third-grade

students. The purpose of Narrs (2008) study was to examine the relationship between

performance on a phonological awareness task, performance on a decoding task, reading ability,

and length of time in literacy instruction with visual phonics (p. 405). The intervention

consisted of students using visual phonics to learn phonemic awareness and phonics skills to

support reading development. Students were made aware of the visual hand sign for the letter

sounds and the symbol that represented these sounds. Visual phonics was used in many of the

literacy activities throughout the day. While students were writing, the researcher would use the

visual hand signs to provide support to students as they worked on sounding out and writing

words. The results from this study found that using visual phonics as an additional instructional

tool supported students phonological awareness and decoding skills. It was also found that
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there was no correlation between the length of instructional time using visual phonics with

students performances on various reading skills such as rhyming, decoding, and reading

abilities.

The research reviewed supported the importance of developing strong phonemic

awareness skills at an early age through the use of STS/VP to acquire reading skills. Valbuena

(2014) studied the visual phonics program called Tucker Signing strategies to develop phonemic

awareness skills for twenty-five Spanish speaking first grade students to learn English in Bogota,

Colombia. Tucker Signing strategies were very similar to STS/VP in which students were taught

hand signs for all letter sounds. Tucker signing strategies were implemented for one hour to the

whole class as their reading program three times a week for six months. During the process,

students learned the hand sign for each letter sound. They looked at a word, performed the hand

sign, and made the sound. After viewing the pre-diagnostic and post-diagnostic test results, the

findings indicated that the use of Tucker Signing strategies helped students to develop phonemic

awareness skills through the relationship between letters and sounds.

After reviewing these studies, it was evident that students needed strong phonological

awareness skills including letter-sound correspondence to become successful readers and writers.

These phonological awareness skills developed with the use of visual phonics as part of everyday

reading instruction. When visual phonics is used, it is developing phonemic awareness skills for

students who may be at-risk for reading failure.

Writing Development

Just as reading is a huge accomplishment to young learners, writing is a tremendous

accomplishment as well. Writing requires knowledge of the alphabetic principle. This

knowledge can be learned through various home or school literacy experiences. Effective
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classroom literacy instruction includes learning the names of sounds of alphabet letters and

developing phonemic awareness skills such rhyming, blending, and decoding of words. Writing

and spelling of words involves students to use this phonological knowledge to match each sound

to its corresponding letter or letters (Ritchey, 2008). Ritchey (2008) examined the development

of beginning writing skills in sixty kindergarten students. The relationship between writing and

reading was also studied. The study took place during the second half of kindergarten with the

majority of data collected in the months of April and May. The study included writing, reading,

and phonological awareness measures. The writing measures included: letter writing, sound

spelling, real word spelling, and nonsense word spelling. Students also completed four reading

measures that included: letter name fluency, letter sound fluency, phoneme segmentation

fluency, and early reading abilities assessment (alphabetics, conventions, and meaning). The

phonological awareness assessment focused on the identification of initial and final sounds in

spoken words and word blending. The results from this study found that early reading skills

such as letter-sound knowledge, letter identification, and phonological awareness skills

supported beginning writers development.

From the previous study it was found that early reading skills supported writing

development. Diamond, Gerde, and Powell (2008) found in their study that the more letters,

sounds, and print concepts a student knows or is exposed to, the more sophisticated writing will

follow. Two hundred thirty six low income Head Start preschool students participated in this

study to examine early writing knowledge. Researchers Diamond, Gerde, and Powell (2008)

examined two components of childrens writing: written forms and writing processes. Student

writing data was collected at the beginning, middle, and end of the academic school year. During

the study students completed a number of assessments including name writing, letter naming,
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initial sound, and concepts about print to collect and analyze data. It was found that students

made growth in all literacy areas assessed over the school year. An important component of

writing is the understanding of letters and letter sounds. Researchers found that the students who

wrote more letters in their name also knew more letters and were able to pick up on learning

letters faster compared to their peers who were not writing letters.

As I began to imagine how this study would take place in my own classroom, I kept

thinking to myself what impact it would have on my students writing. Because the study

occurred during the fall, I focused my writing instruction on teaching students how to write their

first names. In the previous study, Diamond and colleagues (2008) found that low income Head

Start preschool students who wrote more letters in their name were able to know and recognize

letters faster than peers who did not write letters. Recently in another study, Diamond and

Baroody (2013) suggested that prekindergarten students who were able to write their first name

had a better understanding of letters and letter sounds. This study was done with a larger

participant group of 502 at-risk prekindergarten students and was focused only on writing of

letters in students names and not on conventions. Students were observed from the fall of

prekindergarten to the spring of kindergarten. The following emergent literacy assessments were

conducted throughout the study and were followed-up in the spring of kindergarten: Name

writing, letter knowledge, and letter-sound knowledge (word decoding). On the name writing

assessment, students only completed this during prekindergarten because the majority of students

knew how to write their names already by the spring of kindergarten. Researchers coded

students writing to view the sophistication of skills being used. The letter knowledge

assessment had students identify uppercase letters. Again, most students were able to identify all

the letter names by the spring of kindergarten, so this assessment was only used in
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prekindergarten. The last assessment was the letter-sound knowledge assessment. Students were

shown standard English letter combinations and had to read the word by sounding them out

phonetically. This was used in prekindergarten and kindergarten. The results confirmed that

early writing is a predictor of emergent literacy skills. The correlation between these studies was

a valuable tool for promoting early reading skills for my students.

The connection between writing development and knowledge of letter-sounds relations

was apparent throughout a number of research studies. As part of my study, I collected students

writing samples during writers workshop to observe students writing abilities with the use of

visual phonics. The research conducted by Snyders (2014) explored the development of writing

for kindergarten students during writers workshop. Three participants were randomly chosen

for this study and attended an all-day kindergarten program three days per week. Over the 10-

week qualitative study, the researcher collected student writing samples, videotaped student-

teacher conferences, and held participant interviews. Towards the beginning of the study,

students were asked to draw a picture of a writer and then share with the researcher about their

writing. Students were asked interview questions to tell their perceptions about writers and

writing. Students and the researcher continued to confer with each other for five minutes, once

every three days, throughout the study. Student writing samples were used as part of the data

analysis and were collected each week. The results from this study found that the writers

workshop environment supported writers development. During this authentic writing

experience, students writing stamina continually increased as they viewed themselves more

confidently as writers.

After reviewing these studies, it was evident the connection between writing development

and knowledge of letter-sounds relations for beginning writers. Early writing was a predictor of
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early reading skills. With strong phonological awareness skills and letter-sound correspondence,

students become successful readers and writers.

Parents in Education

Jane Dee Hull, the first female governor of Arizona, once stated At the end of the day,

the most overwhelming key to a childs success is the positive involvement of parents.

Effective teaching begins with building a strong relationship with students parents. In a study

conducted by Rodriguez, Blatz, and Elbaum (2014), ninety-six parents of students with

disabilities were interviewed to discuss their views of the schools efforts to involve and engage

them in their childs education. Focus group sessions took place either in the morning or

afternoon at the school. To remain confidential, no school personnel were present. A total of

seventeen focus group sessions and one individual interview session were held at eighteen

different school locations. The number of participants ranged from one to twenty-one and lasted

approximately ninety minutes. During the sessions, parents filled out a parent survey of twenty-

five questions that would guide the group discussion. All focus sessions had a moderator and

were audio-recorded for transcription. The results found eight prominent themes. The most

prominent theme noted was the extent to which schools collaborated with parents in their

childrens education (Rodriguez et al., 2014, p. 85). Parents who spoke positively of this theme

stated that teachers were accessible, accommodating to parents for Individualized Education

Program (IEP) meetings, and were knowledgeable in answering questions. Parents who spoke

unfavorably about this theme reported having a difficult time getting services for their child.

As found in the last study, parent and school collaboration plays an important role in a

childs education. Sukhram and Hsu (2012) conducted a study that reflected an overview of the

Reading Together Program. This program was designed for parents and children, ages six
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months to thirty-six months, to learn basic literacy skills together to help set the child up for

school and life reading success. The results from this study found that parents appreciated the

program and that it helped them to understand the value of these early literacy skills. The

program was for six weeks and met weekly for forty-five minutes, fifteen parents and fifteen

children participated. Prior to the start of the program, parents filled out a pre survey to help

decide the topics that would be presented in each session based on parent concerns or specific

needs. During each of the sessions, facilitators modeled the strategies to be learned for the day.

Parents then individually read with their child while practicing the strategies as facilitators went

around offering guidance and support. At the end of each session, children, with the help of

parents, were able to pick a free book to take home to continue reading and implementing the

learned strategies. Parents also received a handout from the days session recapping the learned

strategies. At the final session, parents were given a survey to tell what they liked best or least

about the program, what they learned from the program, and how the program influenced the

reading partnership with their child. The results from the study found that parents appreciated

the program and were very positive about the support and guidance received.

Keeping parents informed of what their school-aged child was learning while in school

was important to my study so parents were aware of the research that took place. ad and

Gurbuzturk (2013) investigated the involvement of parents in their childs education. The study

involved 1,252 parent participants whose children were between first-grade and fifth-grade in

Malatya province, Turkey. Parent participants were given a thirty-nine question, Likert-type

(always-never), Turkish Parental Involvement Scale-TPIS measuring the performance of parental

involvement tasks. The results found that parent involvement was high on communication with

child, enabling home setting, supporting personality development, and helping with homework as
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parents answered always. Parent involvement was low for volunteering in curricular or

extracurricular activities, as seldom was the highest response. This study supported the previous

literature reviews that parental involvement was important to parents in their childs education.

One of the last studies viewed was research done by Garbacz, McDowall, Schaughency,

Sheridan, and Welch (2015). In this study, researchers wanted to clarify and test the direct

effects of school year, parent education, family structure, and child gender on parent

involvement in elementary school (Garbacz et al., 2015, p. 384). Participants for this study

included 421 primary caregivers of elementary school aged children in New Zealand.

Participants were given a forty-six question, Likert-type (1 rarely to 4 always), Family

Involvement Questionnaire-New Zealand Version, measuring the parent involvement behaviors

in their childs education. A demographic questionnaire was completed by all participants. Data

collected from this survey found that there was no significant correlation between the childs

year in school and parental involvement. Findings revealed a positive relation between parental

school involvement and parent education, which suggested that parents who had a higher level of

education were more likely to be involved. It was also found that parents with two or more adults

at home were more engaged with school involvement; however, it did not impact home

involvement or the communication between school and home. The final finding from this study

suggest a trend toward greater home-school communication reported by parents of boys than

parents of girls (Garbacz et al., 2015, p. 400).

Conclusion

From the reviews of literature, several connections were made. The majority of the

studies took place with students who were deemed at-risk of reading failure and who were deaf

or hard of hearing. There had not yet been much researched on the effects of visual phonics with
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 19

hearing students. It was evident that students need strong phonological awareness skills

including letter-sound correspondence to become successful readers and writers. These

phonological awareness skills took place with the use of visual phonics as part of everyday

reading instruction. The literature I reviewed found that when visual phonics was used,

phonemic awareness skills developed for students who were at-risk for reading failure. Those

early reading skills also supported the development of beginning writers. The studies supported

the implementation of visual phonics in my own kindergarten classroom. Overall, the reviews

permitted me to build a strong foundation for the design of this study.

Methods

Introduction

This descriptive mixed-methods action research study examined the effects of visual

phonics instruction on the identification of letter-sound relations of kindergarten students. In

addition to the primary goal, I also investigated: (a) how did using visual phonics instruction

transfer to students writing? and (b) what were the parent perspectives of visual phonics

instruction used in the kindergarten classroom?

Participants

The participants of this study were kindergarten students from my class for the 2016-

2017 academic school year. The participants attended a Pre-K through 6th-grade elementary

school of around 600 students. The population of the Midwestern Iowa school district

community where this study took place was 40,566. Students were part of a convenience

sample, which included twenty- one students, ten females and eleven males between the ages of

five and six years old. The school district served 5,382 Pre-K through 12th-grade students. Of

these students, 2.5% were English Language Learners (ELL) with a total of 19 native spoken
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 20

languages. Nearly 25% of the students qualified for free or reduced lunch and 11.3% received

special education services. Seventeen parents/guardians also participated in the study by

completing pre- and post -intervention surveys regarding their perspectives of the use of visual

phonics on their childs letter-sound knowledge.

Procedure

This descriptive mixed-methods action research study was implemented from the

beginning of September, 2016 through the middle of December, 2016. Prior to the intervention, I

completed a letter-sound assessment one-on-one with each student. I showed the student an

uppercase letter card and asked them to identify the letter name. If a student hesitated for three

seconds, I provided the letter and continued with the next. I recorded the data on the data

collection sheet as + answered correctly answered incorrectly (see Appendix A). I then showed

the student a lowercase letter card and asked them to identify the letter name. If a student

hesitated for three seconds, I provided the letter and continued with the next. I recorded the data.

The final piece of the pre-assessment was letter sounds. I showed the student a lowercase letter

card and asked them to identify the letter sound. If a student hesitated for three seconds, I

provided the letter sound and continued with the next. I recorded the data. This pre-assessment

provided a baseline for the implementation of the intervention.

Parent participants received a five question, Likert-type, pre-intervention survey through

email and Google Forms (see Appendix B). The results from this survey helped me to identify

the parents perspectives of their childs letter-sound knowledge. I also completed a phonetic

writing assessment oneon-one with each student (see Appendix C). Students listened as I read

five consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words individually. After dictating the word, students
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 21

wrote the word on paper. I recorded each letter sound correctly written within each word. This

pre-assessment provided a baseline of students letter-sound correspondence.

During the study, I used a portion of the visual phonics program Jolly Phonics. Students

were introduced to the capital and lowercase letter, sound, and visual hand sign for each days

alphabet letter. During our whole-group reading instruction, I held a letter card with a letter on it

and said this is letter name and it makes this sound. I had students watch my mouth as I

exaggerated the letter sound. Students repeated the sound with me. For each letter, there was

also a short story and song that went along with the sound and hand sign. As I retold the story, I

taught students the hand sign for the letter while saying the sound. Students repeated the hand

sign and sound with me. As students were producing the sound and hand sign, I observed for

student participation. I completed the letter-sound assessment one-on-one with each student bi-

weekly.

Research Design

I designed this mixed-methods study to determine the effects of visual phonics instruction

on the identification of letter-sound relations of my kindergarten students. I used multiple

research tools to determine the effect of visual phonics on student letter- sound identification.

The quantitative and qualitative tools that were used to collect data were: (a) letter- sound

assessment (b) phonetic writing assessment (c) parent survey responses (d) classroom

observations, (e) student writing samples and (f) FAST letter sound fluency assessment. The

letter-sound assessment was given as a pre-assessment and bi-weekly assessment during the

course of the study. Students were shown a letter card and asked to correctly identify the name

of the letter and the letter sound. Kindergarten students were expected to name twenty- one out

of twenty- six capital letters, twenty- one out of twenty- six lowercase letters, and twenty- one
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 22

out of twenty- six letter sounds by the end of the academic school year to meet the district

expectation of 80%. I also used the district FAST letter sound fluency assessment which was

given at the beginning and middle of the academic school year during the course of the study.

The phonetic writing assessment was given as a pre-and post-assessment with 15 points possible.

Students listened as five CVC words were read individually for students to write. Kindergarten

students were expected to write 12 out of 15 correct letter sounds in words by the end of the

academic school year to meet the district expectation of 80%. Student writing samples were

collected monthly during the study. As students were learning the letter sound with hand sign, I

observed for student participation. I also observed students letter-sound correspondence, the

sounds represented by letters, during writers workshop.

I administered to parents/guardians the pre- and post- intervention Likert-type survey

through e-mail and Google Forms. The results from this survey helped to identify the parents

perspectives of their childs letter-sound knowledge. These research tools helped me to

determine the effects of visual phonics instruction on students letter-sound relations.

Data Analysis

Instruction and data collection took place from September through December, 2016. All

quantitative data collected, such as assessments and parent surveys, were analyzed through

descriptive statistics that included the mean, the median, and the mode. All qualitative data, such

as observations and writing samples, were analyzed to determine patterns, trends, categories, and

commonalities. All data results were presented by graphics or narrative form to analyze and

compare growth from the beginning of the year baseline to midyear post intervention of students

letter sound recognition and writing. By collecting qualitative and quantitative data I was able to

triangulate data to look for commonalities and themes.


VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 23

Results

Introduction

The purpose of this action research study was to examine the effectiveness of

implementing visual phonics on student knowledge of letter- sound relation for my kindergarten

students. This study took place with a class of twenty-one student participants from the

beginning of September, 2016 to the middle of December, 2016. For the duration of the study,

three research questions were investigated. The primary question that guided my action research

study was: What were the effects of visual phonics instruction on the identification of letter-

sound relations for kindergarten students? In addition to the primary question for the study, I

also identified sub-questions that included: (a) how did using visual phonics instruction transfer

to students writing? and (b) what were the parent perspectives of visual phonics instruction used

in the kindergarten classroom? The independent variable was the implementation of using visual

phonics symbols in the classroom. The dependent variables were the letter-sound fluency,

writing and parent perspectives.

Letter-Sound Knowledge

The purpose of the primary question examined the effectiveness of implementing visual

phonics on student knowledge of letter- sound relation for my kindergarten students. During the

study, I used a portion of the visual phonics program Jolly Phonics. Students were introduced to

the capital and lowercase letter, sound, and visual hand sign for each days alphabet letter. I

completed a letter-sound assessment one-on-one with each student bi-weekly. Students also

completed the FAST Universal Screening Assessment for letter sound fluency prior to the start

of the intervention and after the intervention. The results of the students bi-weekly letter-sound

knowledge and FAST assessments are represented in Figures 1 and 2.


VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 24

Letter Sounds
Pre Post

26 26 26 26 26 26 26 26 2526 26 26 26 26 26 26 26 26 2626 26 26 26
24 24 24
19 20 20
18 17 17
15
11 11
9 8
5 6
4 4
0

Figure 1. Students pre and post intervention bi-weekly letter- sound knowledge assessment

FAST Letter Sounds Fluency Assessment


Pre Post

56 56 57 55 58

44 43 45 46 44
40 40 42 40 38 38
31 33 31 30
28 26 27 26 27
22 23 24
16 16 18 18
14 14 13 11
8 9
4 3 5
1

Figure 2. FAST Universal Screening Assessment for letter sound fluency

Writing Development

The purpose of the first sub-question was to determine how using visual phonics

transferred to students writing. Prior to the study, students completed a phonetic writing

assessment one-on-one. Students listened as I read five consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC)

words individually. After dictating the word, students wrote the word on paper. I recorded each

letter sound correctly written within each word. At the end of the study, this assessment was
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 25

given again. All scores were then averaged. The results of students phonetic spelling

assessment are represented in Figure 3.

Figure 3. Average score for the phonetic spelling pre assessment and post assessment

In addition to the phonetic spelling assessment, students were also observed during

writers workshop. I observed students letter-sound correspondence, which are the sounds

represented by letters, and students using the visual hand signs for letter representation. Monthly

writing samples during writers workshop were collected and analyzed. During a writers

workshop session, I observed Student 17 writing the letter sounds for the sentence My house

spelled my hz. Student 17 also labeled the picture of an apple tree as ab re, stretching out the

sounds as he/she was writing them. Student 20 was observed stretching out the word monkey

bars in his/her writing. This student was hesitant with the letter sounds in that word, and wanted

to be correct, asking me Is this right? I addressed the student to not give up and to keep trying

even on hard to write words. Student 14 wrote the full sentence We went to the zoo by

listening to the letter sounds and writing WEWTOthEZO. This was one of the first sentences I

observed students writing.


VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 26

Parents in Education

The purpose of the second sub question was to identify the parents perspectives of their

childs letter-sound knowledge to help me determine the effects of visual phonics on students

letter-sound relations. I administered a pre- and post- intervention six question, Likert-type

survey through e-mail and Google Forms. The results are shown in the number of responses in

Figures 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9.

Figure 4. Results of how parents felt about their child enjoying reading at home.
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 27

Figure 5. Results of how parents felt about their child enjoying writing at home.

Figure 6. Results of how parents felt about their child learning through movement.
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 28

9 My child sounds out individual letter sounds to help


8
8 them with their writing
7 7
7

6
5
5

3
2
2
1 1
1
0 0 0
0
Strongly disagree Disagree Don't know Agree Strongly Agree

Pre Assessment Post Assessment

Figure 7. Results of how parents felt about their child sounding out letter sounds to help them

with their writing.

7 My child applies action phonics to assist them with


learning their letters and sounds 6
6
5 5
5
4
4
3 3
3
2 2
2
1
1
0
0
Strongly disagree Disagree Don't know Agree Strongly Agree

Pre Assessment Post Assessment

Figure 8. Results of how parents felt about their child using action phonics in learning their

letters and sounds.


VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 29

Figure 9. Results of how parents felt about their child sharing what they were learning about new

letters at home.

Conclusion

The purpose of this action research study was to examine the effectiveness of

implementing visual phonics on student knowledge of letter- sound relation for my kindergarten

students. The results suggested that implementing visual phonics increased students letter-

sound knowledge. Students writing was also positively impacted by the use of visual phonics.

The results in the parent survey also indicated that using visual phonics helped their child with

learning their letter sounds and in their writing. In the discussion section, I will summarize and

interpret my findings from my research questions.

Discussion

Introduction

After teaching kindergarten for the past six years, I noticed that our youngest elementary

students were coming into kindergarten with a wide variety of backgrounds and skills. Some
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 30

students attended pre-school, others had not. Some students had practiced writing their name

prior to school, others had not. Not all students entering kindergarten had the same academic

experiences. Often times, what other students found easy, such as learning and remembering

letter sounds, was difficult for young children, especially for those who were just beginning

kindergarten with little or no pre-school experience.

The 2015-2016 school year held true to that, as I had many students who struggled with

identifying letters and producing letter sounds throughout the entire school year. After reviewing

numerous letter sound assessments, I became very anxious and concerned. In order for me to

teach reading and writing, I needed the foundational piece of the alphabetic principle in place

well before the end of kindergarten. I knew I needed to have a plan to help my students become

proficient and with mastery meet the Common Core State Standard to produce the primary sound

for each consonant, including the long and short sounds for the five major vowels.

Starting in the 2016-2017 school year, I needed to investigate a better way of teaching

students their letter sounds so they were able to be successful in their learning. With the wide

variety of student needs, I looked for additional teaching strategies that could be used to help my

students learn and master their letter sounds accurately and fluently. I thought if I were able to

provide students with a visual and kinesthetic hand cue, also known as visual phonics, for

learning the alphabet sounds, this would help students to recall and master letter sounds fluently.

I continued to think then of the next skill that would build upon the letter sound knowledge, such

as beginning to write strings of letters to form words, and to understand that those words carry

meaning.

The purpose of this action research study was to examine the effectiveness of

implementing visual phonics on student knowledge of letter- sound relation for my kindergarten
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 31

students. I was concerned that my students were not able to fluently produce the primary sound

for each consonant, including the major vowels. This problem guided me to study the

effectiveness of using visual phonics to support my reading instruction.

Letter-Sound Knowledge

The purpose of the primary question examined the effectiveness of implementing visual

phonics on student knowledge of letter- sound relation for my kindergarten students. During the

study, I used a portion of the visual phonics program Jolly Phonics. Students were introduced to

the capital and lowercase letter, sound, and visual hand sign for each days alphabet letter. I

completed a letter-sound assessment one-on-one with each student bi-weekly. Students also

completed the FAST Universal Screening Assessment for letter sound fluency prior to the start

of the intervention and after the intervention. After analyzing students pre and post intervention

bi-weekly letter- sound data, it was determined that all students either increased or remained

consistent at 80% in the number of letter sounds produced. I had four students who remained

consistent with little or no room for growth. These students named twenty-one or more letter

sounds out of twenty-six on the pre intervention assessment. After analyzing students FAST

Universal Screening Assessment for letter sound fluency data, it was determined that all students

increased in the number of letter sounds produced.

In 2013, Gardner, Cihon, Morrison, and Paul found the use of visual phonics instruction

to be beneficial to hearing kindergarten students who were deemed at- risk of reading failure.

Students watched and listened as the researcher said the letter sound and demonstrated the hand

sign. The results from their five month study indicated that visual phonics was beneficial to at-

risk kindergarten students letter-sound knowledge and that letter-sound knowledge can be

sustained over time. During the course of my study, students completed bi-weekly letter-sound
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 32

assessments in which students were observed using the visual hand signs to help them with the

letter sounds. Both the research and my studys results indicated that students who receive visual

phonics instruction are able to identify and retain letters and letter sounds. I believe this

inclusion of visual phonics had an impact on students retention of their letter sounds, which

helped a substantial amount of my students to make growth during the duration of this study in

their bi-weekly letter-sound assessment and FAST Universal Screening Assessment for letter

sound fluency (see Figures 1 and 2).

In my own classroom experience of using Jolly Phonics, I believe this growth was due to

students receiving daily repetition of the letter and letter sounds. The process of learning letters

and letter sounds was different while using Jolly Phonics. During Jolly Phonics, students

listened to a short poem which emphasized the letter of the day, sang a song, and learned the

visual hand sign. This was a different way of teaching letters and letter sounds than what I had

done in the past with traditional flashcards. Unlike traditional rote memorization of flashcards,

Jolly Phonics provided students with multiple learning styles. The multiple learning styles

reached different learners visually, kinesthetically, and musically while keeping them engaged

with their new learning. Overall, the results from my study confirmed the effectiveness of

implementing visual phonics on students letter sounds.

Writing Development

The first sub-question I investigated was to determine the effect of using visual phonics

on students writing. Students were given a phonetic writing assessment prior to the start of the

study, and also at the end. Students were also observed during writers workshop. Monthly

writing samples during writers workshop were collected and analyzed. After analyzing the

average score for the phonetic spelling pre assessment and post assessment data, it was
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 33

determined that the average class score grew eight sounds, from pre intervention assessment to

post intervention assessment, in their ability to correctly write the letter sounds within each

consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) word (see Figure 3). I could not believe how many students

were able to write the letter sounds for the CVC words during the post intervention assessment

compared to the pre intervention assessment; it was more than I had seen in my previous years of

teaching at this time of the year. I believe this increase was due to the repetition of daily letter

identification and letter sounds. Students learned their letter sounds quickly and were able to

apply those sounds to their writing. I believe that using the visual phonics hand signs will

continue to help my students meet the 12 out of 15 correct letter sounds in words by the end of

the academic school year to meet the kindergarten district expectation of 80%.

After analyzing students writers workshop observations and writing samples, I found

that many students were beginning to stretch out the letter sounds in their words as they were

writing them. Student samples had strings of letters written for sentences and labels describing

their pictures. As students were writing, I observed if students were using the visual hand signs

to help them with the letter representation. I found that the majority of students were stretching

and hearing the letter sounds and writing those sounds, but very few students actually used the

visual hand sign to help them. I believe this was due to the fact that a substantial amount of

students had or were mastering their letter sounds already and they did not need to use the visual

hand sign to help them.

As I tried to imagine how this study was going to take place in my own classroom, I kept

thinking to myself what impact it would have on my students writing. The connection between

writing development and knowledge of letter-sounds relations was apparent throughout a number

of research studies. The research conducted by Snyders (2014) explored the development of
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 34

writing for kindergarten students during writers workshop. The results from this study found

that the writers workshop environment supported writers development. During this authentic

writing experience, students writing stamina continually increased as they viewed themselves

more confidently as writers. I observed this occurring during my own students writers

workshop as well. Even with students not necessarily using visual hand signs to support their

letter writing, students were confident in themselves as writers because they were able to stretch

out and write letters and words independently. With the strong letter-sound skills that occurred

through visual phonics, students were becoming successful writers.

Based on the research and the results of my study, I believe that using visual phonics

increased my students confidence in their writing during writers workshop and phonetic writing

assessment. Students viewed themselves as writers because they were confident in knowing and

using their letter sounds, which they applied to their writing. During writers workshop, I

observed that students did not use the visual hand signs to support their writing as much as I

thought they would have. I believe this was due to the fact that a substantial amount of students

had or were mastering their letter sounds already and they did not need to use the visual hand

sign to help them. They were able to fluently write the correct letter sound without needing the

additional support. As I look back on how I taught writers workshop, I never modeled for

students to use the visual hand signs to help them with stretching out and writing their words.

While teaching the letter and letter sounds during the Jolly Phonics instruction, I modeled the

hand sign many times. It may appear that since students did not see me using visual hand signs

to help with stretching out and writing words, they also did not use it. My results confirmed that

using visual phonics transferred to students writing. Students with strong letter-sound skills

were becoming successful writers.


VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 35

Parents in Education

The purpose of the second sub question was to identify the parents perspectives of their

childs letter-sound knowledge to help me determine the effects of visual phonics on students

letter-sound relations. I received 17 parent responses for the pre intervention survey and 14

parent responses for the post intervention survey, which I believe could have impacted the results

in the survey. During the study, 57% of parents strongly agreed that sounding out individual

letter sounds helped their child with their writing compared to 12 % of parents prior to the

intervention. Forty-three percent of parents also strongly agreed that their child used action

phonics to help them with learning their letters and sounds compared to twenty-nine percent of

parents prior to the intervention. The results in the parent surveys indicated that using visual

phonics helped their child with learning their letter sounds and in their writing. As I was

interpreting these results, I believe that parents tried to observe the strategies used by their child

to learn their letters and letter sounds. If parents saw that their child was using the Jolly Phonics

hand signs, they may have answered strongly agreed to that question compared to parents whom

may not have observed their child using any strategy. This result may also have been affected by

how open their child is with sharing information about school with parents at home. If a student

does not tell their parents what they are learning at school, parents may not have been aware of

this strategy occurring.

Keeping parents informed of what their child was learning while in school was important

to my study, so parents were aware of the research taking place. ad and Gurbuzturk (2013)

investigated the involvement of parents in their childs education. Their study supported the

previous literature reviews that parental involvement is important to parents in their childs

education. During the study, students were encouraged to share their new learning with parents,
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 36

siblings, or anyone who would listen to them. Students were able to show their growth of letter

sounds by singing the songs and doing the hand signs for each letter. Prior to the study, nine

parents, or 53%, stated strongly agree to the survey question asking if their child shares what

he/she has learned about new letters and sounds at home. This was a high percentage of parents

compared to my post intervention survey result of five or 36%. I believe as the study went on,

students were beginning to lose the interest or novelty of learning the new letter and hand sign,

which resulted in a lower percentage. This is also typical of the beginning of the year- students

are excited for a new school year and have a lot to share at home about their day. Fast forward to

December, students have learned all their letter sounds and hand signs and find it not as

meaningful to share with parents at home. This survey question was also dependent on the type

of child- a child who shares a lot about school versus a child who does not, played a factor into

the survey result.

Based on the research and the results of my parent survey, I believe that using visual

phonics played a role in the parents perspectives of their childs letter-sound knowledge (see

Figures 7 and 8). As my parent survey results came in for my post intervention survey, I was

disappointed in the number of surveys. I believe the low number of surveys was due to the fact

that it was administered during the month of December, which was an already busy time of year

for families. Since the survey was anonymous, I was not able to see which families completed

them pre or post intervention. Because the number was low, I believe only the engaged and

motivated families returned the surveys. I also believe that some of my parents may not have

been aware of what to look for while reading or writing with their child at home. Parents may

not have noticed their child using the visual hand signs to help them with learning their letter

sounds, which was reflected in the survey results (see Figure 8). My results from the parent
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 37

survey confirmed that using visual phonics had a positive impact on students learning their letter

sounds and in their writing.

Conclusion

It was evident that students need strong phonological awareness skills, including letter-

sound correspondence, to become successful readers and writers through the implementation of

visual phonics. By implementing visual phonics for teaching students their letters and sounds,

students letter knowledge and writing development was positively affected. It was determined

from the studys pre-intervention and post-intervention scores that substantial student growth

was made.

Conclusion and Future Implications

I began this action research study hoping to find a better way to teach my kindergarten

students their letters and letter sounds. Over the past several school years, I had many students

who struggled with identifying letters and producing letter sounds throughout the year. I knew

students who struggled with this would have difficulties with reading and writing; as that

foundational piece of the alphabetic principle would not be strong.

Importance of the Study

As I began my action research, I used a portion of the visual phonics program Jolly

Phonics. The result from implementing Jolly Phonics in my classroom was evident. All

students letter knowledge and writing development increased as more letters and sounds were

learned. Cabell, Tortorelli, and Gerde (2013) stated Each childs writing provides teachers with

a window into what that child knows about print and sound (p. 652). As I was teaching Jolly

Phonics, students confidence in letter sound knowledge and writing soared. It was such a

rewarding accomplishment for students when they were able to bridge that gap between knowing
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 38

the letter sounds in isolation to applying it to their writing with the correct letter sounds. This

action research was important to me as a teacher because I was able to share my students

success with my colleagues for future implication. As a result of Jolly Phonics, I feel confident

that I found a more successful way of teaching students their letter sounds so they were able to

be successful in their learning.

Lessons Learned

While conducting this action research study, there were many limitations that could have

affected the results from my study. This was my first time carrying out an action research plan

in my classroom. I was very uncertain of how to implement this plan in my room. I had the

process and a method worked out, but was unsure of how it would go with a classroom of

kindergartners! Another limitation that may have affected my study was student attendance. If a

student was absent they missed learning the letter, letter sound and visual hand sign. This

affected students bi-weekly letter sound identification results. Lastly, the participants for this

study were part of a convenience sample and were not chosen at random. Students and parents

were given the opportunity to decline participating in the study.

Looking back on my study, there were many lessons that I learned which would affect

how I teach this differently for future classes. While teaching students the letter, letter sound and

hand sign, I began to notice lower student engagement towards the end of the study compared to

the beginning of the study. I believe this was because students had to go through the hand action

and song of each of the previously taught letters first before learning the new letter of the day.

This may have started to get long for students after more letters were learned, which resulted in a

loss of focus. When I use Jolly Phonics for my future classes, I would like to only review the
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 39

previous weeks letters so that students would stay more engaged until learning the new letter of

the day.

During writers workshop, I observed students not using the visual hand signs to help

them with stretching out and writing their words. I believe this may have been in part because

students did not see me modeling using the visual hand signs to help me write my words during

the workshop lesson. For future writers workshop lessons, I will model to students the

importance of using the visual hand signs to help them with identifying the correct letter sounds

to write.

One of the last take aways from this study that I would do differently is the parent survey.

I did not have as many parent responses to my pre and post intervention survey as I believed I

would have, especially since all parents signed the research consent acknowledging that they

would be part of the study by taking the survey. The results that I did get from the parent survey

clarified that visual phonics had a positive impact on their childs letter sound identification, but

many of the questions did not tie as closely to my research I thought they would have. Overall,

the success of my study had an impact on what I learned as a professional and how I will conduct

using visual phonics with my future classes.

Future Implications

I have found that many of my students learn and retain much more if they are able to see

it, hear it, and move to it in a multisensory type way. Providing students with a visual and

kinesthetic hand cue using Jolly Phonics for learning the alphabet sounds has helped my students

to recall and master letter sounds fluently. With this accomplishment, students have been able to

successfully write the correct letter sounds with their work in writers workshop, increasing

kindergarteners confidence in themselves as writers. This study may help to reassure any other
VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 40

teacher who is working with younger elementary students that using visual phonics is beneficial

to students learning. Even though this study has come to an end, I will continue to work with

my students on using the visual phonics to help them become better writers and readers. I intend

to use my pre-intervention and post-intervention data along with my end of the year data to

further analyze the effects of visual phonics on students letter sounds and writing achievement.

While implementing action research, I saw the value of doing it in my classroom and can

see myself implementing it again with my future classes. I believe conducting this action

research helped me to open up to trying new things and become passionate in a new way of

teaching students their letters and letter sounds. I feel confident knowing that all my students

made substantial growth because of action research.

My future plan is to reach out to my kindergarten team and share my results of the study.

I believe if we implement this next year in our classrooms, we will have less kindergarteners in

letter and letter sound interventions, and they too will see the growth in their students as I have.

As I was conducting this study, I was contacted by the instructional coach at my building. She

was very interested to hear how the study was going and the results. Of course I was very eager

to share with her the growth students were making in their letter sounds and writing. She was

very happy to hear to hear this and was going to share the data and results from this study with

our districts elementary curriculum director in hopes that the district would get the Jolly Phonics

program for all kindergarten classrooms. Overall, I was very glad that I decided to do action

research in my classroom and look forward to continuing to implement it in the future to help all

students be successful in their reading and writing.


VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 41

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VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 44

Appendix A

Letter-sound data collection sheet


VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 45

Appendix B

Parent Perspective Survey

*Parents will indicate their observations of their childs reading and writing behaviors on a
Likert-type scale that will be completed on a Google Form.

Dear Parents and Guardians,

I am conducting an action research study this fall on the effects of using the visual phonics
program Jolly Phonics on students letter- sound knowledge. I will be evaluating students letter-
sound recognition in the fall (before we begin the visual phonics instruction) and comparing it
throughout the course of this study. Part of my research also looks at parental opinions of the
effects of the Jolly Phonics program on your childs letter-sound knowledge. I would appreciate
your help in completing this part of my research study.

On the Google Form you will find a survey regarding your childs reading and writing behaviors
that you observe at home. The survey questions are made up of a set of statements. Please
answer if you agree or disagree with each statement.

Thank you for taking the time to complete this survey about your childs reading and writing
behaviors. Your responses will be kept confidential and will be only used for this part of my
study.

1. My child enjoys reading at home.

Strongly agree Agree Dont know Disagree Strongly Disagree

2. My child enjoys writing at home

Strongly agree Agree Dont know Disagree Strongly Disagree

3. My child learns best through movement

Strongly agree Agree Dont know Disagree Strongly Disagree

4. My child sounds out individual letter sounds to help them with their writing

Strongly agree Agree Dont know Disagree Strongly Disagree


VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 46

5. My child applies action phonics to assist them with learning their letters and sounds

Strongly agree Agree Dont know Disagree Strongly Disagree

6. My child shares what he/she has learned about new letters and sounds at home.

Strongly agree Agree Dont know Disagree Strongly Disagree


VISUAL PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM 47

Appendix C

Student Phonetic Writing Assessment

Phonetic Spelling Assessment- Fall/ Kindergarten

Spell simple words phonetically, drawing on knowledge of sound-letter relationships.

Directions: To assess students letter/sound knowledge, say the words listed below and
have students write the letters they hear.

Say to the child: Im going to read to you some words. After I finish reading the word,
you are going to write down the word the best you can. Some of the words may be
hard. It is okay to say them slowly and think how you can write them. Begin dictating
slowly word by word.

If student is unable to complete a word say: We will leave that one. The next word is

1. Hop
2. Rat
3. Pig
4. Web
5. Rug

Credit is given for each correctly written sound in the word. The entire word does not need to be
correctly spelled.

____/15

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