1. An Action
Research Plan
by Brittany
Bettger
How mentorship
programs can help at-risk
students build and
maintain peer
relationships
2. Schoolwide mentorship program
How I adapted it for the student I chose
Purpose of the project
BACKGROUND INFORMATION AND PURPOSE
OF THE ACTION RESEARCH PROJECT
3. How can a mentor program help a student
with Autism and Visual Impairment meet his
IEP goal of improving social communication
skills in structured and unstructured
conversation settings that will lead to more
quality peer relationships and increased self-
esteem?
RESEARCH QUESTION OF THE ACTION
RESEARCH PROJECT
4. By the end of a seven-week mentor program, the
student will demonstrate effective social skills that
will lead to at least one established peer relationship.
Throughout the course of the mentor program,
observations in three separate school-based settings,
as well as documented notes for each mentor session,
will show the student implementing the skills taught
by the mentor. Results in the form of interviews with
his classroom and special education teacher and with
the student will show increased ability to use effective
social skills and, consequently, a higher self-image.
HYPOTHESIS
6. This Action Research project utilized
qualitative data in the form of interviews
with teachers and a student, documentation
by mentor of mentor meetings, student work
and journal samples, and observations of the
student in three separate school-based
settings.
RESEARCH DESIGN
7. The subject used for this project is a ten-year-old
special education student in fifth grade at a
suburban Pre-K-5 elementary school.
Primary disability is Autistic Spectrum Disorder
(ASD) and secondary disability is Visual
Impairment (VI).
The student was recommended for the schoolwide
mentor program due to his lack of strong peer
relationships and his struggles in organization and
work completion. The student moved to this school
in the middle of his fourth grade year and often
complains of not having any friends.
SAMPLE
8. Baseline data:
interviews with the classroom teacher and special education teacher and with the
student.
observe the student three times prior to the start of the program; each
observation will take place in a separate setting (lunch/recess, reading,
specialist class). Two more sets of observations will occur during the program for
a total of six observations. Finally, one set of observations will take place at the
closure of the program to make a final evaluation of the student’s progress for a
total of three observations. During the observations, I will take detailed notes
describing student’s behaviors towards self and peers and document any
evidence of student using social skills taught during mentor sessions.
During each mentor session, I will continually reflect with the student
on his progress toward goals. At the conclusion of the program, I will
conduct interviews with classroom teacher (Appendix D), special
education teacher (Appendix E) and student (Appendix F) to evaluate
student’s progress toward IEP goal (Student will improve his social
communication skills in structured and unstructured conversational
settings by February of 2013) and objectives.
INSTRUMENTATION
9. Special Education Teacher Interview Questions (pre-program)
Teacher name _________________________ Date of interview ___________________
1. What are the student’s academic and social/ emotional strengths? Struggles?
2. How have you seen improvement in the student since you have worked with him?
3. How does the student’s disability/ies affect him/her academically? Socially/emotionally?
4. What accommodations does the student have?
5. Based on your knowledge, does this student have a significant adult in his/her life with whom he has a positive
relationship?
6. What is your knowledge of the mentorship program that our school is implementing?
7. What specific skills are taught in social skills program? Goals of the curriculum? How are goals of program
assessed?
8. How can one-on-one mentoring be used as an additional support to this student? How can the mentor build off
of skills already taught in social skills program?
9. If you could name one goal for this student as a result of mentor program, in correlation with his IEP goals,
what would it be?
10. How could the effectiveness of the program be assessed for this particular student?
11. Additional comments:
10. Student Interview Questions (pre-program)
1. What are your favorite hobbies or activities?
2. What do you do at home after school? -on weekends?
3. What do you do in the community (outside home)? Who do you go with?
4. What are your favorite subjects at school? What are you the best at?
5. What do you like about school? Dislike?
6. Do you think you could do better on anything at school?
7. Who do you play with at home? At school?
8. What does it mean to be a friend? How do people become friends?
9. Do you have a best friend? If not what would you want in a best friend?
10.What kinds of things would you like to do with your friends?
11.Which teachers do you interact with every day?
12.What kind of things do your teachers help you with?
13.What are you looking forward to this year? in sixth grade? High school?
14.What do you want to be when you grow up?
15.How do you think you can reach your goals? Could anyone help you? Who?
16.What is one goal you have for yourself this year?
17.If you could make a wish, what would it be?
15. Mills (2011) stated that the validity or “trustworthiness of
qualitative inquiry could be established by addressing the
following characteristics of a study: credibility, transferability,
dependability and confirmability” (p. 103).
Credibility
Triangulation of data
Transferability
Dependability
Triangulation of data
descriptive validity
“overlap method” (Mills, 2011, pp. 104-105)
“audit trail” (Mill, 2011, p. 111)
Confirmability
reflexivity
VALIDITY AND RELIABILITY
16. One assumption of this research project is that the student knows why it is
important to have friends and that he has basic friendship skills but just doesn’t
know how to apply these skills. It is assumed that he has the motivation to learn
and apply these skills during the mentor session and that he will enjoy the one -on-
one sessions.
Because he is a student with Autism Spectrum Disorder, an assumption is
that he will be knowledgeable and talk incessantly about a particular topic.
Secondly, based on my experience with other ASD students, my assumption is that
he will be enthusiastic yet self-absorbed and less empathetic. I assume I can use
his interests and strengths in at least one or two subject areas as a tool in building
conversation skills and in building his self -esteem.
There are several limitations to this study. Primarily, the study involves one student
in fifth grade with one set of disabilities in one suburban school. It may be difficult
to generalize the results to other grades, settings and types of students. The study
results depend exclusively on qualitative data which may limit the validity of the
results. Additionally, the mentor program was a brief seven weeks, whereas
research states that the longer the program the more effective ( Jekielek, Moore,
Hair & Scarupa, 2002). Furthermore, researchers state that effective mentor
programs match students with mentors based on similar interests and shared life
experiences (Newburn & Shiner, 2005; Ryan, et al. 2002). Results of the study may
be limited because the student and researcher in this project were matched due to
the researcher’s prior relationship with the students and interest in his particular
vulnerabilities, rather than by shared interests.
ASSUMPTIONS AND LIMITATIONS
17. Every effort was made in this study to eliminate personal bias.
Qualitative data, in particular, has received criticism as being
too subjective because “the researcher is the instrument of both
data collection and data interpretation and because a qualitative
strategy includes having personal contact and getting close to
the people and situation under study” (source Golafshani) In my
collection of data, to the best of my ability, I remained objective,
only recording what I saw instead of what I expected or wanted
to see.
The student in my study was Caucasian and thus ethnic bias
was not an issue. However, since the student had dual
disabilities, it was challenging to know whether his struggles
with peer relationships were due to his Autism or his Visual
Impairments. It was easy to assume he struggled because of one
of the disabilities and not the other. Throughout the study, I
continually forced myself to be aware that his lack of social
skills was possibly a result of the complexities of both
disabilities among other factors, such as lack of role models.
CULTURAL COMPETENCE/BIAS
18. During this study, much care was taken to ensure ethical procedures
were followed. I gained parental permission of the student involved
before any research took place. I applied and was granted “exempt”
status by the Research Review Board, meaning standard classroom
procedures would take place, and I could continue with project. I
ensured confidentiality by removing the student’s name from any
reports and by keeping the Individualized Education Plan and other
personal information about the student with the researcher at all times
and in a locked room when not in use. This action research posed no
risk for the student; contrarily, he seemed to enjoy the interactions
with and activities shared with mentor.
While this action research project was adapted to be more intensive
than the school program, only lasting seven weeks, I am aware that,
ethically, the mentor relationship with the student should not cease
with the close of the research project. Rather, the student will continue
in the schoolwide mentor program with me as his mentor for the
remainder of the school year.
ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS
