Data to Instruction Analysis Protocol Rubric

Many teachers believe that students are better behaved, more motivated, and learn better
in the morning. Therefore, in this paper, I am investigating the relation between the
scheduled time of mathematics lessons on a school day and the effect it has on the learning
outcome.
In order to check this hypothesis, I collected data of weekly, monthly, and termly summative
mathematics assessments for two groups of students in grade 8 (age 11 to 13) in school ABC.
The two sections, that I label 8B and 8G in this paper, are taught by the same teacher, Mrs.
N.. Grade 8 students have 5 mathematics lessons every week. Group 8B has mathematics
lessons mostly in the morning, while group 8G has most of its mathematics lessons in the
second half of the school day. The table below shows the distribution of the lessons for both
groups over the week.

8.00 8.55 9.50 10.45 11.15 12.05 12.55 2.20 3.10

a.m- a.m.- a.m.- a.m.- a.m.- p.m.- p.m.- p.m.- p.m.-
8.55 9.50 10.45 11.15 12.05 12.55 2.20 3.10 4.00
a.m. a.m. a.m. a.m. p.m. p.m. p.m. p.m. p.m.
Sunday 8B 8G
Monday First 8B Lunch 8G
Tuesday break 8B 8G break
Wednesday 8B 8G
Thursday 8B 8G

Section 8B has 35 students and section 8G has 34 students. Both sections have 3 new
students. The other students are all returning students.

The data collected is for different types of mathematics assessments for term 1 (T1) of the
academic year 2018-2019 (18-19). Data for returning students mathematics results for the
year 2017-2018 (17-18) was also collected.

Terminology and types of assessments:

1- A.M.S. or Academic Monitoring System: Computerized formative assessment that
consists of multiple-choice questions done on weekly basis and testing simple units of
information.
2- H.W. or Homework Exam: Type-in computer correctible exam with closed answers done
on weekly basis testing intermediate difficulty level questions that students have access to
before the exam and have worked on at home.
3- Periodic Exam: A summative test consisting of a combination of computerized multiple
choice and free-response written questions done at the end of one or more units. Students
sit for two to three periodic mathematics exams in one term.
4- Final Exam: Similar in structure to the periodic exam and done once at the end of each
term.

The data of the 4 different types of mathematics assessments results for the two groups
over the first term of the academic year 2018-2019 can be found in tables 1 and 2 below:
 Group 8G
A.M.S T1 H.W. T1 Periodic Total T1
Student average 18- average T1 average average 18-
number 19 (%) 18-19 (%) 18-19 (%) 19 (%)
1 95 99 95 96
2 95 97 97 96
3 83 88 79 82
4 86 83 87 85
5 73 69 77 74
6 82 73 72 74
7 76 68 75 73
8 79 74 71 73
9 73 80 78 78
10 96 97 98 98
11 44 26 44 39
12 49 51 56 53
13 68 63 74 70
14 93 93 85 89
15 85 81 77 79
16 93 90 87 89
17 76 70 72 72
18 60 29 38 40
19 65 68 64 65
20 92 89 87 89
21 98 95 94 95
22 77 71 81 78
23 94 97 91 93
24 85 87 82 84
25 97 95 95 95
26 99 99 99 99
27 79 70 82 79
28 77 81 78 78
29 82 91 77 82
30 85 72 71 74
31 52 50 53 52
32 87 83 83 84
33 87 80 84 83
34 90 90 92 92
Class
Average 80.9411765 77.911765 78.676471 78.8823529
(Table 1)
Group 8B
A.M.S T1 H.W. T1 Periodic Total T1
Student average 18- average T1 average average
number 19 (%) 18-19 (%) 18-19 (%) 18-19 (%)
1 78 94 89 88
2 82 67 76 75
3 69 71 62 66
4 90 88 89 89
5 63 49 52 53
6 76 78 86 82
7 98 100 97 98
8 98 97 93 95
9 62 71 55 60
10 75 70 85 79
11 83 91 73 80
12 88 88 91 90
13 90 90 82 86
14 96 96 89 92
15 78 76 71 74
16 83 87 89 87
17 81 68 67 70
18 85 84 82 83
19 73 64 75 72
20 90 87 82 85
21 96 94 96 96
22 66 53 49 53
23 95 92 93 93
24 71 54 59 60
25 86 95 90 91
26 75 67 79 76
27 73 90 79 80
28 74 65 76 73
29 76 74 80 78
30 83 78 77 79
31 97 90 92 92
32 96 96 94 95
33 88 83 85 85
34 82 71 80 78
35 80 70 74 75
Class
Average 82.171429 79.657143 79.657143 80.228571
(Table 2)
Chart 1 below shows a comparison of the results between the 4 types of mathematics
assessment for the two groups over the course of term 1 (18-19)

Term 1 (18-19) Maths Assessment Results (%)

Total Term

Periodic

Homework

A.M.S

75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84

8G 8B

(Chart 1)

A quick look at chart 1 shows a clear pattern: Group 8B, with the morning classes, has a
consistent higher average in all 4 types of assessment than group 8G. This average difference,
however, does not exceed 2 %.

To better understand the meaning of this difference, groups 8B and 8G total mathematics
term average results are compared with the term average results of other grade 8 sections
taught by other teachers in chart 2 below. It is important to mention that all sections of the
same grade level in ABC schools sit for the same standardized tests.
 Term 1 total Mathematics average (%)
83

82

81

80

79

78

77

76
Term average

8A 8B 8C 8D 8E 8F 8G

(Chart 2)

In chart 2, it can be observed that the biggest difference in the term average between the
different grade 8 sections does not exceed 3.5%. But it is also interesting to notice that the
two groups of this study, 8B and 8G, have the lowest term average. Group 8A is the only
exception. In a quick investigation conducted about group 8A, I found that this group has had
three different teachers over the course of term 1. No other group has had a similar
experience.

To further investigate the assessment results of the two groups 8B and 8G and compare them
with the other sections, I compared the weekly results of one type of assessments (A.M.S.)
over term 1.

Weekly A.M.S. results comparison T1 (%)

95

90

85

80

75

70
Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7 Week 8 Wekk 9 Week 10

8B 8G grade average

(Graph 1)
Graph 1 above shows that both groups under study have consistently scored below the grade
average or just tallied with the grade average, with the exception of week 1.

Weekly A.M.S results Comparison - T1 (%)

95

90

85

80

75

70
Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7 Week 8 Week 9 Week 10

8B 8G

(Graph 2)

Graph 2 above shows meaningful differences in the A.M.S. results in the two groups under
investigation only in 3 weeks out of 10 (weeks 1, 3 and 10). Group 8G, that has the majority
of afternoon mathematics classes, scored lower than 8B in all 3 weeks.

In order to explore more in depth other possible reasons for the differences in the
mathematics results between the two groups under study and to check the fair distribution
of the students over the two groups, I collected data of the yearly mathematics average of
the returning students in both section 8B and 8G for the previous academic year 17-18. The
results are shown in chart 3 below.

Mathematics yearly average (17-18) (%)

85.2

85

84.8

84.6

84.4

84.2

84
Category 1

8B 8G

(Chart 3)
The yearly average difference for the two groups does not exceed 0.7%. Group 8G, with the
afternoon mathematics classes, is again the disadvantaged group in this chart. But can this
small difference in the students’ previous academic year mathematics results be contributing
in the bigger difference observed in grade 8 results for the current academic year? To attempt
to answer this question I looked at data of all seven grade 8 sections previous academic year
17-18 mathematics averages and compared it with their term 1 performance for the year 18-
19. The results are show on the below combined graph 3.

Years (17-18) vs. (18-19) mathematics averages (%)

87 87
86 86
85 85
84 84
83 83
82 82
81 81
80 80
79 79
78 78
77 77
8A 8B 8C 8D 8E 8F 8G

Yearly 17-18 Average 18-19 T1 average

(Graph 3)

Here are some interesting observations related to graph 3:

- Even though groups 8E and 8G have a very similar (17-18) yearly average, group 8G,
with the afternoon mathematics classes, has a 2 % lower (18-19) T1 average.
- Group 8A has the highest (17-18) yearly average but has the lowest T1 (18-19)
average. This could probably be explained by the frequent change in mathematics
teachers that this group of students has had as mentioned previously.
- Group 8C, which is the next highest scoring group in (17-18) after group 8A, is the
highest scoring group in T1 (18-19) as well.

Interestingly enough, groups 8E and 8C are taught by the same teacher, Mrs. S., and even
more interesting is the fact that group 8C has 5 mathematics lessons that are morning classes,
and group 8E has mathematics classes that are almost evenly distributed between morning
and afternoon classes. Below is the timetable of Mrs. S:
 8.00 8.55 9.50 10.45 11.15 12.05 12.55 2.20 3.10
a.m- a.m.- a.m.- a.m.- a.m.- p.m.- p.m.- p.m.- p.m.-
8.55 9.50 10.45 11.15 12.05 12.55 2.20 3.10 4.00
a.m. a.m. a.m. a.m. p.m. p.m. p.m. p.m. p.m.
Sunday 8C 8E
Monday 8C First Lunch 8E
Tuesday break 8C break 8E
Wednesday 8C 8E
Thursday 8E 8C

In one more attempt to understand the effect of the mathematics class schedule on the
students’ assessment results, I looked at the percentage of students who scored below 50%,
between 50 and 70%, between 70% and 90% and above 90% in T1 for the year 18-19. The pie
charts below show the results for the two groups 8B and 8G under study.

8B T1 Maths average (%) 8G T1 Maths Average (%)

<50 50-70 70-90 >90 <50 50-70 70-90 >90

Results in both sections are comparable for intermediate and high achievers, but the same
cannot be said about low achievers. In the group 8A, where students attend morning
mathematics classes, there are no students who finished the term with an average in
mathematics below 50%, whereas in group 8G two students did.

Conclusions:

- Despite the fact that most of the data collected and analyzed does support the
assumption that the morning or afternoon timing of the lessons does affect the
learning outcome, the differences observed in the assessment results are not large
enough to make the timing a determining factor in the learning process.
- The data collected does not explain the reason the timing of the lesson is correlated
to the learning outcome. Is the teacher tired? Is the student less motivated?
- Based on the results of this study, school administrators or educational authorities can
conduct further investigation and look for more evidence to decide if making school
days shorter and/or teaching STEM subjects in the morning can maximize the learning
outcome of the students.