This document proposes using animation technology to supplement reading instruction at Leonardtown Elementary. It found that while both traditional instruction and instruction supplemented with student-created cartoons improved reading comprehension, the improvement was not significantly higher with cartoons. It recommends trying this strategy again with students creating their own cartoons and using color. The document concludes that animation technology appeals to multiple learning styles even if it did not definitively improve comprehension in this study.

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Leonardtown Elementary
Emily Davis & Jessica Morgan

2. Justification
• Leonardtown did not make AYP last year
o As a result, SIP is almost singularly focused
on improving amount of students reading at
proficient or advanced by county benchmark
and by DIEBELS
o Students in 3rd grade received lower than
proficient scores in identifying and defining:
o Setting and mood (38%)
o Words, lines, and stanzas(56%)
o Main ideas and themes (57%)

3. Justification
• Professional Development Goal:“Teachers will use these best practices to
change instruction if necessary after reviewing student work samples”
o Differentiation
o Learning styles
• Animation Technology
o Technology allows students to experience different types of writings
while still remaining in their digital comfort zones
o Supplements culturally relevant teaching
o Incorporation of these tools and applications is merely a natural
extension of the way these students are currently living and
learning outside of that classroom.
• Bakhoum (2008) explained that students test scores made a significant
improvement as a result of introducing animations to traditional
classroom instruction.

4. Strategy
• Choose two appropriately leveled texts of similar level
and type
o First Text
 Will be taught using typical classroom strategies
 Pre- and post-test for content comprehension
o Second Text
 Will again use typical classroom strategies
 Review of the text will be done using
animation/cartoons constructed by the intern that
will ask students to sequence main events
 Pre- and post-test for content comprehension

5. Research questions
• Does sequencing of cartoon technology increase
student content comprehension?
• Is cartoon technology more effective than
discussion in increasing students’ reading
comprehension?

6. Data collection plan
Data Source 1 Data source 2
Does sequencing of Pre-test and Post-
cartoon technology test with cartoon
increase student images
content
comprehension?
Is cartoon Pre-test and Post- Pre-test and Post-
technology more test without test with cartoon
effective than cartoon images images
discussion in
increasing
students’ reading
comprehension?

7. Pre-post assessment items
• Grandma’s Records
o Text-specific questions
assessing vocabulary, story
sequencing, and overall
content comprehension
o Ex. “How does Grandma use
this tradition to connect with
her culture?”
• The Talking Cloth
• Text-specific questions similar
to those for the previous text
• Sequencing question included
pictures from cartoon
supplement used in review

8. Pre-post findings
• Our findings!
o There was a significant increase in reading
comprehension for both Grandma’s Records
(p = .00000001) and Talking Cloth
(p = .000006).
o However, there was not a significantly
higher increase in reading comprehension
when using cartoon technology rather than
traditional classroom strategies. (p = .38)

9. Answers to research
questions
• Does cartoon technology increase student
reading comprehension more then
discussion?
o There was a greater increase in
reading comprehension when using
animations vs. discussion (39 points vs.
42 points)
o However, this difference in reading
comprehension scores was not
significant.

10. Limitations
• Timing
o The cartoon handout was done the Thursday
before the Halloween weekend, so the school
as a whole was off task.
• Curriculum Demands
o Due to passing guides and test schedules,
activities such as these are difficult to work
into the classes tight schedule.
• Small sample size/less data due to unforseeable
events

11. Next steps?
• Yes, this strategy would be
recommended for future
application.
• Next time, we would like to have
the students create their own
cartoon strip of the story. This
gives each student responsibility
for their own instruction and
comprehension.
o Also, due to lack of resources the
cartoon had to be printed out in
black and white, rather than
color. Color would appeal to a
larger variety of learning styles.

12. The Big Picture!
• Animation and cartoon technology has been
proven by various research to be not only useful
as an instrument of instruction, but also as a way to
connect with students in a digital age.
• Even though our experiment did not prove that
animation technology significantly improved
reading comprehension over traditional teaching
methods, including the arts in instruction appeals
to multiple learning styles and student skill and
ability.

13. References
• Bakhoum, E. G. (2008). Animating an Equation: a
Guide to using Flash in Mathematics Education.
International Journal of Mathematical Education
in Science and Technology, 39(5), 637-655.