The Link Between Participation in Response in Intervention (RTI) and Student Performance
You are required to write a 5,000 word on research design (research methodology) for a project that aim to examine the extent to which participation in RTI affects student’s performance in Mathematics (i.e treatment effect of RTI on grade), and students’ perception on effectiveness of RTI.
The research questions are
Treatment Effect of RTI
i. How does participation in RTI affects students’ performance?
ii. Is there any significant difference in performance of students who participated in RTI and those who did not?
iii. To what extent does level of participation in RTI explain the variance seen in its effect?
iv. Can the effect of RTI be associated with other factors (e.g social-economic background and gender)?
Students’ Perception on Effectiveness of RTI
i. What is students’ perception on effectiveness of RTI (improving grade and reducing anxiety when asked a Mathematics related question)?
The report should
i. Give a brief description of how the research questions will be answered (1,000 words)
ii. State evidence (data) that will be used to answer the questions (1,500 words)
iii. Describe methods of data analysis (2,500 words)
a. Effect of RTI to be analysed using quantitative approach – Regression
b. Students’ perception on effect of RTI to be analysed using qualitative approach – Thematic Analysis
The document titled “Answer and Evidence” on page 2 of this file describe the approaches to answering the research questions, and evidence (data) for data analyses.
Treatment Effect of RTI
i. How does participation in RTI affects students’ performance?
This question want to know the direction of relationship between students’ level of participation in RTI and performance. It can be answered by examining the relationship between the two variables (level of participation in RTI and performance). Regarding participation, student can either participate or not participate, therefore the variable “level of participation” is binary, and can be measured as 1 (for participated) and 0 (for didn’t participate or control group). Performance can be measured as grade in assessment divided by total available score (for example, if a student was graded a 33 out of a possible of 50, performance will be 0.66 or 66%).
The type of variables (independent variable and dependent variable) will inform the choice of method that should be used to identify the relationship. In this case, the independent variable (level of participation) is ordinal, while the dependent variable (performance) is continuous, and as such one can adopt Pearson Correlation. Another method is to conduct a bivariate regression analysis (i.e y = a + bx) where y is performance, and x is level of participation in RTI. The sign (+ or -) of the coefficient represents the direction of relationship between the variables.
You are expected to provide in-depth description of both variables.
In summary, you would describe the process of evaluating the relationship using statistical approach, and use literature to support your argument. This should include measure for correlation.
ii. Is there any significant difference in performance of students who participated in RTI and those who did not?
This is a question of significance. The question wants to know whether the mean performance of group of students who participated in RTI is significantly higher than students who did not participate in the intervention (Control group). That is, treatment effect of the intervention. To do this, you would need to conduct a T-Test to test the hypothesis that there is no significance difference between average performance of the groups, by looking at the p-value of alternative hypothesis. If it is less than 0.05, we can reject the hypothesis that there is no significant difference, otherwise, no. You would need to describe this analysis in detail.
In summary, you would describe the process of establishing significance using statistical approach, and use literature to support your argument. This should include measure for significance testing, including two-sample T-Test.
iii. To what extent does level of participation in RTI explain the variance seen in its effect?
This question wants know the value of the R-squared of the regression model. You would need to describe what R-squared is, and its significance
iv. Can the effect of RTI be associated with other factors (e.g social-economic background and gender)?
This question wants to know whether there are any confounders. You would need to conduct a multivariate analysis which includes other variables (gender and socio-economic status (measured as Pupil Premium – i.e student who receive Pupil Premium are expected to come for disadvantaged background, whereas students who did not receive pupil premium are from advantaged background). The variable Social-Economic background will as such be binary (1 for students who received, otherwise 0). The variable Gender is also binary. 1 for male, and 0 for female. Therefore, the regression model will be expressed as y = a + bx1 + cx2 + dx3, where x1 is level of participation in RTI, x2 is social-economic background, and x3 is gender. The coefficients b, c and d are effects of participation, social-economic background and gender, and if their p-values are less than 0.05, they the variable has significant effect, otherwise no.
In summary, you would use describe the process of establishing causal effect that includes more than 1 independent variable using statistical approach, and use literature to support your argument. This should multivariate analyses and significance testing.
Students’ Perception on Effectiveness of RTI
i. What is students’ perception on effectiveness of RTI (improving grade and reducing anxiety when asked a Mathematics related question)?
Here, you will need to describe a qualitative method of analysing student responses to questionnaire on impact of RTI (on their grade and anxiety when asked a Maths related question). A common approach is Thematic Analysis. It involves identifying codes, and extracting themes from responses. Braun and Clarke (2006) is a good article on thematic analysis, and can be consulted on the approach.
- Data (Evidence) to answer the questions.
In order to answer the research questions, data of students who participated in RTI (intervention or treatment group), and students who did not participate in RTI (control group) is required. The data should include relevant factors that have been identified in the literature as determinants of variance in impact of RTI should be included in the data. This include differences in demographics (gender and social-economic background in particular), students grades (before and after participation in RTI). Grades of students who did not participate in the intervention are also required to test the effect of RTI. Performance will be measured as the difference in grades (difference in post intervention and pre-intervention grades of students).
Sample Solution
