Effects of Balanced Literacy Instruction, Gender, and SES on Student Literacy Achievement

The purpose of this study was to add to the limited available research related to the effects of balanced literacy instruction, gender, and SES on literacy achievement for third- and fifth-grade students in western Arkansas. Student literacy scale scores included in the study were from eight elementary schools, four of which participated in Workshop instruction and four that did not participate in Workshop instruction. The independent variables for Hypotheses 1 and 2 were instruction and gender; the independent variables for Hypotheses 3 and 4 were instruction and SES. The dependent variable for Hypotheses 1 and 3 was literacy achievement as measured by the 2015 PARCC literacy assessment for third-grade students. The dependent variable for Hypotheses 2 and 4 was literacy achievement as measured by the 2015 PARCC literacy assessment for fifth-grade students. A review of related literature revealed a variety of effects of instruction, gender, and SES on student literacy achievement. This causal-comparative study was conducted using third- and fifth-grade student PARCC literacy scale scores from eight elementary schools from four western Arkansas school districts within an 85-mile radius of each other. The sample for this study included vii students from four school districts ranging in size from 4A to 7A. Of the eight elementary schools, four schools from one school district used Workshop instruction, and four schools from three school districts did not use Workshop instruction. The population from which the sample was taken included 722 third-grade students and 787 fifth-grade students. Students from the four schools that used Workshop instruction included 284 third-graders, approximately 53% female with SES ranging from 48% to 85%. While students from the four schools that did not use Workshop instruction included 438 thirdgraders, approximately 46% female with SES ranging from 37 % to 81%. Fifth-grade students from the four schools that used Workshop instruction numbered 293, approximately 52% female with SES ranging 56% to 85%. Finally, fifth-graders from the four schools that did not use Workshop numbered 494, approximately 50% female with SES ranging from 36% to 80%. A 2 x 2 factorial ANOVA was used to analyze data collected for each of the four hypotheses. The results of this study indicated, for Hypotheses 1 and 2, no significant interaction existed between instruction and gender. Similarly, for Hypotheses 3 and 4, no significant interaction existed between instruction and SES. For the main effect of instruction, significant findings resulted from Hypotheses 1 and 2, for both third- and fifth-graders. However, the main effect of instruction was not significant for instruction for Hypotheses 3 and 4 for either third- or fifth-graders. For the main effect of gender, significance was found for Hypotheses 1 and 2 for third- and fifth-grade students. Likewise, for the main effect of SES, a significant result was found for Hypotheses 3 and 4 related to literacy achievement. Of the effect sizes for all the significant results, only viii SES in Hypotheses 3 and 4 rose to the level of medium effect size; all other significant results fell in the small effect size range. Many of the studies reviewed revealed that instruction, gender, and SES affect student achievement in a variety of ways. This study found that students who did not participate in Workshop instruction outperformed students who did participate in Workshop instruction for Hypotheses 1 and 2. In addition, there was evidence that females outperformed males on literacy achievement, and SES non-participants outperformed SES participants. The findings related to gender and SES are similar to other research findings relative to those variables. The findings of this study are comparable to previous research results related to the effects of balanced literacy instruction, gender, and SES on student achievement