Directions: Read the author's response and evaluate their answers. What are your thoughts or opinions? Do you agree or disagree? why or why not? What can you adds to extend the conversation?

My mixed-methods study will address struggling early learners' motivation to read after exposure to an arts-based reading comprehension intervention. Quantitative data will be used in the form of an instrument to measure motivation to read in young children called "Me and My Reading Profile" (Marinak et al., 2015). The instrument will be given to second grade students in my class who choose to participate. Qualitative data will occur in the form of an in-depth case study involving two low-performing students in the academic area of reading comprehension. This data will be comprised of student interviews, observations, daily field notes, narratives, and an in-depth analysis and coding of student artistic reading journals.

The arts-based reading comprehension intervention will be comprised of the following instructional strategies during a 12-week period.

--"Using Art to Teach Reading Comprehension Strategies" (Klein & Stuart, 2013)

--"Ink and Idea" (McGregor, 2019)

--"Visual Thinking Strategies" (Yenawine, 2013)

I will briefly explain how this study might be different using the three core designs explained in our readings this week of chapter 3.

convergent design: I would use a convergent parallel design in which qualitative and quantitative data are collected in parallel, then analyzed separately, then finally merged (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2018). Quantitative data analysis will be used in the form of an instrument to measure motivation in young children called "Me and My Reading Profile" (Marinak et al., 2015). A pre-post test design will be used, and significance will be analyzed between the two assessments using t-tests before and after the arts intervention. Qualitative data will be analyzed and coded for major themes that surface, and student interviews will be transcribed and coded as well. Both quantitative and qualitative research will be analyzed for points of convergence and divergence (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2018). This type of design seems more straightforward to me to actually complete and compare the results for similarities and differences, but a drawback may be that the two datasets don't seem to inform the other as in the other types of mixed-methods designs.

explanatory sequential design: In this type of design, I would first collect and analyze quantitative data using the motivation instrument described above. The same pre-post test design will be used and significance will be analyzed between the two assessments using t-tests before and after the arts intervention. Then, in the next phase qualitative data are collected following the results of the quantitative phase. The quantitative results will inform the qualitative data collection and subsequent results for this type of design. Benefits to this type of design are that the quantitative results will inform the qualitative phase, but this may also narrow the scope of the qualitative data collection and some of the deeper, rich analysis may be lost.

exploratory sequential design: This type of design would start with the qualitative phase of collection and analysis, then the second phase would result in designing a quantitative feature based on the qualitative results. Following the qualitative case study phase of collection and analysis, I may decide to use a new instrument or create a new survey to measure student motivation to read. Then, the interpretation of quantitative results will give a pretty clear understanding because they are firmly grounded in the initial qualitative perceptions. Benefits to this type of design are that the quantitative data and analysis will be based upon the rich, qualitative analysis which occurs first. A drawback may be that the qualitative results and ensuing quantitative analysis may not end up showing relevant significance. Developing a new survey is risky because it may not be statistically reliable or valid.

I originally thought I would use the convergent design for this study, but now the exploratory sequential design is piquing my interest because it starts with the qualitative portion. Then, based on the uncovered codes and themes, it makes sense to me to then develop the quantitative portion based upon these grounded findings. It will be extremely important to make sure a new motivation instrument is both reliable and valid.