Capstone Essential Questions and Key DataFinal draft

Please use the boxes provided to insert your responses:

Name:
Celestine H
Project #:
2
Your projects essential question:
How does ones personality [?] [delete: innate traits] affect his/her performance
and learning experience in an academic setting? [delete: him/her in academics?]
Your projects primary research question:
How does being introverted affect either positively or negatively on a students GPA
and learning experience in a discussion based class in secondary school and how
can teachers help mitigate these effects in a comprehensive manner?
Your projects secondary research questions:

What does being introverted mean?

What is the definition of a discussion based class?
How can one measure how introverted one is?
Why do many teachers count participation as an important part of their
grading systems?
Mr. Oakes suggested Is an introspective disposition valued in high schools
today?
What are ways to demonstrate understanding other than speaking out loud in
class that can fulfill the participation requirement?
Does a students participation level decrease as the day goes on?
Is it a teachers job to go out of their way to accommodate students needs?
Do teachers base their judgments of a student on how much they speak in
class? (for example, more likely to write recommendations?)
Can you suppress your introversion?
Can you suppress your introversion for longer periods of time as you grow
older? (i.e. force yourself to speak more)

A concise description of your project:

This project will be very much research based. I will use BLS as my parameters for
exploration. I will send out a notice to the entire school asking for those who feel like
they fit the category of being introverted and wouldnt mind being observed for
around half a year.
They will all take a questionnaire which tests for introversion to determine how
introverted each student feels and be able to compare those degrees of
introvertedness. I will choose around 8 students to follow and observe throughout
the year. I wish to pick 2 students from each grade of high school and see how same

correlations of introversion play out throughout the grade levels. This will answer
questions such as if a person can become better at speaking out loud with more
practice. By observing the people for four-six months, I will collect data on: how
many times they speak in class when participation counts as a grade and when it
doesnt, the differences between their participation in a discussion based class vs. a
math/science class, and the differences in the number of times they participate at
different times of the day. I hope to work with teachers to provide these students with
an opportunity for online discussion and see how the introverts participation online
compares to that of in a classroom. I will interview each student at monthly intervals
and ask them if they feel that their participation grade is bringing down their grade in
a discussion-based class or if its boosting it and why that is so.
I will also at the same time work with teachers who teach discussion based classes
to understand their point of view. I will ask them who they think their favorite students
were and compare that to how many times he/she shares in class. This will reflect on
if quiet students are often ignored because theyre quiet. At the end of the
observations, after I have compiled all my results, I will work with teachers to
accommodate for their more introverted students. I do not know what this plan will
look like as I do not know the information I will gain yet. In this way, my final product
will look much like a paper that share the results that I find and provide a way to use
that data to better accommodate for such a population of students at BLS.
Why does your project matter? How does it make a significant contribution to
our body of knowledge? (1-3 sentences)
The world is obsessed with people who can dazzle and talk confidently to a crowd.
Introverted people are often pushed aside because they dont enjoy such public
speaking or socializing. Through my research, I hope to provide teachers at BLS
with data that proves that participation doesnt necessarily equal content
understanding and help them accommodate for their introverted students.
Introvertism is a trait similar to that of a persons hair color or eye color. High school
students shouldnt be penalized for an innate trait that they dont have control over.
Celestine,
What a great, great project! The essential question (once reworded), the
research questions (both primary and secondary) are all first rate. Clearly they
stem from your passion for the topic.
What we are concerned about, however, is the viability of the research
study. What a great idea to shadow students--maybe 2 for each grade. But
thats 8 students and you want to shadow them for several days each? How
are you going to do that? (We may be good--but we cant get you excused
from 16+ days of school!) Lets say that you could be excused from your
studies and your Capstone class beginning in January. Even if you could
observe them in one class, theres only one of you and 8 of them. Thats a lot
of observing. If you have 45 school days on which you could observe (and
thats in a perfect world--no snow days, interruptions, etc.), how many
observations per student? And what about measuring the data on a student

who is, say, quiet in math but extroverted in Spanish? If you could only see
them for one hour/class in a day, how would you know that?
So the task before you is this. Great project---now find a way to make it
feasible. (Sadly, if you were in graduate school, this would be your full-time
project over several years and you would have a cadre of volunteer
researchers shadowing while you are shadowing, using whatever template
you designed for them to record their observations.) We tried to quickly run
the numbers and figure out how you could do this easily with 4 students
instead of 8--and then we looked at your academic schedule and our heads
hurt. How are you going to be able to accomplish this during a school day?!!
We are convinced and have confidence that you will find a strategy. Let us
know how we can help.
Ms. F and Mr. M