Sesame Street Experiment Summary

Mr. Franklin used the experimental method in order to test his hypothesis that educational programs such as Sesame Street promote reading ability in elementary school children. In his research, the independent variable was the television shows that the children were instructed to watch, such as Sesame Street or a non-educational show. The dependent variable is the child’s reading ability in elementary school, which is measured the child’s scores on a standardized reading test. While Mr. Franklin’s research has a strong hypothesis and operational definitions, there are still flaws in his research. These flawed aspects of the research design weaken the validity of Mr. Franklin’s conclusion. There are, however, ways to correct each of these …show more content…
When Mr. Franklin announced his hunch to the parents, some parents responded enthusiastically. These were the parents that were instructed to have their children watch a one hour Sesame Street program each day after school. The parents that were instructed to have their children watch a one-hour non-educational cartoon were randomly chosen from the remainder of the class, meaning that they were not enthusiastic about the research. This sampling weakens the validity of Mr. Franklin’s conclusion because there may be something different between the parents who were enthusiastic about the research and those who weren’t. It is possible that that the parents who were excited about the research are more involved in their children’s academic lives and push their children harder when it comes to school. Or, since they volunteered to participate in the research, they are more likely to follow the instructions as given. Either of these possibilities could have skewed Mr. Franklin’s results. There would be no way to tell if the reading scores reflected the impact television show or the involvement of the parent in the child’s life. A way that Mr. Franklin could correct this flaw is to have a random sample for both groups. Through random sampling, Mr. Franklin can control for this extraneous variable. It is a start that the non-educational program group was random, but there needs to be a mix of both enthusiastic parents and non-enthusiastic parents to ensure a representation of the entire class in both