Action Research in Educational Settings

One example of action research in an educational setting is leadership teams. According to Nancy Fichtman Dana, leadership teams allow for “building a culture of collaboration coupled with the educational reform, accountability, and improved standards that require visionary and strategic planning, not only from the principal but also from the whole school community.” (p. 21) Teams are normally made up of teachers and administrators working together to address problems, and help the administrators come up with decisions that benefit the entire campus. My district does have different teams made up among their respective campuses. The teams look at problems, such as student test scores, learning disabilities, attendance rates, and parent communication, and they collect and analyze data and then evaluate their findings and share with the rest of the district in staff development meetings.  Another example of action research is PLC’s or professional learning communities. These are made up of six to twelve professionals who meet on a regular basis. (Dana, 2009, pg. 21) Our district actually has 3 PLC’s that meet on a quarterly basis. These PLC’s are made up of administrators, teachers, and community members. I am fortunate to be a member of one of these PLC’s. This allows for other professionals, other than the principal, to collect and analyze data and then bring the findings back to the group for review for improvements or solutions. These problems are usually more campus oriented such as scheduling, programs and classes being offered, playground and campus equipment, volunteers who work for our teachers and even the issues of teachers’ children who roam the campus before and after school hours. My action research project will include my colleagues. Our campus has become quite filled with over 700 students in grades PK-4th. We have a problem with getting all parents much needed information at meet the teacher and parent orientation. Most families have multiple children and the times we ask parents to come is in the middle of the day when most people are working. With our economy the way it has been the last few years, and our district being of low socioeconomic status, this has been quite a challenge. My plan is to collaborate with my principal, superintendent, and fellow team leaders, to create a video orientation from each of the above. These videos will be uploaded to our district website allowing for all teachers to show parents at the same time in their classrooms during their orientation time. Every classroom on our campus is equipped with a SmartBoard and overhead projector. This also allows for families that are new to the district to view these videos for their own orientation and for those parents who are not able to attend the scheduled orientation. This will also alleviate some stress for our teachers as this is such a busy and hectic time for them. This has always been an issue for our campus, and my plan is to have it in place by the 2012-2013 school year. According to Marjorie Ringler, benefits of action research is that, “It allows for an instructional leader’s role to strengthen teachers’ self-confidence and self-efficacy.” (p. 27) Allowing yourself to reflect on what you have done, allows you to grow as an educator and leader. Just being able to look back on data that has been collected, including what a teacher has taught, allows that teacher to go back and see what they can do to improve on the material they have covered or how they have taught the material to their students. I believe most educators reflect on how they have handled certain issues, by thinking about how they could’ve done something different or improved on it, but they don’t share their experiences by jotting what they’ve learned. By blogging, this allows for one to go back and look how they can make that change and it allows others to learn from them. References Dana, N. F. (2009). Leading with passion and knowledge. Thousand Oaks, California: Corwin. Ringler, M. C. (2007). Action Research: an effective instructional leadership skill for future public school leaders. AASA Journal of Scholarship & Practice, 4(1), 27-37.