Caro-Bruce, C., McCreadie, J. (1994). Establishing
action research in one school district.
In: Noffke, S. (1994). Practically critical: An invitation to action research
in
education. New York: Teachers College Press, Columbia University.
The Madison Metropolitan School District began an organized attempt at
using action research as professional staff development. Caro-Bruce and
McCready outline the process and highlight the keys to successful implementation
of action research in Madison. The keys are: It takes time and effort
for a district to embrace action research; finding a meaningful context
to which action research can be connected is critical; moving action research
from the initiative of individuals to a district commitment is essential;
funding release time for teachers to do action research results in teachers
feeling valued and renewed; sharing the costs with the schools leads to
increased commitment by principals; and the more different sources of
support, the more likely action research is to succeed. The expectations
that they held for the participants were: Each teacher will identify a
problem or question to pursue; Teachers will be encouraged to acamine
and assess their own teaching and then to consider ways of working differently;
and teachers will work collaboratively with each other, with course facilitators,
and with other staff members in their schools. The article also outlines
organization and process requirements. The district is looking to include
an area action research network as a way of disseminating information
and findings.
Eib, B.J., & Cox, S. (2003). Integrating technology with teacher
inquiry. Principal
Leadership, 3 (5), 54-58.
Eib and Cox explore tying teacher inquiry with both technology and professional
development plans (PDP) that are often required in school districts. The
PDP model is job embedded and already seeks inquiry. By tying it in with
AR, teachers would be enhancing the greater population of the educational
field. This particular study focused on the AR question being posed by
all the teachers of a community of how technology can best help student
learning outcomes. The benefits of the program are that it enhances reflection
and dialogue, builds trust and promotes valuing all colleagues, offers
K-12 collaboration, is professional development that is learning focused
for students and teachers, is learner-directed and data driven, and that
it is authentic, job embedded professional development that does not begin
and end with a training seminar.
Galland, P. (2002). Techie Teachers: Web-based staff
development at your leisure.
TechTrends, 46 (3), 7-10.
Using web-based staff development focused on increasing computer skills
as they relate to educational issues, Galland discusses the experience
of first time online distance (WebCT) users. The results overall were
very positive and teachers were enthusiastic about the flexibility of
the program. The main complaint from the students’ perspective was
that they preferred more interaction than distance learning allowed. One
person who was fairly new to computers stated that while she sought assistance,
“you had to know what you were doing to even do that.” Clearly
all programs must be user friendly for the most basic learners. Galland
also pointed out that it took much more time to set up than she had anticipated
and that continual upkeep was needed to keep web links current.
Leh, A.S.C. (2002). Action research on the changing roles of the instructors
and the
learners. TechTrends, 46 (5), 44-47.
The authors focus on teachers changing roles as it pertains to self learning
and modeling that for new learners. Teachers should take on the role of
expert learner while students are novice learners. Throughout the process,
it creates a learning community of experts, learners, parents, and other
members of the community. The article was actually an action research
project on these changing roles. The students in the project were K-12
educators working on their masters’ degrees at the university. Each
had to implement information technology into their curriculum as part
of their course work and facilitate an action research plan on the process.
Llorens, M. B. (1994). Action research: Are teachers
finding their voice? The Elementary
School Journal, 95 (1), 3-10.
Llorens explores the various types of action research (AR) that has taken
place both historically and in educational research today. It has become
a viable method of enhancing teacher professionalism and a means to “bridge
the gap between educational theory and educational practice.” One
of the major restrictions in carrying out AR is the teachers’ feeling
of inefficacy and fear of carrying out their own research. Lloren’s
calls this phenomenon a lack of a teacher voice believes that teachers
need to be empowered. They need to rise to the challenge and assert themselves
as the experts as to what is happening in the classrooms. Ways to encourage
teacher voice are to offer support and encouragement throughout the project
by having mentors, small groups that address either the same research
question or different questions to gain greater perspective. It is also
important to allow for flexibility and diversity in approaches when giving
results. Teachers may feel comfortable with oral or written approaches
depending on their personal style.
Luetkehans, L.M., & Robinson, R.S. (2002). Reforming from “without”
by leading from
Within.” TechTrends, 46 (5), 13-17.
This article discusses the lack of technology integration in teacher
preparation curriculum. The university has an online course available
named “Engaging with Technology. The study is focused on engaged
learning and action research as professional development. It is their
belief that teachers are more influenced by how the technology will help
their prior and future teaching experiences rather than the technology
itself.
Wang, M.; Sierra, C.; & Folger, T. (2003). Building
a dynamic online learning
community among adult learners. Education Media International. Retrieved
from.
Wang, Sierra, and Folger explore the dynamics of online learning communities
and discuss the components that make the e-communities successful. The
communities profiled worked through Webcasts for formal presentations
of material and information. They also used a system called Digichats
to have online classroom discussions and interactions. The chat system
allowed for public and private chatting which allowed for the individual
contact that is needed at times. It was important for the group to build
a team identity. To help facilitate this the participants formed a social
network that was started with student profiles so the participants could
get to know each other on a more personal basis through the first few
weeks of the program.
Whatley, J., & Bell, F. (2003). Discussion across
borders: Benefits for collaborative
learning. Education Media International. Retrieved from http://www.tandf.co.uf/journals.
The benefits of online learning communities are that the information
is not constrained by time or space. It embraces diversity (even globally)
and allows flexibility. To be successful, it is important that they be
tied to an outcome project that gives guidelines and incentives for timeliness.
Having authentic and situated collaboration with team members brings the
most successful outcomes. When designing the module, it is essential that
the main topic be identified with clear purpose as to the research question
being posed.
Raphael, R.E., Florio-Ruane, S., Kehus, M.J., George, M., Hasty, N.L.,
& Highfield, K.
(2001). Thinking for ourselves: Literacy learning in a diverse teacher
inquiry network.
Reading Teacher, 54 (6).
A group of 30 teacher/researchers from Michigan formed an action research
collaborative group to explore the question, “How can we re-engage
low-achieving readers?” They were not from the same local environment
and committed time for traveling on weekends and evenings to meet and
used email contact for networking within the group. They implemented their
ideas within the curriculum set by the local agencies and used themed
units to enhance reading and writing. They shared data, methods, plans,
resources, and created evaluation instruments together. This is an excellent
model of how AR can work even without school wide support but through
teachers wanted to make a difference through collaboration. Their belief
is that “inquiry is central to the work of teaching and it requires
community.”
Calhoun, E. (2002). Action Research for School Improvement.
Educational Leadership. 59(6), 18-24.
“Action research is continual professional development—a
direct route to improving teaching and learning. It is seeking to understand
and acting on the best we know.” A more formal definition is continual
discipline inquiry conducted to inform and improve our practice as educators.
Calhoun believes that those who embrace action research are ready to “embrace
difficulties realistically, to apply honest fact-finding, and to work
together to overcome them.” Done correctly, AR can transform the
social structure of school and brings new leadership skills to those who
take on the challenge. For implementing change of this magnitude, Calhoun
suggests using a Schoolwide Action Research Matrix that includes current
student information, external information about learners, student performance
goals, internal information about the learning environment, external information
about the learning environment, and the learning environment goals.
