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Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Action research is an insightful tool that reminds us how beneficial change can occur.  It is an active approach that seeks to make a genuine difference and provide a solution to a possible problem.  Action research requires the participation of everyone that it affects; thus, making it practical and realistic.  The first step in action research is to reflect.  As educators, we are often overworked and have difficulty finding the time to complete all necessary and desired tasks.  We simply attempt to get through our “to do” list and do not have the time to truly reflect on our teaching and the needs of our students/school.  If we look at this from a learning perspective, we are only becoming “surface level” educators.  We are not truly learning from mistakes, colleagues, students,   and possibly other districts.  We are doing exactly what we teach our students not to do.  As educators, we attempt to develop creative, engaging lessons hoping that the students enjoy these and perceive learning as enjoyable.  We all know that if learning is enjoyable and positive, the students are more likely to become lifelong learners.  We continually encourage the students to learn a concept instead of simply going through the motions of memorization.  Contradictory to this, we are often going through the motions of our profession.  We do not take the time to reflect and learn from each other.  If we take more time to reflect, then we become overall better learners.  Reflection opens the soul and the mind to various problems that may exist.  We must take the time to reflect on the day, the lesson, the students, the school, and each other to continue to have a well balanced and successful campus.

 Since I am currently a teacher and department chair, I am going to reflect from that perspective and then incorporate that view into the entire school as though I might be the administrator.  Our math scores have seen a steady increase over the last few years with various changes we have made. It has taken several years, but we are excited about this.  After the second administration we are at 92% for our 5th grade math.  We very much want all of our students to succeed so we are looking for the final piece to our puzzle.  We realize that we must think beyond the norm to accomplish this final challenge. Some of the action research that I am interested in would be:
1. The benefits of our new math computer programs
2. Inviting parents to come and observe their child in intervention classes so that the parents have a better understanding of how they need to help instruct their child at home. 

3.  This is also the first year that we will have a math interventionist on our campus.  This, too, might be an area of interest.

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There are many ways that an educational leader might use blogs.  Department chairs and team leaders can use blogs to communicate ideas and changes within their department, helping to create a more cohesive team.  Administrators can use blogs as a key source of communication among parents, teachers, and between other district administrators.  Teachers can use blogs to communicate with both students and parents.  Blogging is an important tool that allows reflection among all and the opportunity to better communicate concepts that a busy day might not allow time for.

1 comment:

  1. Thank you for your insightful writing. I would agree that sometimes we neglect to reflect because we are spending too much time thinking about accomplishing our tasks. I fall into that trap many times. I love the idea of inviting parents to observe an intervention math class. That seems like a great idea to get the parents and students walking on the same path towards academic excellence. Thank you for listing your action research plan so clearly. Good luck to you!

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