Updated Action Research Plan

I did not have a lot of changes other than adding some student interest surveys in to simply have more data. These will not change my results since I am simply searching for number driven data. Please feel free to add more responses. From my weekly assignment: 

I was a little surprised that I received so many depressing comments on the discussion board, most of them questioning how I could withhold technology from my students. I thought about writing a response but decided to see how any of the responses affect my research plan. I found no reason to change my plan based on the discussion board comments since I am withhold technology for testing methods and these are not devices that belong to the district, they are my personal property.

I answered some questions about strategy usage that I did not add to my original plan. My students will be using their strategies because they will have the story we are working on with them. These stories come from a text book so I will be wasting no more additional paper and they will be able to use all of the strategies that we have worked on. I was also asked about student engagement but decided since I wanted my data to be about the testing numbers, I would ask about engagement but would not use it in my results except as a note. Other than that I received no other comments about my plan and after discussing with my site mentor, we have decided to keep it as it currently is.

Action Research Plan

You can also link to my plan here.

EDLD 5301 Week 2 Reflection

    This week gave many ideas for reflection due to the sheer amount of material covered. In the Dana text, we covered the nine main ideas for research for leaders. My main focus would be on the ideas of professional development and the school community. I feel that we must take the time to make sure that educators are being challenged and developed in a manner that they feel like they are growing as educators. I also like the ideas of campuses being united by one common theme or idea that all of the students can relate to.
    I was also able to choose a theme for my action research paper this week. My action research project will be to determine the effects of classroom response systems, specifically the i<clicker system, on literacy testing of a third grade class throughout the year. I would like to see if constant, instant feedback will play a part in test scores. I believe that this project will make students more aware of their thinking patterns and modify their thinking to improve their learning. I also believe that the introduction to a new technology as well as using pencil and paper will inspire more engagement. I believe that these students will have higher test averages than students in the previous year comparing benchmark data.

For More Ideas

Please feel free to check out my third grade blog @ Taking on Third or my class website @ Taking on Third (the classroom). I look forward to talking with everyone!

Why should educators be using blogs?

Educators should be blogging. They should be following, reading and creating ideas to encourage personal and professional growth. Leaders should be able to use blogs as a way of reflection, of data collection, and as a forum to receive advice and new ideas from those in the same positions. Leaders should not be afraid to put themselves out there to give and receive different viewpoints and ideas.

Using Action Research

Action research is different from traditional educational research in that the administrator/educator is looking at inside issues and attempting to solve them. In traditional research, educators are looking at outside resources and attempting to fit them to the school even though it may not be a top priority. Action research is important because we as educators need to look at what needs to be changed now in our schools, not necessarily what we can take from elsewhere that would merely be a change for changes sake. I have so many amazing ideas for action research floating around in my mind. In my district alone, I feel that a Professional Learning Community (PLC) revolving around discipline would be an excellent action research. This committee could involve parents of behavior issues, administrators and educators coming together to make goals and plans to improve these students’ behavior and learning. I would also like to see more collaborative meetings (tagged as professional development) between educators to discuss ideas and thoughts on improving their ability in the classrooms to improve student engagement and ownership. On this same note, there should be collaborative meetings between educators and administrator sharing ideas on what they believe might improve campus or classroom issues. Administrators should be using their educators to share and implement new ideas.