Week 2 - Aha!

My aha moment this week came from watching the videos on epic. If you talk to my closest colleague she would agree that I have real issues with reinventing the wheel. I have reluctantly learned over the years that it's okay to use something that is tried and true and just tweek it to fit my situation. I noticed in the interviews that most of them basically stated in their own way that you do not have to reinvent the wheel. Through that I realized the importance of taking my time during the literature review process and using valid and reliable sources. I have also been known when reinventing the wheel to take it to the extreme. So I will definitely need to stick with the advice of Kirk Lewis and stick with "practical active research". I will constantly ask myself the two questions he noted "What is practical for you?" and "What do you need to know to apply to student learning?". Hopefully this will keep me from doing more work than is necessary, and I can feel good about it because I am taking the advice of respected, accomplished doctoral graduates. :-)

Educational Leaders as Bloggers

As an educator at secondary level, I know sometimes I find myself in isolation from others in my content area. I can only imagine how isolated principals and other educational leaders find themselves due to the fact that they are the only person in that position on the campus or within the district. Blogs would be a great resource for these leaders to collaborate with other professionals dealing with the same issues they are. It could serve as a resource for action research. It's a way to gain feedback on the inquiry you are working through and to provide advice to others that are dealing with a similar inquiry you have solved. It can also be a place to find additional resources for relevant literature to read or possible strategies to try. Basically, it is a tool that allows for collaboration.

My thoughts on action research in action

Before reading the text, taking part in an action research project seemed overwhelming and quite frankly a bit scary to me. I now, however, have a better idea of what action research is and am very excited to implement my first of many projects. Action research is just that, research in action for the purpose of implementing proven strategies to solve  a problem on your campus for your campus. Of course, this doesn't have to only be on the campus scale model it could be used in your classroom or even with a whole district. It is a process that utilizes the leaders on a campus to determine solutions to problems they identify. The process consists of determining your question, problem or "wondering", reviewing literature, analyzing data, making changes based on what you have learned and sharing solutions. There are many ways I can implement my own action research. I can implement it as part of the campus leadership team and working through campus problems. I could even use it to make changes to instruction or classroom management within my own classroom with my own students. I am planning to use action research to determine some strategies that can be used to simultaneously improve student motivation and reduce student discipline issues within the classroom. I have also considered using action research to improve parent involvement.