Part 1
Over the last few weeks I have been reading about action research and designing my own teacher inquiry. This week I had the opportunity to watch, read, and analyze the first part of May’s action research plan. May is a seventh grade science teacher and is struggling with student behaviors that are impacting the way she is teaching her classes at the end of the year. She designed an action research plan to help her solve her dilemma.
CHAPTER ONE
Setting the Context, Studying the Literature, and Developing the Wondering
Prompt #1 Questions: Why is it important for May to look at literature as a part of her inquiry journey? What insights did May gain about her inquiry topic through her readings? In what ways might May’s readings inform how she will collect data for her study?
Response:
It was important for May to look at literature for her inquiry to help her refine her wondering. She was able to reword her original wondering into a “clear and concise”, student centered wondering after looking at literature (Laureate Education, Inc., 2010). This pushed May to think about pursuing her frustrations with the conditions of her science classes in a different way. The literature she read intrigued her to work with her students in the inquiry process. May gained insights through her readings as she was challenged to admire the negative attitudes and behaviors she observed in her students. These readings may change how May would have originally collected data. She may decide to work with her students as teammates as she read about in her literature review.
CHAPTER TWO
Designing the Inquiry Through Collaboration With Colleagues
Prompt #2 Questions: May, Naomi, Margaret, Darby, and Mr. Brown formed a professional learning community that met regularly to plan May’s first inquiry and to support one another in their work as educators. What specific benefits did May receive as a result of collaborating with her colleagues? Why is collaboration an important component of the action research process?
Response:
There were several benefits that May received from collaborating with her colleagues. Specifically, May found out that several of the students who misbehaved in her class, also misbehaved in her colleagues classes. May had to choose one of her classes to collect data on. Talking through her inquiry with her peers, gave May a way to decide which class to focus on for her action research. She was supported in her inquiry by involving her peers and it gave her the opportunity to talk through the process. She was able to deeply discuss her problem and get help on finding ways to solve it. Her colleagues offered her help and suggestions. Collaboration is important to the inquiry process because it gives teachers the opportunity to share ideas and feel supported.
CHAPTER THREE
The Intervention and Data Collection Plan
Prompt #3 Questions: A critical component of the inquiry process is designing a plan for data collection that is doable! Explain the importance of developing a data collection plan that is meaningful but practical to the life of a classroom teacher. Address the following:
· What part of May’s data collection plan do you feel will be most meaningful? Why?
· What parts of May’s data collection plan do you believe to be the most practical? Why?
· What parts of May’s data collection plan do you believe to be impractical? Why?
· Pretend you are one of May’s colleagues. Suggest one additional form of data you think May might collect that could inform her research. Be sure you provide an explanation that describes why you think May should consider collecting this form of data.
Response:
I feel that May’s data collection plan is both meaningful and practical. I think that the interviews will be the most meaningful part of her plan because she will gain insights as to what her students think. Also, discussing the issue with the students makes them aware of it. I think that the timed agenda will be the most practical way to collect data. This will be simple to collect the data and the graphs that the students create will inform them of the number of students who copy the daily agenda in the time given. I believe this will be highly motivating for the students and they will continue to want to do better. If I had to pick a data collection strategy that was impractical I would say the journal entries. I feel the journal entries would give May the least amount of information about her students because it only involves her thoughts, although I believe it could be beneficial. If I were part of May’s professional learning community I would suggest video recording her science class. I believe May would gain insight into her wondering by watching videos of her teaching (Dana & Yendol-Hoppey, 2009). She would get the opportunity to see into her classroom as an outsider and see what she does that may impact her students.
CHAPTER FOUR
Coding May’s First Data—The Wish List for Great Classroom Learning Conditions
Prompt #4 Questions: Download May’s “Wish List” Student Response data.
Follow a modified version of how to conduct a data analysis as described in the course text, The Reflective Educator’s Guide to Classroom Research.
ü Begin reading through the entire class’s wish list responses.
ü Next, read through the data set a second time. Ask yourself, What am I noticing about the student responses? Do the responses seem to fall into different categories? How would I name the categories? Select your categories.
ü Code each category with a different color.
ü Finally, read through the data a third time, highlighting each response in a different color to correspond with the categories you created above.
In your journal responses, share the categories you named, as well as examples of responses that were included in each category. If you were May, what do you think your analysis of this initial data is telling you to do next?
Response:
I put May’s student responses into four main categories. I first noticed that five students wrote on their wish list that they wanted class to start on time. They wrote comments like, “I wish we could come to class, sit down and get started on our work!” and “Class would be good if it started on time every day”. Four students commented that they wanted students to respect the teacher. They wrote things like, “Listen and be quiet” or “My wish for the whole class is to respect our teacher”. A few students wished for good grades by writing things like, “I wish everyone would get an A, and that we had more field trips”. Some students made comments about homework by writing, “Saying there is no homework! Saying we don’t have to do nothing to pass!”. If I were May the next thing I would do is share the typed up wish list with the class. I would also have the class categorize the responses just like I did to get more of their input and hear their thoughts. This would give me more data about my wondering and I would gain a deeper understanding.
I am looking forward to reading the second half of May’s inquiry journey. It will be interesting to see what her next steps are and if she will do things similar to what I would do. I am enjoying reading about May’s action research plan and cannot wait to see what she learns about her students from her data.
Part 2
Last week I read and analyzed the first half of May’s inquiry journey. This week I had the opportunity to read the second half of May’s teacher research project. I analyzed her field note data and the data collected from her five minute challenge. I looked closely at her students graphed data and read through her focus group interview data. Finally, I summarized May’s inquiry journey from start to finish in order to share it with others. Through all these experiences I feel better prepared to complete my own action research project.
CHAPTER FIVE
Analyzing Field Note Data
Prompt #5 Questions: There were four observations that Sienna conducted over a two-week period to document May’s redirection behaviors. First, you will examine the series of observation reports. Second, identify any trends and themes you find in the data. Be sure to consider the observational notes that Sienna included. Look to find and share any triangulation processes in May’s data collection and analysis work. Third, evaluate the data and provide reasonable explanations for what you think might be happening over time that would explain the story the data are revealing.
Response:
After studying Sienna’s observation reports, the first thing that I noticed is that the number of teacher redirections continued to decrease each day. May also used less students name redirections as time went on. Sienna noted that there were ten redirections when the teacher stepped out of the room and went to the bathroom. This tells me that without supervision, many of the students in her class were off task and misbehaving. When the teacher is watching and paying attention to the students there is less of a need for redirections. According to Sienna’s notes the students seem to stay on task and require less redirection when they have a job to do. For example, on April 26, 2010 there were no redirections given for nearly five minutes because the class was engaged in going over a sheet together. When the students have a purpose to work, like during the timed bellwork, there were very few redirections. Sienna also notes more than once that she believes that the teacher would need to give fewer redirections if she moved some of the students to different seats. May used the process of triangulation in her inquiry because she used “multiple data sources” (Dana &Yendol-Hoppey, 2009, p. 112). May first analyzed her students “Wish List” responses and then changed her redirections over time from talking with and analyzing Sienna’s notes.
CHAPTER SIX
Analyzing Data Related to the 5-Minute Challenge
Prompt #6 Questions: Describe May’s class graph. What happened over time, and what are some possible reasons for the trends and patterns you notice? What new goals do you think May should set for the class as a whole based on her students’ response to the timed agenda challenge?
Response:
There was a gain of nine students that finished writing the daily agenda in five minutes or less over the nine days that May’s class recorded data. I believe there was a spike from Day 1 with eleven students to Day 2 with fifteen students because the “Five Minute Challenge” was new to the students. From Day 2 to Day 3 there was a small decrease in the number of students who finished on time, but then there was a gradual increase for the next seven days. I would suspect that some students did not buy into the timed bellwork in the beginning, but more students jumped on board as they saw that it could be fun to beat the bell over time and improve their time. I think May should consider further challenging her students by giving them less time to copy down the agenda. Since many of her students have been successful at finishing in five minutes, maybe she could give the students four minutes instead. May might also want to time her students to get other things done quickly in her class because she learned that many of her students were motivated to get the task done and beat the clock.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Graphing Data and Focus Group Interview
Prompt #7 Questions: Describe Anthony’s and Leah’s data. What happened over time? What do you think May might do in the future to capitalize on Anthony and Leah’s success and keep them on track during the entire class period?
Response:
Both Anthony and Leah dramatically improved their times from Day 1 to Day 9. They both seemed to be extremely motivated by keeping track of their times on their individual graphs. These students wanted to get the agenda copied and achieve the goal that they set forth the previous day. Not only did they want to beat their previous day’s time, they challenged the class to copy the agenda faster as well. I think that May might give Anthony and Leah more individualized attention and have them do “special” jobs to keep them on track for success in her class. Both of these students seem to like the competitions and the challenges against the class were motivating to them. May might want to design more challenges for these two students in her class.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Bringing Closure to May’s First Cycle of Inquiry—May’s Journaling
Prompt #8 Questions: Pretend you are May, and it is now the start of the next school year. Your assistant principal, Mr. Brown, asks you to talk about your inquiry journey at the first faculty meeting of the year. Discuss a plan for your presentation. What will you share and how will you share it? Refer to Chapters 6 and 8 of The Reflective Educator’s Guide to Classroom Research for support in responding to this prompt.
Response:
As Dana and Yendol-Hoppey said, “An unshared teacher inquiry has little chance of creating change” (2009, p. 188). So if I were May and Mr. Brown asked me to share my inquiry story with the staff at my school I would be delighted to. I would tell them that at the end of the year last year I noticed that I was spending far too much time managing behaviors in my science class that I was unable to teach science in a hands on inquiry based way. I decided that I had to do something to change this. After talking with my colleagues in my professional learning community (PLC) we designed a plan so that I could create a classroom environment that allowed me to teach the way I knew was best. With lots of help from my PLC colleagues and some of my most challenging students working as my inquiry assistants, we were able to collect data so that I was able to figure out what I could do to change the conditions in my classroom. I learned that it was effective to recruit challenging students as helpers, I needed to limit the number of redirections to my students, and most importantly I learned collaboration is key. My PLC was extremely helpful in my inquiry and we have already started discussing another teacher inquiry on culturally relevant pedagogy for next year.
I learned a lot about teacher inquiry from reading and analyzing May’s journey to solve her question. The most important thing I learned throughout this experience is that the purpose of teacher inquiry is for teachers to change their own behavior. Our goal is not to change and control our students. Teachers need to look at what they can do, to impact their students and better their own teaching practices.
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