EDLD 5301 - Final Course Reflections

     I have learned so many things in the past five weeks in EDLD 5301 Research course.  The EDLD 5301 Research course gave me an opportunity to examine the difference between action research and traditional research.  In this course we took a look at how action research benefits educational leaders and the stakeholders in school and educational settings.  Reflection is such an integral part of research and an important skill for leaders to have.  We learned that blogging is very beneficial in sharing what we learned from our action research.  The readings and tools from Examining What we do to Improve Our School:  8 Steps to Improve Our School (Harris, Edmonson, and Combs, 2010), and from Leading with Passion and Knowledge:  The Principal as Action Researcher (Dana, 2009) gave us examples of action research in educational settings.  These readings and discussions enabled us to choose an action research topic and begin to make a clear purpose in explaining why this action research project is important in our professional development.  We had an opportunity to meet with our site mentor and review our internship plan and brainstorm about potential research topics.  We identified at least nine areas that are common targets or themes in school-based action research.  We took a look at interviews of three school leaders who discussed their action research projects.  This gave us an opportunity to reflect on what we learned from these scholars by watching and listening to their interviews.  We developed a framework to approach action research and share strategies that would help us to better understand how to conduct an action research project.  We gained a better understanding of the time frame and the understanding that it may take months to complete the project.  This process would be to develop an effective plan that would guide us through our action research project.  We developed our action research plan and included our goals, objectives, resources, tools, persons that will be responsible, and the process of monitoring our achievement of goals and objectives.  This allowed us to collaborate with our classmates through the discussion board and through comments on our blogs.  We also had an opportunity to focus on some additional strategies to sustain and support our action research.  We developed an effective blueprint of how we were going to conduct our effective action research project and utilized our site supervisor, the instructional associates and the Lamar University faculty.  This gave us an opportunity to look into some strategies such as the Force Field Analysis, the Delphi Method, and the Nominal Group Technique to provide us with support to sustain our action research project.  We utilized the Tool 8.1 CARE Model to provide us with a strong rationale and framework for our Action Research Plan conference with our site supervisor.  I firmly believe that the collaboration with my site mentor and my peers really assisted in helping me further develop my Action Research plan.  This past week, we had the opportunity to access the quality of our inquiries utilizing the quality indicators of practitioner research. 

My Action Research Plan is located on my blog at  http://tectrendz.blogspot.com/.  My action research inquiry will involve developing a method to help make technology staff development collaborative, job-embedded, and ongoing to enhance professional growth and student success.  I hope to use input from my site mentor, other district principals, peers, teachers on my campus, technology leaders from other school districts, and information from previous staff development to help with action research inquiry.  We are continuously learning and growing and I feel with the techniques that I have learned in EDLD 5301 Research, I will continue to grow, to inquire, reflect, and the gain insight to my wonderings through analyzing data, collaboration/sharing with others, and utilizing action research as a powerful tool.

Fichman, Nancy Dana (2009). Leading with passion and knowledge:  The principal as action Researcher.  Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Harris, S., Edmonson, S., and Combs, J. (2010). Examining what we do to improve our schools: 8 steps to improve our schools.  Eye on Education Press.

EDLD 5301 - Week 4 Reflection

      I am in the process of gathering information for my Action Research Inquiry through teacher survey questionnaires, meeting with departmental meetings, and through interviewing other district technology leaders. Additional strategies can be used as explained in the Harris text (p 94-96).  Some of these methods are the Force Field Analysis, the Delphi method, and the Nominal Group Technique.

     The Force Field Analysis method can be applied through the assessing and supporting of school improvement.   I will be utilizing the Force Field Analysis (Harris 2010) prior to implementation and during the Action Inquiry to create effective and relevant surveys or evaluation tools.  The steps for the Force Field Analysis, as outlined in the Harris text (Harris p 96) are as follows:

·        Describe the current situation

·        Describe the proposed change

·        Identify what will happen if no change occurs

·        Identify the forces driving the proposed change

·        Identify the forces resisting the change

·        Determine whether the change is viable (this can be done by assigning points to the forces driving the change and points to the forces resisting change)

·        If the change is viable, what is needed for implementation?  Will you need to reduce the strength of the forces opposing the change, or increase the forces driving the change?

     The Delphi Method allows for gaining a deeper understanding of the problem.  It can involve as many as 20 participants and still provides for a good level of confidentiality.  I will be utilizing the Delphi Method while conducting the survey research on our campus.  I will create the teacher survey using this method.  During the process, the participants respond to questionnaires in two or more rounds and sometimes the responses can be made through an email process.  As the process continues the group converges on a level of consensus to the original problem.  The following format is used during this process:

·        Send around a problem statement to staff

·        Ask staff to write down what he or she believes needs to be done

·        Retrieve the written comments

·        Reproduce everyone’s comments

·        Return all the comments to the participants

·        Participants read comments and then individually write a synthesis of the various ideas (this step is optional and often is omitted due to time constraints)

·        Collect everyone’s syntheses or you do this yourself

·        Make a new list of all synthesized ideas

·        Send the new list back to participants and ask them to rank items

·        Collect and compute an average and frequency of ratings; then return tallies to participants to re-rank

     The Nominal Group Technique is a five-step process that is usually completed in small group meetings such as departmental meetings or curriculum meetings, or at a faculty meeting with a facilitator leading the discussion.    I will be utilizing  the Nominal Group Technique to evaluate the effectiveness and ineffectiveness of changes made to the PLCs.  Use the results to come up with future Action Inquiry topics.

     To follow the format of this technique you would follow these five steps as outlined in the Harris text (p 96, 97):

·        Have each individual within a small group silently generate and write perceived needs/issues.  Do not allow discussion among participants at this point.

·        Ask each individual to share orally with the small group one perceived need/issue at a time.  The Facilitator then writes these on a flip chart with NO discussion.

·        Lead small group discussions of each perceived need/issue for further clarification.

·        Ask group members to rewrite and rate all perceived needs/issues listed in the previous step.  Numerical values can be assigned to each from 1-5 for example.

During this technique, the leader or facilitator of the group cannot be judgmental or allow judgmental comments from participants as they work through the issues for explanation.

Action Research EDLD 5301 - Action Research Planning Week 3

Goal:  We need a method to help make technology staff development collaborative, job-embedded, and ongoing to enhance professional growth and student success.

  Action Step (s)           Person(s)               Timeline:               Needed                 Evaluation

                                     Responsible              Start/End            Resources                      

1.Discuss my action research topic with my site supervisor Actual meeting with site supervisor to discuss action research topic	Myself and Randall Maxwell, site supervisor Myself and Randall Maxwell, site supervisor	November 19 November 29	Laptop – emailed site supervisor to set up meeting Laptop – tentative action research topic	Suggestions for action research topics – formulate topic Question and Answer about topic; ideas on teacher surveys
2.Create teacher surveys concerning current technology staff development and assessing the technology needs of teachers that could be developed into job-embedded mode Interview other district technology leaders to access their methods of technology staff development for potential job-embedded staff development ideas.	Myself, site supervisor, and participating teachers and administrators Myself and Participating technology leaders from other districts	November 30 – December 10 December 6	Laptop, teacher surveys, past district staff development packets for spring of 2008, 2009, 2010 Laptop, telephone for interviews, and journal to collect information from interviews	Evaluate the data from the teacher surveys and from the past staff development training to assess the technology training needs. Evaluate data from these interviews; create a checklist that can provide assurance that all needs can be met through a collaborative site/method
3. Using information collected from surveys and interviews, implement process for technology staff development to be a collaborative, job-embedded and ongoing process.  Gather and research on possible technology sites that would be potential and beneficial sources for staff development collaborative site.	Myself and Randall Maxwell, site supervisor, department heads in core subject areas	December 10 – January 20	Previous staff development packets, Excel spreadsheet containing cross tabulation of data from survey information and interviews with charts and graphs for explanation of collected data. Assess research on potential technology sites to decide which of these might be the most helpful for collaborative, ongoing staff development.	Determine if current technology staff development methods provide technology needs for administrators and teachers; teacher surveys, journal entries from interviews; field observations of teacher technology usage.
4.Create a campus site such as a protected Wiki site that will  provide technology staff development that is collaborative, job-embedded, and ongoing to enable teachers to interact with each other to develop more proficient ongoing technology staff development	Myself, campus personnel	January 20 – February 20	Laptop, Wiki template, internet for helpful technology sites that can embedded into campus site including webinars, videos, and other necessary information for collaborative site	Utilize survey and interview data, evaluate past staff development data, brainstorming sessions.  Interviews, field observations, meetings with departments used as evaluation tools.
5. Meet with teachers to train and implement the campus site.  Be sure that teacher’s technology needs are being met in the site to provide for collaborative, job embedded, ongoing staff development.	Myself, teachers, and Randall Maxwell, site supervisor	Meet once a month with department  meetings  for period of time  January - March	Continue to develop campus site to insure that technology needs are being met for collaborative, job embedded, ongoing staff development	Meet with each departmental meeting of teachers to be sure that they technology staff development needs are being met with the campus site.
6. Continue to meet with teachers and administrators to make changes and additions in the campus site.  Continue to make additions to the site and invite teachers to add helpful data to the campus site making it a collaborative site that everyone on campus can benefit from.	Myself, teachers, administrators, and Randall Maxwell, site supervisor	Meet as often as necessary during study time frame.	Continue to encourage all teachers and staff to make the site a collaborative effort.  Continue to organize helpful technology staff development material for the site.  Keep the site consistent and organize so that campus staff development site is “user friendly” to keep the staff development ongoing and job-embedded.	Collaborative technology staff development campus site.  Post more helpful technology sites that can be embedded into campus site including webinars, videos, and other necessary information for collaborative site.  Post helpful instructions on TEAMS attendance and grade book software, STAR CHARTS, instructions for Kuder career assessments, Starboard training modules, technology equipment training modules and any other helpful instructions.
7. Evaluate campus Wiki site for technology staff development that is job-embedded and ongoing.  Be sure that teachers and administrators needs are being met with the site.  Finalize action research project with teachers, administrators, and staff.	Myself, administrators, teachers, and Randall Maxwell, site supervisor	As often as necessary to assure that the site continues to be ongoing and to assure further development so the technology staff development site stays current and up to date.	Closing procedures to assure that the campus Wiki site can stay maintained meeting the technology needs of the teachers, administrators, and staff.  Continue to update site with current data.	Final observations, finals interviews with teachers to continue to make the technology staff development site a collaborative, job-embedded, ongoing site that all campus personnel can continue to use for technology training and staff development.

EDLD 5301 Week 3 Action Research Action Planning

ACTION INQUIRY: What can we do to make technology staff development collaborative, job-embedded, and ongoing to enhance professional growth and student success?

GOAL: We need a method to help make technology staff development collaborative, job-embedded, and ongoing to enhance professional growth and student success? My site mentor is interested in utilizing all of the technology tools, programs, software, and equipment that we have available on our campus. But sometimes teachers do not have detailed instructions, technology lesson plans ideas, or helpful links to be able to utilize some of this campus technology. Many times there are yearly staff development meetings on some of this technology, but when the teachers get back to the classroom, they do not retain what they have learned in a brief staff development.
Our action inquiry is to research this topic; "What can we do to make technology staff development collaborative, job-embedded, and ongoing to enhance professional growth and student success?" We need a collaborative staff development method that won't take teachers out of their classrooms and is job-embedded and ongoing to help teachers be able to utilize technology for lesson enhancement and student success. We need a method to provide a location for administrators, teachers, and staff to collaborate, learn, share, post, technology instructions (Star Charts, Star Boards, Elmos, Neos, Clickers, Student Island), helpful ideas, lesson plan templates, Lesson Plan Cycle, READ 180, helpful technology sites, and helpful YouTubes, instructions for 2007 Microsoft Office, Test INOVA data, TEAMS report data, TAKS reviews for the purpose of technology staff development in a collaborative, job-embedded and ongoing method to enhance professional growth and student success.
Sampling/Data Collection: 71 teachers on our campus will be surveyed on current staff development methods and on measures to improve technology staff development. Interviews of other technology district directors/coordinators will be conducted and completed to compare other districts' technology staff development methods.

Rationale: In reading, Leading With Passion and Knowledge, Dana uses a quote from Roland Barth (1981) about the importance of staff development. "Nothing within a school has more impact upon students in terms of skills development, self-confidence, or classroom behavior than the personal professional growth of their teachers. When teachers examine, question, reflect on their ideas and develop new practices that lead towards their ideals, students are alive. When teachers stop growing, so do their students."
     We want to review the Web site of the national Staff Development Council at http://www.nsdc.org/ to review the standarts for powerful professional development. Using this exercise noted in Leading With Passion and Knowledge we can look at our current school's staff development practices and inquire into methods to improve in this area. Fichman, Nancy Dana (2009). Leading with passion and knowledge:The principal as action Researcher.Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.