My Action Research Plan for Week 3

I am posting my action research project plan as required by our week 3 assignment.  I know that this information will be subject to change as I do my research.  I would love to have any feedback so I can fine tune my plan.

Action Research Project
Goal: As an early childhood campus, parent involvement is a very necessary part of building the foundation of reading and math skills in our students.  Without that one on one support system and positive attitude about the importance of education many of our students will get behind their peers who have parent who are involved in the learning process.  So my main inquiry will be “How can I motivate all parents to become more involved in their child’s academic life?”
Action Step(s):	Person(s) Responsible:	Timeline: Start/End	Resources/ Research tools needed	Person responsible for implementation and Process for monitoring  the achievement	Evaluation of effectiveness of the action taken
Meet with the principal to go over the best course of action to improve parental involvement in grade levels Pre-K-1st grade.	Principal: Jo McDonald Denise Mays	May 30, 2012- Jun 15, 2012	List of ideas to motivate parental involvement	Denise Mays Monitoring- notes taken during the meeting.	We prepare a list of action steps in addition to the ones I list below.
Arrange for a focus group of teachers in all three grade levels	Principal Jo McDonald Denise Mays	May 1, 2012- May 30, 2012	Focus group interview questions targeting the year- long success of students who have or do not have parental support at home.	Denise Mays-  Monitoring-  Interviewing focus group	I will take the  in-house data, and compile the information to be used  during my action research.  I will look for a lateral pattern  across the grade levels
Interview other teachers about specific students that are at risk in their classrooms.	Remaining Pre-k through 1st  grade teachers Not interviewed in the focus group at the end of the 2011-2012 yr.	September 1, 2012- October 30, 2012	List of students that are at risk and make a comparison between the students who have parental support with homework and those who do not.	Denise Mays Monitoring- Interviewing individual teachers formally and non-formally, taking notes of the meetings.	Teachers will provide a complete list of students who are at risk academically
Research different ways of motivating parental involvement and the importance of parental involvement in education.	Denise Mays	October 1, 2012- November 1, 2012	Online research sites, scholarly articles, blogs	Denise Mays Monitoring Process: Collect data found on parent involvement online, in articles and blogs.	I will have my research results to show to the principal and the classroom teacher who participated in the action research
Hold a staff meeting that will discuss the data results about the effects of student and parent involvement	Principal Jo McDonald Denise Mays	January 1, 2013- January 30, 2013	Complete a Presentation based on the research results,	Denise Mays Monitoring- Conducting a staff meeting.	I will have signatures of staff members that attended the meeting
Create a survey that includes the research results about parent  involvement.  Hopefully this will steer my research in such a way to find workable ways to improve positive parental involvement on our campus.	Denise Mays All teachers at BES	February 1, 2013- February 30, 2013	Surveys created to get the opinions and suggestions of the teachers at BES.	Denise Mays- Monitoring- Compiling data found through the teacher surveys completed.	The results of these surveys will be my evaluation. Giving me ideas to increase the needed parent involvement.
Teachers will implement the updated parent involvement plan and document what affect it is in their individual classrooms and their at risk students	All teachers Grade levels Pr-K – 1st grade	March 1, 3013- March 30, 2013	Research results about the updated parent involvement plan	Classroom teachers Denise Mays Monitoring Progress:  Observation of student improvement.	The follow up data from the implemented plan will be an additional evaluation.
Teachers and administrator will meet and discuss the follow-up data and decide if the updated  parental involvement plan was successful and if it will be used during the next school year .	Principal Jo McDonald Denise Mays All classroom teachers at BES	April 1, 2013- April 30, 2013	Bring notes from observations	Classroom teachers Denise Mays Administrators Monitoring procedure:  Notes from staff meeting.	Signatures of teachers that attended the meeting and the results for the decision concerning ways to improve parental involvement.

What I have learned in Week 2 of ED 5301

This week I have gotten a better understanding of the action reseach process. Using the 9 topic areas when an educator is starting an inquiry will be very beneficial so the actual question that will drive the  research will be refined to the actual inquiry.  Knowing the topic your research will address will also help you stay focused on the inquiry. With that being said,  I learned that when you start an inquiry that inquiry may take you off into an entirely different direction. 

How Does Blogging Help Educational Leaders?

Blogging will help the educational leader organize his/her thoughts.  He/she will be able to use his/her posts as a reflection document because the posts are saved and available.    He/she can also benefit from the interaction of other administrators and educators by discussing the various issues that would provide feedback with another school that may be going through the same experiences.  Blogging creates a community of educational learners who are able to work through various issues together.

What Is Action Research?

First let me tell you what action research is not.  It is not your traditional literature based research that uses university studies and connecting theory.  Action research is the systematic research that is used to bring about change in a school campus.  This change can focus on campus climate, student success, or parental involvement to name a few.  The administrator uses the eight steps in the action research process.  First He/she, sets the foundation of the research  by collecting data on his /her campus to address the issue being studied. Next the administrator and a small group of staff members analyze data collected, thus developing a deeper understanding of the study in correlation to their individual campus needs. The committee will then engage in self reflection and look at the patterns that have caused the issue to be in place.  Once all the above steps have been completed the committee will then determine the direction the school should be going to ring about the desired change.  Once the direction of change has been determined then the committee will decide what action should be taken to put the new ideas and changes into place. When the changes are in place the administrator and the research team have to review and sustain the improvements by giving support to the teachers, students and parents thus supporting the desired change.

Action research is a crucial part of keeping up with the fast pace of change in the world of education.  No longer can we as administrators or educators do what we have done for the last decade.  We all have to keep up with the changes so our students will be able to be successful in each consecutive grade level.

Resources:

Dana, N.F. (2009). Leading with Passion and Knowledge: The Principal as Action Researcher.  Thousand Oaks, CA Corwin Press

Harris, S., Edmonson, S., & Combs, J. (2010). Examining What We Do To Improve Our Schools: 8 Steps from Analysis to Action, Larchmont, NY. Eye on Education