Action Research Knowledge

In my readings about action research, I have learned that there is an educational way to research, and that info truly intrigues me. I would cringe every time I heard that word, but now have a positive spin on doing research for this class and in my future educational endeavorers. Action research is a way for administrators to perform a self inquiry on their own practices.  Instead of the usual readings on research on practices from other researchers, action research provides for individual selection of the practice being evaluated that is relevant to interest of research .  They gather data on their own practice, analyze the data, make changes according to what they learned from the data collected, and then reflect on the change that was made. It is a great way to facilitate learning as an administrator by only focusing on their own practices at the school in which they are leaders of.  Administrators are part of the team that comes up with a solution to the problem and then responsible for implementing the change. Taking ownership in the process also holds them accountable.  Therefore, the practices that are being evaluated call for a lot of self-reflection. Administrators are more likely to be become aware of what is really going on in their campus and then are able to make changes as needed.  This is something that does take time and should become a learned behavior by true instructional leaders.  In turn, campus achievement rates improve and administrators can be true instructional leaders by their own self-growth and improvement. 

Educational blogs can be used in many different ways.  Administrators can use blogs to keep the community and parents involved on what is going on at our campus.  They can also provide important dates and events that are coming up in the future on a calendar.  Another way to implement blogs as an administrator is to interact with their staff, students, and other community or district members. Blogs can be used as a positive way of communicating.