Draft Action Research Plan

Action Research Plan
Goal: What are the most effective strategies for providing teachers/staff with the highest-quality training and professional development centered on the integration of technology into the classroom?
Action Steps(s):	Person(s) Responsible:	Timeline: Start/End	Needed Resources	Evaluation
Observe various trainings on both campus and district levels	Tanya Henslee	March 2012-February 2013	Observation Template	Record observations/self reflection
Survey and interview facilitators, trainees, and administrators on their experiences, difference of perceived and actual outcomes, and ideas for improvement.	Tanya Henslee	March 2012- February 2013	Facilitator, Trainee, and Administrator Surveys	Data analysis, report findings to Site Mentor
Compile a list of suggested effective strategies to improve current technology training.	Tanya Henslee Wendy Jones	March 2012-February 2013	Internet Research, Literature, Previous Surveys	Administrators/Site Mentor consensus based on evaluation of surveys, observations, interviews, etc.
Demonstrate effective strategies during professional development/staff trainings.	Tanya Henslee Wendy Jones	November 2012-March 2013	Presentations	Observation of trainee participation and understanding of topic.
Observe integration of technology (introduced in training) into the classroom before and after implementation of effective strategies.	Tanya Henslee	March 2012-April 2013	Classroom Observation Template	Teacher interview/classroom observation
Compare the utilization of technology with improved training strategies as opposed to previous strategies.	Tanya Henslee	March-April 2013	Continuous survey comparisons	Observations/Data analysis
Complete action research plan	Tanya Henslee	February-May 2013	Rubric, plan requirements	Completion of program

3...2...1...ACTION!

It’s week two of 5301 and the black cloud looming over my head (a.k.a. Action Research Project) is beginning to turn a light shade of grey. Now, that’s not to say it isn’t ready to burst at any second, but I have a good feeling that it will remain intact, but applying just the right amount of pressure. All exaggeration aside, I have digested a considerable amount of information over the development and beginning stages of action research.

Watching Dr. Kirk Lewis’s interview made the most impact on my understanding of action research. He conveyed the importance of conducting action research on a topic of true interest and how that will ultimately provide a more focused outcome and will prove to be most beneficial to students. I really learned a lot about his tactics and his views on the importance of action research. His strategy of evaluating data and research from various districts or campuses and learning from the ways they have addressed problem areas is a great way to begin assessing your school’s areas of difficulty. Just as Dr. Arterbury and Dr. Jenkins expressed in their interview, knowing what is practical for your students or teachers and being invested in your action research project will ensure a more focused outcome and a project that is beneficial for advancing student achievement.

After considering many topics with my site mentor including using iPads in the classrooms, evaluating discipline procedures, and improving student-teacher-parent communication, we decided to focus on evaluating the effectiveness of professional development and teacher training. I struggled with finding an action research project that I would have the opportunity to really spend the amount of time necessary to research and comprehensively evaluate. Unfortunately, I am not teaching at a school this year because we moved at the beginning of the school year for my husband's job. After seeing the limited opportunities for teaching positions in my certification area, I have begun exploring other options. I thought that focusing more on technology-centered training, which is something I thoroughly enjoy and currently do part-time, I would have a better chance of really utilizing my research in the event that I cannot secure a teaching position next year.

            I plan to attend many trainings and faculty/teaming meetings in order to observe the overall structure vs. effectiveness of the meetings. I plan to research recent findings and other literature to determine how to present material in the best and most beneficial way possible. To teachers, time is everything. It is scarce and precious. In an interview for the New York Times, Barbara Stein, senior policy analyst for education technology issues for the National Education Association, said "The greatest indicator of technology improving student achievement depends on the degree to which the teachers can use it" (“More technology training,” 2000). I completely agree. I plan to prove that cooperative, ongoing training focused on implementation in the classroom is the best approach for teachers to utilize technology and relay these learning experiences to make certain their students are receiving the highest-quality education possible.
 
More technology training for teachers. (2000, November 22). The New York Times. Retrieved from    http://nytimes.com/2000/11/22/technology/22EDUCATION.html

Blogging for Educational Leaders

I have always been one to keep a journal. The fascination with recording my own thoughts began in middle school. It was actually spurred by a beloved English teacher who I admired greatly. She required us to journal for the first ten minutes of every class period. I must have filled a dozen journals that year. Granted, these weren’t profound or intellectual and usually revolved around middle school drama such as the day a girl bought the exact same sweater that I had, they still hold a record of my life, no matter how trivial the words on the page may be. I still love to know that they are tucked away in the back of a closet with the rest of my sporadic journaling. As an adult, I appreciate that my teacher made me write and reflect on my own thoughts. I believe that journaling is a great way to understand your values, your concerns, and your goals.

The 21^st century version of journaling, or blogging, is a fantastic for educational leaders to collaborate with one another and discuss current educational issues and action research. As administrators reflect on their own professional goals and experiences, they discover ways to challenge their own thinking and develop interesting and engaging ideas that provide springboards of thought for other educators. Being able to share ideas with other administrators or teachers on a global level is incomparable. Using blogs to connect with people in a personal way can promote a valuable line of communication and interaction between the administrator, teachers, parents, students, and surrounding communities.  Blogs are a great tool to promote learning and collaboration.

Utilizing Action Research

In order for administrators to fully understand their faculty members and students’ needs, they must evaluate the need for change and improvement. By conducting administrative inquiry or action research, administrators can raise questions and generate knowledge in order to improve both the education and training of their staff and the continued success of their students. Action research allows the administrator to become the “head learner” of their school through continued professional development and routine inquiry so that they may pass that same knowledge onto their teachers. By posing questions, collecting data, analyzing the data, and making necessary changes based on the findings, administrators provide effective problem-solving skills and provide the basis for school improvement. This can lead to better choices by administration based on teacher-centered and learner-centered research results.

Conducting action research is beneficial because it not only shows teachers that their administrators are actively seeking effective and productive solutions to current problems, they are also including the teachers themselves in the process. Action research conducted by administrators can evaluate and remedy problems that exist in almost every school or district. Such problem areas include integration of technology, scheduling, discipline, faculty collaboration, standardized testing and evaluation, and professional development training. Whether we participate in ongoing education by enrolling in university coursework, attending administrative team meetings, utilizing leadership teams within a school, or building professional learning communities, principals understand that collaboration is vital to the success of action based research and demonstrate the need for professional development.

Administrative inquiry allows staff and administration to collaborate freely and gives the “practitioners” a role in implementing change that will ultimately result in school improvement. As administrators develop the mindset that action research should be a constant practice, they open themselves up to so many opportunities that will enhance their leadership skills and effectiveness with implementing changes and producing positive results.

EDLD 5306- Course Reflections

Before beginning this course I was worried about what type of job I could acquire with this particular Educational Technology Leadership degree. I was worried about having the time to commit to a 150 hour internship. To say the least, I was worried that I had bitten off more than I could chew. Then, after several personality assessments in the first week of the course, I realized that’s just what I do; I worry. And that’s fine with me. Worrying can be beneficial. It pushes me to persevere, to overcome, and to have a constant reminder that I am strong enough to get through anything! I envisioned that by the end of this course I would gain knowledge of ways to improve instruction by integrating technology. I imagined I would learn about state technology standards and appropriate assessment of those standards. In the end, I was knowledgeable in all of the previous and more. I gained knowledge in examining and supporting the campus technology infrastructure, modeling the use of Web 2.0 tools, and even made some friends along the way.

While discovering new technology tools and brushing up on some familiar ones, I have actively implemented these innovations into my current job to a great extent. I am no longer in a public school, but through my teachings with the Dell Powering the Possible Launch Pad program, the incorporation of these tools has been very beneficial to my students and colleagues. I have shared my knowledge with others and will continue to educate others on the importance of technology integration. The Web 2.0 tools, legal and ethical issues, learning strategies, and e-communication are all relevant topics that I use every day in the workplace. I read the RSS feeds for educational leadership and technology that we subscribed to in week three and added more that were more applicable to my current occupation. The copyright and security issues that were discussed in week four were presented at just the right time. A few days after I completed the week four assignment, there were some issues with copyright policy that arose at my workplace. My supervisor asked me to plan and conduct training on legal and ethical use of materials for my co-workers. I look forward to sharing my knowledge and helping others define the grey area that sometimes exists when people investigate copyright policies.

Even though I have been immersed in the conceptual framework of instructional technology, I still feel there is one vital outcome that I don’t believe I experienced to its full potential. I had a very hard time securing a site mentor. Looking back, I know that I worked diligently to procure a mentor who would benefit my learning and leadership experience. I thought that after I had found a mentor during week two, I would have plenty of time to get to know my mentor and really sit down and plan activities to improve my inadequacy of leadership experience. Life’s constant reminder that not everything goes as planned derailed my ideal mentor experience and left me at square one during the last week of class. As I frantically contacted every school I could think of and searched for a new mentor in an unfamiliar area with a fast-approaching deadline looming overhead, I worried that all my hard work was for naught. Finally, I read what seemed to be a sanity-saving email from a wonderful mentor. It was bumpy for a while, but it seems that everything has turned out better than I hoped. In the beginning, the workload seemed daunting. There was a lot to do in a short amount of time. I believe that the key to success in this class, and others, is to spend a lot of time on the assignments and never wait until the last minute. I knew coming into this program that I would spend more time with my computer than say, pots and pans, tempting new books on my kindle, or my beloved reality TV. I have always been a fan of online learning and completed many online courses as an undergraduate. I was not at all surprised by the assignments and I was prepared to work ahead and spend a lot of time at home behind my desk. I believe that I was successful in every assignment. Even though there were a few snags in my plan, I didn’t let them affect the quality of my assignments. I know that some classes will take even more study time, but I believe in the result.

This course taught me so much more than just standards and concepts. I learned to evaluate what I was doing in my career and what I hoped to accomplish in the near and distant future. I am conscious of how I can improve learning and training by integrating technology. I have faced challenges in my work and within myself. For the most part, I like to complete tasks on my own. I usually detest a group project where I have to depend on strangers to complete tasks that influence my performance. I can’t say that I am anywhere near over this just yet. It is on my list of interpersonal skills to improve through my internship experience! I enjoy working with people and I thrive when I am challenged to assist others, I just don’t enjoy putting my hard-earned grades in their hands. I have chosen many activities that will challenge me and provide more leadership roles and I look forward to pushing myself to add an entire page of impressive skills and accomplishments to my professional vita.

Web Conference #4 (Week5)

Web conference number four, the final conference for EDLD 5306, was short but to the point. (Just as we like them in Cohort 26!) We discussed more details about the internship including ideas for activities which I found to be very helpful. I was a little confused about how to accumulate 150 hours of internship activities, but after talking with Mrs. Borel, I feel a great deal of confidence that I will be able to meet the requirements. Many students were asking questions about other students’, the instructor’s, and the IA’s access to their wikis. We briefly discussed the Summary Report and Validation that we will complete in order to fulfill the 150 course-based embedded internship hours. We will complete this by the end of our last class of the program. The following documents need to be uploaded to Tk20 to meet the requirements of EDLD 5306: Assignment 1 (Part 1), Application for Internship, Draft Internship Plan, Principal Competencies and Skills Chart. Mrs. Borel also included a class schedule for Cohort 26 as well as a last week to-do list. I guess all there is left to do now is order the books for the next class!

Web Conference #3

During the Week 3 web conference, the main topics of discussion were using TK20 and our internship requirements. We were visited by Pamela Comer and she further explained the uses of TK20 and that Lamar University uses TK20 to collect samples of students’ work for various accreditation agencies. After Ms. Comer’s presentation, Mrs. Borel explained our internship requirements and some of the changes that were taking place with the internship program. We discussed the forms that were currently being updated and that we were no longer required to complete the monthly reports. We searched through our texts to find the 33 activities in the ISTE text that are required per our internship. We also clarified that we may repeat some of the 33 ISTE activities for the remaining requirements if they apply. There are examples of activities in the leadership text. 150 hours are course-embedded but we will complete a reflection assignment. She also hinted that we could visit other cohort websites to see examples of their activities/reflections. This was a very informative meeting, and I believe that I am slowly understanding all of the requirements of the internship. I look forward to securing a site mentor and getting started on the activities.