I have just completed my 3rd week in my Action Research course, and I am afraid, like many of my fellow students, that I am floundering. I have produced my plan using the template and the examples provided and it sounds OK. My biggest concern is whether any of the principals I know will have any interest at all in looking at my study and determining whether there is a problem and how to go about fixing it. In the initial stages of this when I have spoken with other substitutes and classroom teachers about my plan to study this, the initial reactions have not been positive. The substitutes are concerned for their jobs. If the schools realize the impact that unqualified substitutes have on learning, the substitutes are concerned they will be replaced by better qualified subs. Teachers on the other hand have expressed a desire to retain control. If they get a substitute in the classroom that actually teaches the lesson, they are concerned that the substitute will mess up the dynamics of the classroom. That the students will not be able to learn if the lesson is not presented in the manner the teacher has determined is best for that particular class.
I can see both perspectives, so I am concerned with how to present this so that schools, teachers, and substitutes see it in a positive light. I am concerned that schools will prefer not knowing they have a problem to knowing it and having to spend time and money to do something about it. If I point out a problem which is affecting student performance, I have obligated the schools to do something about it. As long as there is no study, there is no problem.
My other concern is that I'm not really sure what I'm doing. I am following the examples and the instruction provided in the text but I feel very inadequate to the task and I'm not sure I even know what kinds of questions to ask or how to word them to get the data I need.
I wish I had a better equipped mentor to guide me through this process. I wish I had known before selecting my mentor what kinds of projects I would be doing and how much power the mentor would need to have to help me accomplish them. Now that I have this plan, I wish I knew for sure who to speak with about it, because my current mentor is not going to be able to help.
I think in some respect, we are all floundering to understand exactly what we are to do. An action research plan will be included in our final Internship plan, but it may not be the exact "wondering" we worked on in this class. It would be nice if we got it right the first time around, so we didn't have to do more research than necessary, but I think it is especially hard for those like us that are not in the school or classroom at this time. As a substitute teacher, I think your action research plan would provide valuable results. However, I agree with you that both sides have issues. This is a subject that everyone involved thinks would require more work. But, isn't this our quest as educators? To provide the best education possible for our students! I think the main struggle you are going to have is changing the perspectives of teachers, adminstration, and substitutes. Here is an altered action research wonderings that might be easier to do:
ReplyDeleteInstead of capturing lost classroom knowledge, what if substitutes were responsible in teaching real-world tasks? Some examples would be balancing a check book, setting a budget, learning about diffferent careers in a particular field, etiquette, etc. With the back-up of the administration and telling students thay they were not going to have a free day, you could create or find lesson plans from the campus teachers that the substitutes could teach. These lessons could include "Teaching tolerance" or how to work together lessons. It would be interesting if behavior issues went down with the implementation of a substitute program like this one.
Julia,
ReplyDeleteRemember you can add and consult with other "mentors" to help you with your research. I suggest you seek out other administrators and ask for their advice and guidance. This learning journey can and should involve many guides. Your topic is one that might cause some concern but the results will prove very valuable to determine the effectiveness of substitues. Perhaps someone in the HR department might be of assitance to you since they deal with these types of issues daily.
Good Luck!