Action Research

Action Research, also known as administrative inquiry, can be a very valuable tool for educators. According to Dana, “administrator inquiry refers to the process of a principal engaging in a systematic, intentional study of his/her own administrative practice and taking action for change based on what he/she learns as a result of inquiry.” Inquiry is a systematic way of investigating ways for school improvement. The way it works according to Dana is this, an individual will first “pose questions or ‘wonderings’ and then collect data to gain insights into their wonderings, analyzing the data along with reading relevant literature, making changes in practice based on new understandings developed during inquiry, and sharing findings with others.” Through using action research principals or teachers become life long learners.

As a graduate student studying educational administration, it is very beneficial for me to learn what action research is and how I can use it before stepping into a real administrator role. Currently as a second grade teacher, I would like to use action research to study why students are not remembering their basic addition and subtraction math facts from one grade level to the next. Using action research is going to give me a hands-on process to use to discovery information and data I need to make the necessary changes to improve math fact recall for my students.