The Use of Blogs...

Blogs can be an effective tool for educational leaders to connect with other leaders, not readily accessible to them. I once attended a conference, where an administrator from the Chugach district in Alaska was providing information on differentiated instruction. Through the use of his blog we were able to obtain various elements of his program and effectively implement them in our school, thus meeting the needs of students on various levels in their educational goals. This was something that was deemed impossible 10-20 years ago, but now educators can share effective tools with colleagues in all parts of the world.

Of course blogs do not only have to be a way for educational leaders to share with each other, but they could be extremely useful in sharing with campus faculty.  Through a centralized campus blog, administrators can open the door for their faculty to share ideas and instructional practices that work within their classrooms, thus providing an avenue for cooperative learning in a technological setting. As a classroom teacher it’s not always feasible to sit down with a colleague to share ideas, but being able to do that from my home, at a convenient time for me, it becomes more of a reality.

Action Research Is...

Action research, is a method of problem solving, or inquisitive investigation that is performed either individually, or by a group of individuals working together to improve performance. Action research involves determining the critical problem/question, establishing a suggested action that may improve the situation, collecting and analyzing the data obtained through the study, and finally implementing a change based on your analysis.

Action research involves the individuals who are actively invested in the outcome from the study, and therefore participants are more engaged in finding and implementing a change in their environment. Most of the time, traditional educational research is comprised of individuals who make suggestions to improve a campus when they do not truly understand the students and demographics of that campus. Thus, the teachers do not completely “buy into” the suggested changes. However, when a one can actively pursue changes based on what is needed for his/her students, the ability to conform to the necessary change is greater, since student needs were taken into consideration when the change was developed.

As a fifth grade Mathematics teacher, I feel it is necessary to continuously make changes based on student needs. Differentiated instruction is key in every classroom on my campus. Through data analysis, whether it come from independent practice or assessments; instruction needs to be adapted to meet the individual needs of the learner. In my classroom, I have students are low performers on various student objectives, as determined from the data I have collected. I must continuously use various methods to meet the needs of those students, re-teach the skills involved, and re-assess to see if the student performance increased through the re-teaching.  I will continue to find new ways of reaching my students, and action research make this possible, because it's a continual cycle that encourages reflection and futher action to improve even further on instrcutional practices.