Action Research in schools refer to a wide variety of evaluative, investigative, and analytical research methods designed to diagnose problems or weaknesses to help educators develop practical solutions to address them quickly and efficiently.
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Action Research Outline
Review of Literature
Action Research Plan
Implementing the plan
Unfortunately our administration would like for our building to stick to the curriculum as it is stated. We have created a projected timeline of implementation and action research for the following year in hopes of implementing STEAM into our classrooms daily for the 2019-2020 school year.
Our plan is as follows:
Summer 2018 - Planning Stage: Outline, Literature Review, and Action Plan
2018-2019 School Year- Acting Stage: Stick to curriculum and collect data ( No STEAM integration)
2019-2020 School Year- Acting Stage Cont.: Implement STEAM, Collect and Analyze Data: Beginning, Middle, and End of School Year. Reflect and Share Results.
Spring 2020- Developing Stage: Create Action Plan with others based on results. Share and reflect on plan.
Summer 2020- Reflecting Stage: Create a report to share findings and reflections. Plan for future steps.
Our plan is as follows:
Summer 2018 - Planning Stage: Outline, Literature Review, and Action Plan
2018-2019 School Year- Acting Stage: Stick to curriculum and collect data ( No STEAM integration)
2019-2020 School Year- Acting Stage Cont.: Implement STEAM, Collect and Analyze Data: Beginning, Middle, and End of School Year. Reflect and Share Results.
Spring 2020- Developing Stage: Create Action Plan with others based on results. Share and reflect on plan.
Summer 2020- Reflecting Stage: Create a report to share findings and reflections. Plan for future steps.
Collecting & analyzing the data
I will collect and analyze the data through an online database(MAP) and writing and science scores on an excel spreadsheet. I will also look at the bar graphs I receive from the MAP reading assessment three times a year and compare the differences between the assessments.
Developing the action plan
Based on the findings of the action research I will develop an action plan. What I imagine could be a possibility would be keeping STEAM activities in my daily schedule during the mainstreaming hours. If needed I could also modify the writing rubrics and the science assessments. The assessments given in the MAP testing can not be modified.
Sharing and communicating your results
I plan on sharing my reflections with Eryn weekly so we can compare what is working and what is not and then try to bounce ideas off each other. At the end of each assessment period I will share my results at either our monthly meeting with the whole staff, during our kindergarten meeting, during our PLC meetings, or during our early release time.
Reflecting on the process thus far
As I was completing my action research plan the first problem I ran into was finding my topic and then figuring out my fundamental research question. With Eryn and myself both working on the same innovation plan we wanted to make sure we both had different topics that would give us more information on the topic once we put the innovation plan into action. I also found it difficult to find a lot of information that specifically correlated STEAM education to ELL student achievement. I found I mostly had to combine bits and pieces of different resources to get the right information I needed for this particular fundamental research question. However it just makes it that more exciting to put this action research plan into action and see what I truly can find out. I do believe, that I will find out that with implementing STEAM correctly into the classroom daily I will see an increase in ELL student achievement.