The U:SOAR meeting on the 5th of November 2007 showed again the need for a AR interest group here in Bloemfontein. I find strength in the responses from the group on Adri’s contribution on Jean’s and Jack’s book. I feel comfortable with the view expressed in the book that AR is about your own learning, your influence on the learning of others and change of practice that came about the better understanding of the particular situation because of that what was learned.
Arlys you’re and Jean’s study seems very important to the lives of the children that you will reach. In your description of your frustration with the teachers it seems that except you as researchers, the sponsors and maybe the department of education there are nobody with a direct interest in the problem, certainly not at the school. This is unfortunate because you need stakeholders that understand that the actions you implement will benefit the children and the schools results, ultimately.
If I understand Jean’s and Jack’s view of AR correct you need to influence the ‘learning’ of the teachers as stakeholders. Once they understand the problem that poor reading skills equals poor results maybe they will participate in reading skill development of the children. In my mind the question is how many teachers do you need to influence to achieve a positive result in the children? Think minimum here and reach one or two teachers, forget the ones that rather stay in the tearoom after the break. Focus on the ones that indicate a concern for the children. Your study is not to fix all educational related problems in SA but rather the reading skill problem that you have identified at the specific school. In making your research account public you will express concern regarding lack of commitment on the side of teachers and maybe theorize that department of education need a stronger influence in schools but your main focus should be your original problem, reading skill development.
Arlys you’re and Jean’s study seems very important to the lives of the children that you will reach. In your description of your frustration with the teachers it seems that except you as researchers, the sponsors and maybe the department of education there are nobody with a direct interest in the problem, certainly not at the school. This is unfortunate because you need stakeholders that understand that the actions you implement will benefit the children and the schools results, ultimately.
If I understand Jean’s and Jack’s view of AR correct you need to influence the ‘learning’ of the teachers as stakeholders. Once they understand the problem that poor reading skills equals poor results maybe they will participate in reading skill development of the children. In my mind the question is how many teachers do you need to influence to achieve a positive result in the children? Think minimum here and reach one or two teachers, forget the ones that rather stay in the tearoom after the break. Focus on the ones that indicate a concern for the children. Your study is not to fix all educational related problems in SA but rather the reading skill problem that you have identified at the specific school. In making your research account public you will express concern regarding lack of commitment on the side of teachers and maybe theorize that department of education need a stronger influence in schools but your main focus should be your original problem, reading skill development.
You may put lack of commitment as a hurdle in the project but how far you need to go in addressing it should be determined by your main concern or focus. You may thus decide to only influenced one or two teachers to understand the problem better and to commit to the development of reading skills in children, or you may decide that the lack of commitment in teachers should become the concern of a complete AR cycle and then use only those teachers that did become more commited to students after the AR cycle to do reading skill development. The emergent trend of the reseach and your reflection should influence your planning and action.
Regarding your concern about the lack of change and how that may influence the outcome of the study you should read Suzanne Grant’s article Learning through ‘being’ and ‘doing’ (Action Research 2007 5: 265-274). She discusses the emergent trend of AR and states that AR not always produces the outcomes that are hoped for. She encourages researchers to rather focus on the experiences in the process than a positive outcome. Try this link to the AR journal - only on UV campus
Regarding your concern about the lack of change and how that may influence the outcome of the study you should read Suzanne Grant’s article Learning through ‘being’ and ‘doing’ (Action Research 2007 5: 265-274). She discusses the emergent trend of AR and states that AR not always produces the outcomes that are hoped for. She encourages researchers to rather focus on the experiences in the process than a positive outcome. Try this link to the AR journal - only on UV campus
