Action Research Update

My action research is going fairly well, though there were more steps added to the process than I could have imagined. For example, I thought that I would just track my students, but instead, all of the other teachers have decided to use the same methods as I am in teaching writing, which is good news. The bad news is that I have to train them and discuss with them the necessary steps. The other bad news is that the kids they teacher are not the same as me, so we have to come up with smaller lessons, more like several mini lessons to achieve what I do in maybe 2 or 3 lessons.
Another thing that has gotten in the way of us getting everything done is the stupid machine we have to use to collect all the data.  It takes FOREVER!  First, we have to print out single documents--one for each students--so roughly 540. Then, we have to bubble in each sheet with the correct score.  Since it's a multiple choice test we can really only give one letter the "correct" answer. The good news is that there is a way to break it down further so we can see how many 1's, 2's, 3's, and 4's we have.  The scanning of all these documents though is what takes the longest.

Some things I have considered: I am focusing on the economically disadvantaged students but it's hard to get this info in the program we use, so it may need to be done by hand.  And the overall data we are using really won't be official until they take the test in April. I know my grading is consistent, as the grading of the other teachers, but we may not be consistent with each other.

I am currently working on an agenda to present to my principal to see if we can get a day out of the classroom where we can go over grading, do some grading together to make sure we have inter-grading reliability, and so we can over plans and do model lessons.

This is hard work and I am feeling like I don't have enough time to get everything done. I have not felt this overwhelmed since my first year of teaching, but I know it will get better. I just need to "find my stride" so to speak and get the other teachers there with me.

Reflection on Web Conferences

I have attended at least one web conference each week, and tonight's (the very last one) has proven to be the most helpful.  I wish, almost, that we could have had this kind of conference (where we shared our ideas for our projects) earlier--maybe during week 2.  I am really impressed by the ideas that people have come up with for their schools. I wonder how many of these are ideas of our own, or improvements on already existing programs.  I enjoy this portion better than what we have been sharing in all the rest of the conferences because it really gives me a lot of great ideas of things that we can do in our school--or in any other school that I work for in the future.
I remember in an earlier course, we watched a video and one of the speakers said, "why reinvent the wheel? Somewhere, in some similar school district, they are having the same problems as you are. Do a little research and see what they are doing.  This will help you because you won't have to go through the same bumps as they did--take their experiences and build upon them." Of course, this isn't word for word, but it just made so much sense to me. It's similar in teaching.  As an English teacher, I am always striving to find ways to present material in a way that is memorable and interesting, but also effective.  I am not the first teacher to ever teach grammar.  And I am certainly not the first teacher to want to do it in a way that is more interesting than diagram-ing sentences! 
This transition we have made from EPIC to blackboard wasn't easy--I feel like our discussion groups are a lot less personal and this class, especially, seems to be a lot less close than our past two were. I think it may be due to how many people are in the class and how there are so many different levels of people in the class.  So, some of the questions that people were asking (people that are nearly finished with the program) were good ones, ones that I should be aware of, but were not ones that I should have been stressing out during the first few weeks of school.  Lesson learned, I suppose.  Someone told all of us during the first few weeks of our first course that it would take us until our 3rd course before we got 'in the groove' so to speak and didn't stay up until 1 am doing work everyday.  I don't feel totally comfortable, but I am not as stressed either. I at least know who to ask when I have a question, and I think that really has helped ease my stress. I have learned that Lamar email never works, so I never use it. And I have learned that Jana Barnett is probably the best IA ever.  Most importantly though, I have learned that the professors want us to succeed and they are there for us, which has really been a comfort. 

Too Many?

It looks like I have about 66 students to focus on in my action research......that seems like a lot--out of 190 or so. What do you think? 

Reflections and Thoughts About the Future

When I purchased the APA book before the class started, I was sure this class was going to be one where I was going to have to write a paper about something I researched.  I wasn’t afraid of this idea, but I didn’t like the formality of it.  Much to my surprise, this course was something entirely different. This approach to research is a much more realistic way to gather practical information.   The things I learned where the things that I could take away with me to use in my own practice of teaching.  A little light when off when I read in our text that action research can be used with teachers and their PLCs. In my PLC, we often struggle because there is just so much to cover and we never know where to focus.  At the end of last school year, I attended the School Improvement Plan Committee meeting where we discussed what our objective would be for the next year, which is writing. Being an English teacher, this gave me the perfect opportunity to take this to my PLC and present my idea of action research to them.  They all agreed, and were excited about the different approach we would take this year. Of course, we still have to cover all the material that we would have covered last year—but because our question for our research is deals with practices within the classroom and how they effect writing, we can incorporate everything we do already, just making sure that we always go back and incorporate some form of writing. I am very interested also on what kinds of things you can do to motivate your staff when you are an instructional leader. I think that instructional leaders can use action research to their benefit here, when working with staff members. Instead of trying to raise scores with “blanket” professional development that nobody cares about and nobody does, an instructional leader could do the following: present staff with the information (like, “this is where we have a deficiency”), then he could form groups—maybe the deficiency is in Math. Then, he could ask each group, “what kinds of things can your group do to help us with this deficiency?” It would be up the group to research, experiment, reflect and decide what they wanted to do to help. This way, it gives the teachers the autonomy the deserve, and because they are the ones coming up with their own solution, they take ownership over it and are more likely to follow through with enthusiasm. On top of that, it leaves the instructional leader more of a change to explore different ideas with different groups. There will never be ONE thing that works with ALL the diverse groups within a school.  I know this is different from what we have been taught in this class. During a web conference I was told that my question for research was too broad.  But, on the other hand, my site supervisor told me that a more specific question, like “How does the Heart of Texas Writing Project Technique of teaching improve writing?” was way too specific and that I was assuming it was going to be the solution, and that wasn’t research.    I think both ways of thinking have merit and I can see why being specific works to our benefit—we only have so much time.  But I can also see why having an open-ended question like “how can we improve writing scores?” can also be a benefit when approaching a more diverse group—which, as an instructional leader, we are faced with more often than not.  Like I said, as an English teacher, I always think that literacy based skills are going to be the ones that are the solution to anything.  But what that looks like in Biology could be entirely different than what it looks like it Geometry or US History.  I am very much open to this idea and I am even trying to think if there is a way I can use it with my students.  I think the most important aspect of this entire process is the reflection process, and this can be used with my students.  I used it while I taught summer school. I had a class of writers who failed the writing EOC. The first thing I asked them to write about was why they were in summer school and what they wanted to improve upon.  After a week of class, I asked them to look back at the first journal and assess whether or not they had done anything in class (or on their own) that helped them move towards their goal.  We did this throughout the entire 3 weeks and I think it helped for many reasons. It helped keep them on track and goal orientated. They also were more focused on their area of weakness.  The real question now is whether or not it helped them on the test. I am curious to find out whether or not this self-reflection helped them slow down and focus on their areas of weakness on the test (and hopefully improve in that area). I was having a hard time trying to use what I had researched and learned in my Heart of Texas Writing class with my action research project and the planning of it.  It was suggested on my blog that students also could blog, and that could be used as an electronic journal.  Though I like this idea, I don’t know that it’s practical, nor do I think that my students should be writing everything about themselves on a public blog via the internet, where anyone in the world could read it. I would have for that to have some negative effect later. What I could use the blog for though, could be a reflective blog where students can track their growth and achievements when it comes to writing.

Classroom Oraganization

I visited my classroom yesterday to see what it looked like after all the summer "cleaning" and just as I expected, it's in total chaos.  It's okay though, since I want to change my room a little.   My question is for anyone who has "stations" or different writing sections or whatever in their classes. 

How do you set it up? 

My problem is that I will have at least 35 desks in my classroom.  Comfortably, I can fit about 25, if that gives you any idea. 

I would like for one whole side of the classroom to be dedicated to writing.  Maybe a table set up for all their notebooks.  Since we are doing so many different types of writing, I want to organize things for them as much as possible. While I recognize their need to "write for the sake of writing" (ie..their notebooks), I will also have guided work and notes that they will need to refer back to, and therefore, I am having trouble deciding how to organize this. In my perfect world, I think a 4 subject notebook would be awesome. One section for literary, one for expository, and one for notes. The final one can be for final drafts, or drawing or whatever.  But, is that really realistic? I cannot require they get these notebooks and I am sure not buying them for them. 

What about two notebooks (one for expository, one for literary) and then a folder for notes and final drafts?  Is that too much? What do you think?

Do your students blog?

So, in my last post, I expressed some frustration.  Another students suggested that I collect writing samples from students in the form of a blog---which, I had been thinking about doing anyway, especially since we have been doing the blogging here.

So--does anyone use blogs in their classes?  How well does it work? Do you have any suggestions for sites to use? I've been looking at edublog.org.  This is the same site my husband uses with his 12th grade AP students. If your students don't use it, have any of you been asked to use a blog in your college courses (obviously, besides this one)?  How useful was it?

This brought me to my next thought--I have often sat in the library when a kid who is in my husband's class comes rushing in and starts typing furiously.  "Blogs for your husband are due today! I totally forgot!"  Or, I have been sitting there watching/listening to the kids who talk about what they wrote--most times they forgot and they would just do it because that is what their teacher asked them to do.

Do you think this would work with freshmen or do you think it is too much? Or maybe they aren't mature enough?  Do you think it would be hard to monitor? How would you approach the idea of "mature writing"--and by that, I mean, being respectful and writing appropriately?  

Just some thoughts.....any advice is welcome.

Not impressed with this stuff....

Week 4 Discussion: Mo’ problems

My project focuses on improving writing scores.  Upon the suggestion of my district coordinator of English (this crazy smart lady), I attended the Heart of Texas Writing Project and planned to implement these strategies in my class.

So…..I have been attending the training. We are currently on day 3 of 4, and I couldn’t be more bored.

Here are my foreseeable problem areas:

1.     Including “research”. It’s all very theoretical, which, as we know, is not practical in real life situations.  I guess I am already implementing good practices in teaching writing in my class, but I went the long way—I just had to figure it out myself as opposed to doing the research (and I can’t exactly cite the “Amanda Gripp” way, can I?)  So…while I agree with much of what they are saying, I am already doing these things in my class.

So what to change/add/delete?

2.     I like their idea of writing in a journal.  I have tried this approach in the past though and it was SOOOO  frustrating!  The kids wouldn’t buy the stupid notebooks. And where to store 160 notebooks so they are safe and other people won’t mess with them?  If I let them take them with them….they will lose them (bc 9^th graders lose everything) or they will forget it and be unprepared for class. Or they will purposely leave it, and it will be a darn mess.

3.     Also…in this training, the approach is very “hippie” like –they are like, “Write whatever you want, as long as you are writing”  Well, I get that, but if you think about it, I have from now until the end of March to teach these kids how to write two very different types of essays.  7 months.  Out of those 7 months, if you split them in half, you really only have 3.5 months for each essay. Since we are on block schedules, we only see the kids every other day. So, split it in half again.  That’s like 2 months. So then, take out testing dates, days off, etc, I have about a month (maybe a little more) of instruction time. This is not enough to lead a hippie writing workshop, letting everyone explore their feelings and whatnot.  It NEEDS to be more structured. 

4.     When I argued the above point, the leader of the training argued that her way works and that I should just trust it and that all the research backs up that it works.   Ummmmmm……

5.     I would TRUST in her system if my own system wasn’t already proven to be successful.

6.     AND FINALLY…..I am soooooo bored with this.  The entire training is based around us having time to “write in our journals” so we can feel what our students are feeling—which is an excellent approach.  What I am feeling is: this approach is lame, I don’t like it, and I am bored.  I would never do this with my kids because I will be bored grading their boring writing and I will be bored teaching it. 

Something needs to change.   To summarize, my problems basically are that I don’t believe in this particular approach, don’t know what I need to do to improve it, and I think it’s sort of boring.   Can we use our own approach, and then just find research to back it up? 

ANY suggestions.....