This morning I started reading a book called "Action Research in Organisations" by Jean McNiff. My principal actually gave a copy to me last year after our annual learning plan meeting. In that meeting, I stated that my goal was to conduct a kind of "mini action research project" in which I looked at my students' multiple intelligences as well as their left brain/right brain preference. My principal handed me a copy of the book and it sat on my shelf - until now. So far, I have only read through part of the introduction and believe me, it has been an interesting and thought-provoking experience. A few things have come out of my reading so far. Here they are, not in any particular order, just random comments based on writing in the book. In each case, I will quote the part of the book and then give my perceptions/comments/questions afterwards. Forgive me for taking each quote out of context...
a) "What is needed, says Schon, is a new way of theorising which integrates theory and practice, a form of theory which is embodied in real lives and shows the process of reflecting on reflection-in-action, and which may be shared with others who are also studying their own practice" - Isn't this what action research is all about? Isn't this what we, as teachers, do inside our heads (except for the "sharing with others" part)? Is this the shift that needs to take place in education - going from each of us teaching in our own rooms to a point where we each share our "best practice" with our colleagues both in our school and perhaps virtually around the world?
b) "Our language informs and creates our realities. Change the language and you may change the reality." Reminds me of a principal who told me that "perception is everything" and a parent who remarked during an interview that "MY (his own) perception is what matters." Perhaps our difficulty in understanding our students is not so much finding out what their needs are but, rather, having a glimpse into their own personal perception. Is this what the new "metacognitive" piece in the Ontario curriculum is all about - ie. finding out a student's perception so we can better understand the student?
c) "Learning involves creating new ideas out of old ones. It does not mean entirely rejecting what went before, but making new connections and reconfiguring the neworks, so that previous knowledge transforms into new knowledge that serves human purposes more adequately than older forms." Reminds me of a keynote speaker at Leading Learning 2008 (maybe George Siemens??) who said that we all come to education with a bulk of understanding of what has gone before. Everyone has had their own experience in education and we interpret what happens in the classroom now based on our own experience. Since the world around is is changing exponentially, we cannot afford to subscribe to the attitude of "this is the way I have always done it in the past - and this is how I will teach in the future." Perhaps the self-reflective nature of action research allows us as educators to get a better indication of what the present attitude is in our classrooms and in our teaching communities so we can actually use our experience (our "best practice") to frame the direction in which we are to head next....
Just a few thoughts... I would welcome comments and discussion from anyone else.