4. Action Research

The term ‘Action Research’ refers to a classroom based research, which could be conducted by practicing teachers whenever they come across an issue in the teaching and learning process. Before you understand the concept, try to answer the questions, 1. How do you rate the success or failure from your classroom experience?

2. What makes a classroom experience challenging or unsatisfactory? Which aspects of it proves problematic?

The term research is defined as “ a systematic process of inquiry in which the researcher poses a question or questions, collects relevant data on the question(s), analyses and interprets the questions, and makes the results of the inquiry publicly accessible in some way”(Nunan, 1997, p.14).

When a practicing teacher handles a research it takes many forms and serves a range of purposes, but it is conducted by teachers, individually or collaboratively, with the primary aim of understanding teaching and learning in context and from the perspectives of those who live and interact daily in the classroom (Meier & Henderson 2007; Zeichner 1999).

Now let us understand the process involved in a classroom based research

Steps involved

1. Identify a problem

eg. Students’lack of interest in writing skills

2. Develop questions and examine assumptions

Eg. Why do students lack interest to write in English?

How can I motivate students to show interest in writing.

3. Gather data

Eg. Qualitative data---Observation notes on activities given to students in writing and students’ responses to the tasks given.

Quantitative data – short tests in writing and the score given based on rubrics in writing.

4. Analyze data

Eg. Qualitative data—analyse your observations about each student’s performance to tasks given compare that with the score got (quantitative data)

5. Interpret data

Eg. See if there is any relation between qualitative data and the quantitative data.

6. Take action

Eg. Design more tasks that would help students show commitment to writing.

Data collection methods

When you conduct an action research, like any research study, you need to collect data. The qualitative data includes Narrative inquiry, i.e what teacher researchers can use in the form of field notes, interviews, journals, letters, oral stories, and autobiographical memories, as qualitative data. In other words, you need to maintain a record of the activities given in the classroom, our teaching strategies, the effectiveness of using those teaching methods and the responses of the chosen sample, in the form of observation notes, oral narration and reflective diary. If you plan to conduct an interview, the recording of those audio or video files will be considered as qualitative data.

Similarly, the quantitative data has to be collected through

— Surveys or questionnaires – a set of standardized questions that explore a specific topic and collect information about demographics, opinions, attitudes or behaviours.– can be created with Google forms or Survey monkey or menti.com– use rating scales

— Students writing samples/test papers/homework(relating to the aspect taken up for research)

Analysis of data

a. You need to analyse the qualitative data collected through various tools like interviews, observation notes, reflective journals and oral stories or narrations. Similarly, the scores received by the sample (quantitative data) for their responses to tasks have to be analysed.

b. The results got from the analysis of qualitative data have to be compared with the scores got from quantitative data. In this way it is possible to verify the relation in the results got from both the data.

Interpretation of data

The analyses of the results provide us the insight about the effectiveness of teaching and learning process. If the observation and the score prove that the selected samples have shown improvement, then arrive at the conclusion that the particular strategy had worked well.

It must be stated that once the research is completed, it is necessary to use those successful teaching strategies more for students to perform better in their learning process. However, if you identify that a particular teaching strategy has not given positive results, you have to attempt another strategy, collect data, analyse the data and interpret the results again. Thus, it is essential to know that a classroom based research is an ongoing study done in a classroom.

Task:

Read this story of research by Lorena Muñoz, told in her own words. You need to identify the different steps of action research in Lorena Muñoz’s story.

“I am a teacher at a High School in Osorno working with students who have a high level of vulnerability. I teach from 9th to 11th grades and I have more or less 38 to 40 students per group. The 9th grade students are between 14 and 15 years old. In this context I noticed they were not working properly in listening activities. In lessons I observed that they didn’t do the activities and I wanted to know the reason why.

I chose four questions to work with during the exploratory research process:

1. In which listening activities do my students listen better?

2. How is listening presented during the lesson?

3. What kind of information are my students able to identify from the listening material?

4. How does the length of the listening material affect students’ performance?

In order to collect information, I conducted a survey and discovered that they found the topics interesting, which was surprising for me; songs were the activities they liked the most. They were able to listen and understand the teacher’s instructions. Then I carried out a focus group discussion to find out what they found difficult or easy when listening. They told me that they found the recordings too long and could not complete the activity. That is why they got frustrated and became distracted. They also said songs were easier because they were shorter and they could complete the tasks. I also organised a session of formal peer observation where a student-teacher observed pupils’ behavior during listening and the instructions given by the teacher. He confirmed the findings and also noted that students listened to the instructions and demonstrated that they knew what to do. I decided to start working with the audios as if they were songs. I divided them into sections and created activities such as order the information, filling in the gaps, etc.

By the end of two weeks I observed several changes. The first one was that they actually did the activities, handouts were completed with the correct answers and I could observe many hands up to participate in the lesson. I conducted another survey in which students answered that working with the listening materials as if they were songs allowed them to work better. They also said that they were able to identify information from the text and that the activities they liked the most were underlining the correct word, filling in the gaps and crossing out the odd one out. They still found it difficult to order the information because sometimes the material was too fast. The focus group participants mentioned that they now felt motivated and more successful because they were able to do the tasks, and do them well. This was confirmed by another peer observation, where the student-teacher told me that students were able to focus on the activities and they did not get distracted by anything else.

As a reflection I learned that conducting action research can be helpful to improve my teaching practice and my students’ listening skills. Students are able to improve listening skills if we, as teachers, implement strategies according to their needs. I was able to see a change which motivates me to continue working like this. From now on, the way I teach listening will be different according to what the group requires. Finally, I realised that with a simple action I can change and improve what I am doing in the classroom.”

(Source: A Handbook for Exploratory Action Research)