Action Research Project

GOAL: To create awareness of bullying on our campus and to find ways to prevent bullying.
OBJECTIVES:
1. Administrators, faculty, students and parents will learn the characteristics of bullies and victims and the signs of bullying.
2. To find out the perceptions of bullying on our campus from students and teachers.
3. Teachers, staff and students will work together to create a bullying policy.
4. Teachers will learn ways to use school related activities, including classroom activities to curtail bullying.
5. Teachers, administrators, parents and students will learn the consequences of bullying.

Action Step 1: Students and staff will learn characteristics of bullies and victims and the signs and consequensences of bullying.
Persons responsible: Karen Maerz
Timeline: Start at the beginning of the 2010 fall semester and continue throughthe end of the 2011 spring semester.
Resources needed: Informational handouts and posters, research information from various sources, create a blog to display information.
Evaluation: Informal assessments will be given to administrators, faculty, staff, students and parents throughout the project.

Action Step 2: Students and teachers will complete survey and questionnaires.
Persons Responsible: Karen Maerz
Timeline: Start on 9-7-10 End on 9-14-10. Students and teachers will be able to give continual feedback bgy using a question/concern box.
Resources needed: Student survey (paper or web based), teacher questinnaire (paper or web based), question/concern box, Survey Monkey or other technology based instruments.
Evaluation: Follow up survey will be administered at the end of 2010 fall semester and again at the beginning of the 2011 spring semester.

Action Step 3: Create a bullying policy.
Persons Responsible: Karen Maerz is initially responsible. Responsibilities will later be handed over to group members.
Timeline: Start 9-13-10 and a draft wil be completed by 11-1-10. The final copywill be completed by 12-1-10 in order for all students and staff to be familiar with the policy before the holidays.
Resources needed: Results of surveys and questionnaires. Groups will be assigned and they will bring their ideas and research results and sampl;es of bullying policies from other schools, Dr. Dan Olewus' framework for creating a bullying policy.
Evaluation: I will evaluate the ongoing process by asking questionsof the groups and making sure that deadlines are met.

Action Step 4: Sharing classroom learning activities to curtail bullying.
Persons Responsible: Karen Maerz
Timeline: Start by 9-13-10 and will continue to the end of the school year.
Resources needed: Create a blog for ideas to be posted on.
Evaluation: I will check teacher blogs and assess activities as well as in class activities and make suggestions on the blog.

Action Step 5: Administrators and teachers will learn ways to observe and monitor bullying
Persons Responsible: Karen Maerz
Timeline: August, 2010 to June, 2011
Resources needed: Conduct and informational session to learn what to look for and "hot spots" to be aware of while observing and monitoring hallways and classrooms.
Evaluation: I will periodically contact teachers and administrators for their feedback.

Reflection

Last week I had a partial knee replacement, I am at home now, trying to get my thoughts together for what needs to be done for this weeks assignment. I will be posting my action researach plan shortly. I would appreciate any comments that you may have to offer.

Do You know what action research is? Oh how I wonder!

Ok by now I should have a pretty good ideaof what action research is. I wonder how many times I have actually answered this question? It 's all for the good. By creating an example for 9 topics of major wonderings by school leaders, I was given the opportunity to reflect and understand more about the process of action research. The topic that I came up with is different from my original idea. If I was presented with the idea of Social Justice I would not have come up with the idea of bullying. Now my mind is constantly wondering about something!

Action Research Project

The purpose of this study is to increase awareness of bullying on our campus and to create a plan for prevention.

Bullying seems to be an issue which is coming to the forefront on our campus. A teacher and I were talking and she said that she had 2 male students who were bullying other students in her classes. She knew what was going on and reported the paricular incidents to administrators. My main concern is for the students who are targeted because many of them are special education students. However, we also need to be concerned for the students who are doing the bullying. The targeted students for the most part do not know how to stand up for themselves or they are afraid to say anything for fear of retaliation. Teachers need to be able to identify the signs of bullying and know what action to take. Parents need to have an understanding of bullying so that they can identify signs of bullying, whether it involves their child being the victim or that their child is the bully. Identifying ways to prevent bullying will be beneficial to parents and to everyone on campus.

What I've Learned About Action Research

As you probably have noticed, my title is Inquiry, aka Action Research. Dana refers to Action Research simply as Inquiry (Dana, N.F. 2009, p. 6). Practitioners including myself, have difficulty relating to the word research because of the images we remember from past experiences with traditional research. Action Research brings a new light to research, especially in the field of education. In thr educational setting inquiry comes from within the school, and is based on questions and concerns of school practitioners. Action Research allows us to work together in order to “create a compelling vision that takes people to a new place, and to translate that vision into action(Harris, S., Edmundson, S., & Combs, J., 2010, p.3). Being successful in the process of Action Research requires the skill of reflection which leads to deeper thinking and the ability to adjust acordingly(Martin, G., E., Wright, W. F., Danzig, A. B., Flanary, R. A.,& Brown F., 2005, p. 104). The process of reflection and taking action can be time consuming. As practitioners we need to consider the importance of our inquiry and be able to create a balance in our busy schedules in order to complete the research.

Learning about Action Research has opened my eyes to all of the possibilities for inquiry on my campus. I will be able to utilize it during my internship as I collaborate with a team of interns to restructure our Saturday School Program. There will be multiple opportunities for me to investigate other issues as they arise and also to reflect on myself as an administrator.

Resources

Dana, N. F. (2009). Leading with passion and knowledge: The principal as action

researcher, Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin and London, UK: SAGE Ltd.

Harris, S., Edmundson, S., & Combs, J. (2010). Examining what we do to improve our

schools: 8 steps from analysis to action, Larchmont,NY: Eye on Education.

Martin, G. E., Wright, W. F., Danzig, A. B., Flanary, R. A., & Brown, F. (2005).

School leader internship: Developing, monitoring, and evaluating your

leadership experience, Larchmont, NY: Eye on Education.

To Blog or Not to Blog?

Before taking this class I did not have the opportunity to learn about blogging. I was familiar with the term however, I was not aware of how beneficial blogging can be for educational administrators as well for all educators. Blogging can be used as a tool for communication and inquiry. The administrator can post important information such as calendars with meeting dates and other important news for staff to view. Teachers can ask questions of the administrator and also post examples of student’s work, lesson plans and activities used in their classrooms. Administrators can also have access to articles and information regarding other administrators and their practices from around the world. I was amazed at all of the outstanding educational blogs representing so many different subject areas from so many different countries. There are also many links to get connected to other sites. I will definitely encourage my colleagues to get involved in blogging. To answer my question To Blog or Not to Blog, the answer is overwhelming to BLOG!