What I have learned about action research is that the name I like better is action inquiry. Action inquiry is an intentional and planned approach to making positive school improvement. I like that it serves to move the principal away from the role of manager to the role of instructional leader. The "action" occurs from taking the needed backward step of asking of the campus, "what is critical that we change/address?" Once this is identified, a plan of action can occur through campus collaboration, collecting the needed data to drive it, and through careful reflection from the administrator regarding the course of action necessary to stay on track. How different this model is from the gathering of pertinent literature readings and advice and logic given from outside sources. And how unchanging. Action inquiry allows the learning from sources to be used not as field guides, rather as resources to pull - one of many resources; the primary resource being the campus team and students themselves.
What I have also learned is that the time needed to invest in this inquiry process will pay you back - but it is time that will have to be carved out of the schedule intentionally. It will not happen by chance. I thought the correlation to how we must purposefully set aside time to exercise is perfect. After all, the benefits of this "exercise" reach beyond ourselves.
Using the Blog world as a part of the process makes perfect sense. It can become the host of reflections and examples that can serve as our stream of consciousness. Blogs are cumulative so an emerging of formed ideas can be witnessed and commented on by the team, giving collaborative feedback and support when needed. It is always great to look back over time to see how solutions were derived, and by what influences.
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