Your 2nd Grade Teacher's Thoughts

  This last week’s sources have been centered around a type of self-study called action research. It is a type of research that refers to “a wide variety of evaluative, investigative, and analytical research methods designed to diagnose problems or weaknesses” (Great Schools Partnership). The main goal of conducting it is to help educators grow as life-long learners and develop solutions to classroom problems they encounter. There are a few key aspects of it that I find potentially very beneficial as an educator. First, action research allows educators to have the autonomy to decide what they want to study and how they want to conduct their research. Having the autonomy to decide what problems or practices you want to study is immensely important. Currently, most of my required learning comes from classes the state or school district decided all elementary teachers need to take and know. However, the information sometimes being taught is not always beneficial for my students or grade l

  This week I have begun learning all about the processes of educational research and why educators need to pursue it. I foremost learned that educational research is simply an organized approach to “asking, answering, and effectively reporting a question” (Biddix, 2018). While educational research can be summed up in pretty simple terms what educational research requires can be quite complex. Educational research requires an individual to first have “a basic understanding of the methods used to gather and analyze information” to judge the validity of research findings (National Education Association, n.d). Additionally, it requires an individual to look closely at a source like a “prosecuting attorney” to study the source for validity (Lauer 2014). In order to determine the validity of a source, an individual must be able to analyze the study for possible errors in a source’s research question, research design, study design, and explantation (Lauer 2014). While these steps may seem ov

Overall the sources these last two weeks sources have taught me some really valuable information about successful learning and have opened my eyes to just how important quality learning is for not just students but also teachers. The major driving questions in my learning these last two weeks have been: What does quality learning for teachers look like? and How can teacher education programs better prepare future teachers? Several of the sources this week touched on the fact that “Teacher learning is the key to improving teaching” (Stigler Hiebert, 2009, pg. 7). In order to cultivate learning for students, a teacher must also be open to learning and have a curiosity for learning new things (Meadows, 2006 ). While every year I set a professional practice goal of learning new strategies or trying new things in my classroom when I step back and think about how much quality learning I do throughout the school week sometimes it really doesn’t amount to as much as it should. Quality learning