I am in a new semester of masters classes, one of which is called "Enhancing Learning Through Action Research." If you can't tell by the title, we are working on learning about action research! Part of this involves learning about the methods of collecting data and the differences between qualitative and quantitative data. To learn more about these things, our professor assigned us to read Ch. 6 of our textbook "A Short Guide to Action Research" by Andrew P. Johnson. At the end of this chapter, the author provides suggestions for activities to do in order to practice collecting data. Our assignment was to choose one of these activities, create a checklist/rubric/questions/etc. to use to collect the data, then blog about our experience and results.
The activity that I chose involved recording one of my classes and creating a Data Retrieval Chart (DRC) to indicate the number and type of some observation. DRCs are "graphic organizers that are used to help you (or your students) collect and organize information" (pg. 80). One of the ways of doing this is to create a map. These maps can record the paths students take in the classroom or where certain behaviors occur. I decided to use this form of DRC to indicate how many times and the type of interactions I had with my students in one of my Algebra 1 classes. A picture of my map is below:
I know it's a bit difficult to see on here, but all of the lines indicate the paths that I took when walking around my classroom. An "X" on the desk represents some sort of direct conversation that I had with the student. I may have walked around and glanced at their work, but the "X" shows that we had some sort of conversation about their work, whether that was checking if their answer is correct or having some other conversation about the work. An "X" with a circle around it indicates that the conversation involved me explaining something to the student or clearing up misinformation. Finally, and "X" with a square around it involved the students explaining something to me.
After looking at my results, there were a few things that stuck out to me. First, I wanted this lesson to be an exploration of multiplying polynomials. We had discussed the distributive property before, so I wanted them to come up with the "FOIL" method on their own for multiplying two binomials since "FOIL" is just an acronym to remember the order in which to use the distributive property. The "X"'s with the squares on the map show that I only went to a few of the students to hear their explanation of how I got the answer to the example problem. Therefore, I only know that a few of them saw and understood that I used the distributive property to simplify the expression. I instead, should have visited multiple/all students to see/hear their level of understanding. I also noticed that I only had direct conversations once or twice with a couple of students, but multiple times with others. That tells me that I need to make sure that I am in contact with all of my students and making sure that they all understand versus only talking to a handful of them. As I was watching the video back to get this information, I also discovered that it took roughly half the period to get around to some of these students. Other students had been taking my attention up until then so I hadn't gotten around to them. Once I did, I then made sure to get around to them more often since they needed a little more help. Their number of "X"'s then increased.
Doing this activity helped me see how I could better use my class time and helped me realize that I sometimes have little one-on-one contact with some of the students. This of course isn't on purpose, but rather it's due to timing. Sometimes other, more vocal students want to know if they have the answer right or want an explanation. I then get tied up with those students and time has ticked away so I go back to the front of the room and discuss it as a large group. However, the more quiet students need to be involved too and need the one-on-one contact as well. I need to change so that I get to all of my students in some way so that all students are understanding the material, and I know that they are understanding it or not.
I enjoyed this activity and definitely recommend it to other teachers. If you didn't want to create a map like this, you could use a DRC instead to indicate the number and level of questions you ask, the gender of the students who respond to your questions, the number and type of times/ways your class gets off task, or any other information you would like to know. Have any of you done anything like this before? I'd like to hear about your experience!
That's awesome! What a great way to practice reflective teaching!
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