Improving Practice through Action Research

Action research is fulfilling, frustrating, messy, confusing, and exciting--just like real life in fact." Nod Miller Action research is a powerful tool for continuing professional education. It assumes that people learn best when they work together and are focused on real problems that impact their work or community Reaching into the uncertain world of practice, action research engages the practitioner on a personal level and promises the opportunity to solve persistent problems. This article provides a brief description of action research, shares examples from the field of adult literacy education and suggests implications for the practice of continuing professional education. What Is Action Research? Over the years, action research has expanded to include a broad array of action inquiry technologies, making it difficult to provide a simple definition. In general, action research is an intentional, systematic method of inquiry used by a group of practitioner-researchers who reflect and act on the real-life problems encountered in their own practice. Often the research is conducted in partnership with academic researchers or professional development staff that help facilitate the process. This reciprocal process, in which practice and research inform each other, leads to new knowledge and increasingly effective action. Action research possesses a unique set of characteristics that make it suitable for continuing professional education, including control, collaboration and context. Practitioners-as-researchers control the research process and are responsible for the construction of new knowledge. Collaboration is central to the action research process. Researchers and practitioners collaborate as co-researchers, with each contributing expertise from their own area. Context is the final characteristic that sets action research apart from other types of research. Action research focuses on problems that occur within the context of everyday life. An Example From the Field The Center for Literacy Studies located at the University of Tennessee has used action research methods for professional development since its inception in 1988. As a part of its mission to bridge theory and practice, the center conducts professional development for most of the adult literacy programs in Tennessee. For the past 14 years, the center's staff members have conducted many action research projects focusing on a wide variety of subjects. As a result of our combined experience, we have developed a series of steps that often frame the action research we conduct. * Identify a topic. Topics are generally very broad and may come from a formal needs assessment, informal conversations with practitioners or comments from committees. * Recruit practitioner-researchers. Research groups may have as many as 20 participants, and all participants are generally volunteers. * Review the action research process and invite participants to contribute their insights to the upcoming process. The group might establish communication ground rules, expectations for one another and structures for their future meetings. * Select a problem or raise a question. As participants reflect on their practice and share experiences, they begin to ask questions, describe problems and share concerns. These become the focus of an action research project. Throughout the research, project members continue to reflect on and refine their original questions. * Collect and analyze information. Practitioner-researchers collect information that will lead to an understanding of the problem. Researchers use many common data collection methods such as surveys, interviews and observations; they may ask experts, research the literature, poll peers and examine records. The information collected is dictated by the problem to be solved. Collectively analyzing the information provided by different group members often stimulates people to reframe the problem, seeing it in completely new ways. …