Sarah Fletcher

1
Sarah Fletcher

• Creative Partner Educational research mentor
• http//www.TeacherResearch.net
• sjfmentor_at_yahoo.com

2
What is Action Research?

• any systematic enquiry conducted by teacher
  researchers to gather information about how their
  particular schools operate, how they teach and
  how well their students learn. Action research is
  done by teachers for themselves it is not
  imposed on them by someone else
• Mills, G. (2003) Action Research a Guide for
  the Teacher Educator, USA, New Jersey, Pearson
  Education

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What is action research?How do I identify my
focus or research question? How do I carry
out an audit as a starting point? How do I map
out possibilities for taking action?How do I
collect data in rigorous, systematic ways?How
do I make sure I am on track with my project and
sharing ideas as I make appropriate headway?How
do I provide evidence for any claims that my
creative project is helping students and my
school?
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Action Research

• What matters most to me as a creative teacher?
• How do I teach best and how can I teach even
  better?
  
• In my work as an teacher, what is my main
  concern?
  
• How can I live out my professional values more
  fully?
  
• What can I do to become a more professional
  teacher by helping my colleagues to learn with me
  and to teach me?
  
• How can I help our students to learn creatively
  in lessons?
  

5
Action Research

• What is a good focus for a research project?
• (relevant, realistic and rigorously
  researched)
  
• What is a good research question? Spot the
  difference ..
  
• How can students be more motivated and creative
  in lessons?
  
• How can we work with year 9 to develop motivation
  and raise
  
• attainment in English lessons based on our Scheme
  of Work?
  
• How can I evaluate and then improve teaching and
  learning?
  
• How can I publicly evidence and disseminate our
  claims to have improved students learning by
  developing creativity?

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You dont have to start with a problem! Start
from enjoyment!

• Why do you want to develop creativity?
• What exactly do you hope to achieve?
• Which students do you want to work with
  creatively and what is your joint project?
  
• How do you know when students are being creative?
  What does it feel and look like?

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Teachers Action Research

• How will you teach more creatively?
• How do you show you are creative in your project
  and how will others?
  
• How will you demonstrate that your creative
  project is worth all the time, energy and money
  invested in it?

8
Research Mentoring is

• concerned with continuing personal as well as
  professional development (CPPD) and not just
  continuing professional development.
  
• Fletcher, S. (2000) Mentoring in Schools A
  Handbook of Good Practice London, Taylor and
  Francis

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Research Mentoring

• . should unblock the ways to change by building
  self-confidence, self-esteem and a readiness to
  act as well as to engage in ongoing constructive
  interpersonal relationship.
• (Fletcher, 2000)

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How do teachers destroy CPs creativity when they
work with students in a class?

• You are the creative one. Tell me what to do!
• I am not very creative nor is my class.
• Could you do something creative with my students?
  They seem bored in my lesson
  
• Ill give you space to get going - Ill be in the
  staffroom if you need me. Im bit busy today.
  
• Shall we just say it went Fine if we have to
  report on our CP project? Do we tick box 5?

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How can teachers help enrich students creativity
by sharing action research?

• How do students explain and share their creative
  knowledge in school?
  
• How do students share what they know with other
  students and other schools?
  
• How do students explain what they know to improve
  Creative Partnerships regional and national
  work?

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Why integrate mentoring in action research?

• Action research is formulaic when you restrict
  personal and professional interrelationships.
  
• Mentoring helps students, teachers and partners
  develop creative relationships with one
  another.
  
• Action research can sometimes be a solitary
  experience but mentoring builds supportive
  networks for building collaborative creativity.
  
• Mentoring students and teachers skills, values,
  knowledge and understandings develop. These are
  the core areas for creative engagement.

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How can we develop creativity with action
research and mentoring ?

• at the Input stage? (idea, language, environment,
  resources, qualities, values)
  
• at the Doing stage? (identifying problems,
  divergent thinking, fascination, risk-taking,
  skills challenges, refinement?)
  
• at the Showing stage? (solving problems, new
  ideas, capacity to learn, confidence, new skills,
  valued outcomes
  
• at the Reflection stage? (an on-going process
  before, during and after a project)
  

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Promoting and Sustaining Creativity with Action
Research and technology

• How can we develop critical and structured
  thinking to assist our creativity-as-learning?
  
• (Critical Thinking Scaffolds, Coombs, 2000)
• How can we develop school websites to show and
  share our creativity-in-teaching?
  
• (http//www.cfkeep.org http//www.TeacherRese
  arch.net )
  
• How can we develop Creative Partnerships
  web-based networks to disseminate
  creativity-learning and learning-creativity?

15
Sarah Fletcher

• http//www.TeacherResearch.net