scholarly journals An investigation into the undergraduate dissertation tutorial as a Personal Development Planning (PDP) process to support learner development

1969 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrea Raiker
Keyword(s):  
Action Research ◽  
Collaborative Learning ◽  
Personal Development ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Critical Reflection ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
Development Planning ◽  
Research Network ◽  
Successful Completion ◽  
Action Research Project

The investigation discussed in this paper was motivated by a finding revealed through analysis of the dissertation grades of final year undergraduates on an education honours degree. A third of dissertations received grades equating to third class honours or fails and this was viewed by the Faculty as being unacceptable. As a Fellow of the University’s Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning with a focus on personal development, I was asked by the course leader to identify possible causes and suggest changes. My critical reflection on the dissertation suggested that its creation is predicated upon Personal Development Planning (PDP) processes practised through the mediation of the tutorial. I am investigating the effectiveness of the tutorial to support learner development over a two year period, contributing to an overarching action research project undertaken by the National Action Research Network (NARN). This paper presents the outcomes of the first cycle of my action research, involving the collection and analysis of quantitative and qualitative data from students and dissertation supervisors. At this stage it appears that the design of the dissertation meets the needs of some students but not all, particularly the lower third of the sample cohort. Furthermore some students, including a number of thirds and fails, do not perceive tutorial support as essential for the successful completion of their dissertations. Overall, it appears that the tutorial process requires review in order to support the autonomous and/or collaborative learning needed for effective learner development.

scholarly journals Building research capacity in a practitioner community: framing and evaluating the 'National Action Research Network on Researching and Evaluating Personal Development Planning and e-Portfolio Practice'

1969 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Peters
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Action Research ◽  
Capacity Building ◽  
Personal Development ◽  
Research Work ◽  
Development Planning ◽  
Research Network ◽  
Important Lesson ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Learning And Teaching

This paper evaluates key aspects of the National Action Research Network on Researching and Evaluating Personal Development Planning and e-Portfolio Practice (NARN). This was a National Teaching Fellowship Scheme funded project which ran from 2007-1010 and involved sixteen English Higher Education institutions (HEIs). The context, purposes, theoretical underpinnings and framework for the NARN are briefly explained before the experience of members is explored through an analysis of their own accounts. The NARN was proposed in response to widespread calls for more research evidence to underpin our understanding and implementation of Personal Development Planning (PDP) and e-Portfolio practices, taking its lead from Clegg's (2004) invitation to produce more researched examples of situated PDP and e-Portfolio practice. The NARN was primarily a capacity-building project aimed at developing a community of PDP and e-portfolio practitioners into practitioner researchers. Borrowing heavily on ideas of community and participative inquiry as well as concepts about developing communities of practice, the project placed an emphasis on promoting collegiality, a sense of belonging and the establishment of the project as a safe space in which to discuss research work. It is evaluated here through the thematic analysis of a particular data set of twelve anonymous accounts provided by project members. The NARN project's emphasis on process rather than product or output, mark it apart from most Higher Education (HE) learning and teaching funded projects. Its success carries an important lesson for fundholders, educational developers and HE managers about the funding of more process-based learning and teaching development in HE. It also provides a possible framework for similar capacity-building projects across other communities.

The sociology classroom as a pedagogical site of discomfort: Difficult knowledge and the emotional dynamics of teaching and learning

2016 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Audrey Bryan
Keyword(s):  
Action Research ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
Economic Institutions ◽  
Action Research Project ◽  
Research Project ◽  
Sociological Knowledge ◽  
Dimensions Of Teaching ◽  
Theoretical Considerations ◽  
Affective Dimensions

While recent years have witnessed a growing recognition of the importance of attending to the complex affective dimensions of teaching and learning, emotion remains under-researched and under-theorised as an aspect of education. This paper explores what it means to engage with emotionality in the classroom, particularly in terms of how difficult (sociological) knowledge is experienced, felt and understood by learners, i.e. how they are affected by knowledge that is historically or socially traumatic and hence difficult to bear. Drawing on qualitative data gathered as part of an action research project undertaken during a postgraduate course on globalisation, it offers insights into how course participants felt, experienced and engaged with difficult knowledge about their participation in harmful global economic institutions and practices. The paper concludes by considering some of the theoretical considerations and pedagogical conditions that are necessary if we are to engage learners with difficult (sociological) knowledge which asks them to contemplate how they are implicated in their learning.

scholarly journals An action research project to implement personal development plans into a community specialist practice programme

2012 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 31-44
Author(s):  
Liz Griffiths ◽  
Lynn Sayer ◽  
May Ryan ◽  
Nessie Shia ◽  
Rick Fisher
Keyword(s):  
Action Research ◽  
Community Health ◽  
Personal Development ◽  
Best Practice ◽  
Course Design ◽  
Development Planning ◽  
Action Research Project ◽  
Research Project ◽  
Community Health Nurses ◽  
Effective Manner

This paper sets out to explore the implementation of Personal Development Planning both in university and professional practice settings for community health nurses, as an action research project. This was achieved through a series of cycles of implementation, review and modification using a collaborative approach. The introduction of this process into the course design has enabled all those involved to record student progress in an effective manner. Our findings show that community health students and their assessors in practice have found the experience a very positive one and as a result some “tips for best practice” have been developed that will help take the process further.

IMPROVING THE STUDENTS ACHIEVEMENT IN SPEAKING THROUGH TEAMS-GAMES-TOURNAMENT TECHNIQUE

2014 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ramadhayani Fitri Nasution And Busmin Gurning
Keyword(s):  
Action Research ◽  
Learning Process ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
Speaking Test ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Thinking Process ◽  
Classroom Action Research

The objective of this study was to investigate whether the application of Teams-Games-Tournament Technique improve the students achievement in Speaking. This study was an classroom action research. The subject of this study was class XI IPA 3 SMA Muhammadiyah 8 Kisaran which consists of 35 students. The study was conducted in two cycles, cycle I consisted of three meetings and cycle II was consisted of three meetings. The instruments for collecting data were quantitative (oral speaking test) and qualitative data (observation sheet and diary note). Based on speaking scores, students’ score kept improving in every evaluation and based on observation sheet and diary note, it was found that teaching and learning process ran well. Students could enlarge their thinking process. The result of this study showed that Teams-Games-Tournament improved students’ achievement in speaking.

IMPROVING STUDENTS ACHIEVEMENT IN VOCABULARY THROUGH LUSTERING TECHNIQUE

2013 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisda Yuniati Tumanggor And Zainuddin
Keyword(s):  
Action Research ◽  
Learning Process ◽  
Quantitative Data ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
Clustering Technique ◽  
Class Viii ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Mean ◽  
Vocabulary Score

This study attempts to improve students’ vocabulary achievement through Clustering Technique. This study was conducted by using classroom action research. The subject of the research was class VIII-B SMP Katolik Trisakti 2 Medan that consisted of 32 students. The research was conducted in two cycles and each cycle consisted of three meetings. The instruments for collecting data were vocabulary tests for quantitative data and diary notes, observation sheet and questionnaire sheet for qualitative data. Students’ score kept improving in every test. In the first cycle test, the mean of vocabulary score was 64.68. And in the second cycle test, the mean of vocabulary score was 79.85. Based on diary notes, observation sheet and questionnaire sheet, teaching and learning process had done effectively showed the improvement. Every student was studied actively. And from the research can be concluded that Clustering Technique can improve students’ achievement in vocabulary.

scholarly journals Mixed or Complementary Messages: Making the Most of Unexpected Assessment Results

2016 ◽  
Vol 77 (2) ◽  
pp. 197-211 ◽  
Author(s):  
Phil Jones ◽  
Julia Bauder ◽  
Kevin Engel
Keyword(s):  
Mixed Methods ◽  
Action Research ◽  
Quantitative Data ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
Important Research ◽  
Action Research Project ◽  
Research Project ◽  
Research Literacy ◽  
Initial Results

Grinnell College participated in ACRL’s first cohort of Assessment in Action (AiA), undertaking a mixed-methods action research project to assess the effectiveness of librarian-led research literacy sessions in improving students’ research skills. The quantitative data showed that the quality of students’ sources did not markedly improve following a research literacy session, while the qualitative data indicated that many students were able to state and describe important research concepts they learned. This article profiles the development of Grinnell’s AiA project and discusses how Grinnell’s librarians responded when the initial results led to more questions rather than to satisfactory answers.

Curriculum Development in Technology-Enhanced Environments

2011 ◽  
pp. 492-504
Author(s):  
Mike Keppell ◽  
Eliza Au ◽  
Ada Ma ◽  
Christine Chan
Keyword(s):  
Action Research ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Teacher Educators ◽  
Implicit Theories ◽  
Assessment Practices ◽  
Educational Beliefs ◽  
Attitudes And Beliefs ◽  
Action Research Project ◽  
Teaching Learning ◽  
Insight Into

As teacher-educators, we are acutely aware of our responsibilities in nurturing the knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs of pre-service teachers. As part of our interest in improving our teaching, learning, and assessment practices, we have been participating in an action-research project on technology-enhanced assessment over the last 12 months. Throughout this collaboration, we have become aware of our assessment practices and have been delighted that this has also resulted in a questioning of our current learning design for our modules and further clarity in our own thinking about why we teach the way that we do. The process of action-research has forced us to examine our educational beliefs and how these motivate our teaching and learning. This article focuses on why as teacher-educators it is our obligation to articulate our theories of teaching and learning. It is essential that we articulate these often-implicit theories not only as a means of engaging in dialogue with other teacher-educators, but also as a means of engaging in dialogue with our own students who are pre-service teachers. This cascading waterfall of dialogue and explicitness may allow pre-service teachers to gain insight into the decisions we make as teacher-educators and the rationale we use in our teaching. This obligation has important ramifications for the education of children in the Hong Kong setting, as pre-service teachers may see these explicit rationales as a guide to their own teaching within the early childhood, primary, and secondary settings.

The challenges of participation in doing community-based participatory action research: Lessons from the Kwithu Project

2016 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 198-213 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathalis G Wamba
Keyword(s):  
Action Research ◽  
Participatory Action Research ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
English Language ◽  
English Language Teaching ◽  
Participatory Action ◽  
Action Research Project ◽  
Community Based ◽  
Random Group ◽  
Running Water

The Kwithu project started when a volunteer who joined Kwithu, a community-based organization in Mzuzu, Malawi (Africa), to teach English gave a diagnostic test to a random group of forty 7th and 8th graders (20 boys and 20 girls) and discovered that most of them could hardly read or write in English. The test results prompted Maureen, the Kwithu director and co-founder, the teacher and myself to meet with the headteachers of the three schools mostly attended by Kwithu children. The headteachers appreciated our concerns about the English proficiency of the children, but they advised us to focus on more urgent matters if we truly wanted to help, e.g., lack of teaching and learning materials, lack of running water in schools, hunger, teacher qualifications, etc. This advice shifted our initial inquiry goal—from English language teaching—to a community-based participatory action research project designed to address the school conditions in Luwinga. In this paper, I describe the community-based participatory action research inquiry and I reflect on the process of participation.

scholarly journals From Research to Action: Four Theories and Their Implications for Knowledge Mobilization

2014 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Janet Mosher ◽  
Uzo Anucha ◽  
Henry Appiah ◽  
Sue Levesque
Keyword(s):  
Action Research ◽  
Collaborative Learning ◽  
Social Problem ◽  
Knowledge Mobilization ◽  
Learning Spaces ◽  
Action Research Project ◽  
Building Capacity ◽  
Multiple Levels ◽  
Action Change ◽  
The Relationship

Integral to both knowledge mobilization and action research is the idea that research can and should ignite change or action. Change or action may occur at multiple levels and scales, in direct and predictable ways and in indirect and highly unpredictable ways. To better understand the relationship between research and action or change, we delineate four conceptualizations that appear in the literature. Reflecting on our experiences as collaborators in a community–university action research project that set out to tackle a “wicked” social problem, we consider the implications of these conceptualizations for the project’s knowledge mobilization plans and activities. The major lessons point to the importance of building capacity by nurturing collaborative learning spaces, of drawing many others – situated differently and with varied perspectives – into dialogue, and of embracing change within the project itself.

scholarly journals Fun English pictures to improve students’ simple communication ability

2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 37
Author(s):  
Elisa Dewi Kusumawati
Keyword(s):  
Action Research ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
English Teacher ◽  
The Third ◽  
Third Grade Students ◽  
Communication Ability ◽  
Field Notes ◽  
Academic Year ◽  
Planning Action

The objective of the research is to improve the third grade students’ simple communication ability of SD Muhammadiyah Macanan in the academic year of 2017/2018 with the use of Fun English Pictures media. It was expected that Fun English Pictures could improve the students’ simple communication ability. Based on the observation, there were some problems in the teaching and learning of simple communication. To solve those problems, the researcher implemented Fun English Pictures as a learning media. The research was carried out through action research that consisted of two cycles. The researcher collaborated with the English teacher in implementing the actions and an observer. The data were in the forms of qualitative. The qualitative data were in the forms of field notes, observation sheet, interview transcripts, and photographs. The validity used were democratic validity, outcome validity, process validity, catalytic validity and dialogic validity. The reliability used was time triangulation and investigator triangulation. The steps of the research were reconnaissance, planning, action and observation and reflection. The research found that: (1) Fun English Pictures can improve students’ simple communication ability and can help them to speak confidently, (2) the use of Fun English Pictures can give the students more chances for practicing simple communication, and therefore the students can lose their fears of making mistakes and be more confident, (3) the use of Fun English Pictures can improve the students’ fluency, pronunciation, vocabulary and accuracy.

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