Action Research - Lessons Learned

As a campus principal, I oversee several improvement teams at the campus level. This past year, the district administrative team decided to look closely at our teacher snapshot (walk-through) process and the desired outcome.  This is the improvement process I will share.  The most significant desired change was to shift the focus from teacher behaviors to student learning behaviors through “Learning Walks” and “Bright Spots.”  What causes a student to learn? What does true student learning look like and sound like?   And also begin looking at the bright spots. Focus on what is happening to breed success rather than trying to analyze failures.

In the beginning at the administrative level, we worked diligently at meshing our AFL expectations and the 7 student behaviors.  We were successful in doing this, however, came up with entirely too many expectations for a simple learning walk. We then began finding commonalities in the expectations and narrowed this down to seven.

The “7 student learning behaviors” are:

• Students can articulate the learning objective and find meaning in their learning.
• Students assess their progress toward achieving the current learning target.
• Students utilize classroom processes created for intervention and/or challenge.
• Students understand and use a variety of learning strategies and tools to help them learn.
• Students are interacting and engaged in their learning.
• Students set learning goals and track their progress on an on-going basis.

These expectations were written and we completed action research in the classrooms by having teachers look at the behaviors of their current students and maintain a log of student behaviors.   Students were asked questions such as: Can you tell me your learning target for the day?  Why is that important?  What do you do if you are struggling? What learning tools are available to you? What keeps you engaged and enjoying what you are doing today?  We found that it is vital for teachers and administrators to listen to the replies of the students to understand how they learn best. It is also vital that we involve students in this process. 

When introducing this new expectation to the teachers, it had to be done in a creative and non-threatening manner.  We needed allow for teacher feedback and ideas in order to have continuous improvement in our Learning Walk process. I worked with the campus leadership team and then allowed them to be creative in presenting this to their teams – allow them to differentiate to meet the needs of individual grade levels and departments. To evaluate and improve the process of introducing the 7 behaviors, I had the leadership team complete a plus/delta on how I presented to them.  I then had them work in small groups to improve on my process and develop a plan for presenting to their teams. This quickly gave them ownership in the success of the program.  The Team Leaders presented the 7 behaviors to their teams during the first week of inservice.

It was also important for the teachers to understand how this aligned to our district guiding documents and to find purpose and focus for our desired change.  To evaluate how the 7 behaviors aligned with the District Guiding Documents, I had the leadership team complete a Lotus diagram that indicated how these 7 student behaviors correlated with our district focus.  (Graduate Profile, Leander Learning Model, The Leander Way, Seven Year From Now, 9 AFL Expectations, 10 Ethical Principals, Gap Critical process, and student ownership)

 At the end of the first week of inservice, I had all teachers participate in a “Learning Café” to determine their understanding of the 7 behaviors.  This provided excellent feedback and direction as I continue the process of implementing learning walks focused on the 7 student learning behaviors.

It is vital to remember that change or improvement is a process and not instantaneous.  And also we must remember that people don’t necessarily resist change, they resist being changed.  By that I mean, we should strive to change systems and processes, but not individuals. In addition, when aiming for change, it is important to involve as many stakeholders as possible.