Technology Reflections

Technology Learning Style I think that I learn technology best by being a “hands-on” type of learner. If someone can show me how to do something and talk me through the steps, I can learn it and do it myself. I have always been the type of learner that if you tell and or show me how to do something, I can grasp the concept and do it myself. I also like take notes and have them as a reference point for the future. The ideal professional development format to meet my needs would be one in which I had to listen to what was being taught and I could be able to take notes. After the professional development, I would want the opportunity to practice what I have been taught. I think I am very capable of listening to get understanding and then doing. BASIC COMPUTER OPERATIONS  My technology development goals are to become more efficient in some of the areas that I answered no i.e.. Such as troubleshooting local printer problems and installing stand alone software. I believe if as a school leader I become more efficient in the areas in which I have weaknesses, it would make the school as a whole more efficient. Improving my skills and knowledge in all areas would enable me not to have to stop and call for help each time a problem arises. If I were able to fix problems that are occurring with my own personal computer, it would free up more time for other individuals to handle jobs throughout the school. At this point and time, I would not fill comfortable serving as a coach or mentor to other staff members in this area. I feel as if there is still more that I need to learn before I took on the tasks of helping others. I would fill comfortable in some of the basic areas described above. INTERNET USE  Based on your responses to the quest  in this section, what are your technology professional development goals?  How would improving your skills and knowledge in this area help you do your job more efficiently?   Do you feel that you could serve as a mentor or coach to other staff members in this area?   My technology professional development goals are to become more proficient in areas where I am weak. I from answering the questions above I see my greatest area of weakness is in my web publishing skills. I think the best opportunity that I would have to make this weakness a strength is to enroll in workshops that would help me to fill my gaps in this area. Improving my skills and knowledge in this area would help me to design better materials that I would be able to use to communicate with  staff. I think that anything a leader can do to better communicate material to his staff would be beneficial to him as a school leader. Making your weakness a strength would also model life long learning to all stakeholders. I do not feel at the present time that I could serve as a coach or mentor in all areas. I do that I have strengths that I could pass on to others in the areas of email and internet use. Through workshops, I do believe that in the future I could serve as a coach and or mentor.  OFFICE PRODUCTIVITY TOOLS  Based on your responses to the questions in this section, what are your technology professional development goals?  How would improving your skills and knowledge in this area help you do your job more efficiently?   Do you feel that you could serve as a mentor or coach to other staff members in this area?  My technology professional development goals are to become more familiar with presentation software. As a leader in the school system, I think having an understanding of how to present data to stakeholders is very important. I would also like to become more efficient and proficient in data base usage. Improving my skills in this area would afford me a better opportunity to present information to stakeholders in the entity. Learning how to become more efficient in data base usage would allow me a better opportunity of keeping track of important information. Anything a leader can do to become better in an area can only be helpful. Once again, I think that I have too many weaknesses in these areas at this time to be a coach or a mentor. Through professional development, I do think that in the future I could serve as a mentor. My desire is to be the best I can be at all areas to help my school to be successful. WEB 2.0 TOOLS  Based on your responses to the questions in this section, what are your technology professional development goals?  How would improving your skills and knowledge in this area help you do your job more efficiently?   Do you feel that you could serve as a mentor or coach to other staff members in this area? My professional development goals are to learn more about the areas that I am weak in. I would like to learn about Podcasts, online polling tools for timely feedback on student progress, link sharing, and really simple syndication feed reader. Since starting the course work, I have been able to use blogs and wikis. I find both of these to be interesting and a valuable tool for not only myself, but students as well. Improving my skills in some of the areas mentioned above would afford me a better opportunity to keep track of student progress better. I would also be able to communicate better when I am away from my office by using Podcast. I think the more you are able to use technology, the better administrator you will be. I could serve as a mentor or coach in the use of blogs, wikis, social networking sites, wordle, and google docs. The other components in this area I do not feel comfortable using and therefore I would not make a good coach or mentor. This is an area that I believe maybe one of my strengths.

Action Research Plan

How does increasing parental involvement affect discipline at school?

Needs Assessment

If the parents become more involved then it is believed that the discipline issues at school will discipline.

Objectives and Vision of the action research project

Student surveys, parental surveys, individual student reviews, and computer-generated data will be used to obtain information.  Student and parent surveys will contain questions the researcher would like to see answered.  Student interviews will cover topics that deal with barriers that they foresee when trying to get their parents involved in discipline issues at school.  Computer generated data will include discipline referrals, in and out of school suspensions and assignments to alternative school placement. Parents face many barriers when it comes to parental involvement during school hours.  Many parents work during the day and may not be available to talk or come to the campus during the school day. Many students come from single parent homes where the parent is seen as a friend instead of an authority figure.

Review of the Literature and Action Research Strategy

Using Self Reflection:  Is this action research beneficial for my campus and do I have the resources to provide adequate solutions to problems?  Will this action research be able to find the resources to sustain the solutions for years to come?  Some of the problems that I will encounter will consist of the surveys and parents being available during the school day. I do not know the parents and how they feel about discipline.  I also know that there will be other obstacles to face when it comes to discipline. 

Articulate the Vision

This research project will find out if parental involvement will help the discipline issue of students with chronic discipline issues to improve. Collaboration with the assistant principle of discipline and my site-based supervisor has helped with the approach to this project.  Evaluation methods to monitor this project include student referrals, in and out of school suspensions, and assignments to alternative discipline campuses.

Manage the organization

This project will include a written plan that will be discussed between me and my site-based supervisor.  Once details of the research project are concluded, a summative report will be drawn up based on the findings.

Manage Operations

If parental involvement does significantly impact student discipline, I hope to recommend a plan to develop a parent/student involvement program.  This program will encourage parents to get involved with their child’s discipline during school and help them understand how discipline issues affect all areas of the school entity.

Respond to Community Interest and Needs

Students and parents both face many barriers when it comes to parental involvement in discipline areas during school. Many parents work during the day and may not be able to come and help with discipline of their child during the school day. Some students live in home environments where discipline may not be important because they are being raised by a single parent, which is usually a mother. Some students see their parents as friends and not as a person in charge of discipline. Many of these barriers play a significant part in parental involvement when it comes to discipline. I plan to develop a parental involvement program in hopes to encourage parents to participate in their child’s discipline.  Data from the action research will follow a students’ progress throughout the entire study when it comes to discipline issues. 

One of the biggest problems I am having with my Action Research project is reaching parents during school hours. Most of the parents work during school hours and the only time to contact them and talk is late into the evening hours. Another problem is that some students contact information is out dated making contact almost impossible. As a whole I must say that this research is proving to be worthwhile. The fights and major discipline issues on campus are down due to the fact that we are getting the parents more involved. As I continue this research and compare it to data from previous years, I think it will prove to be very beneficial. One thing that I have changed due to our campus make-up is, I want to look at this discipline issue focusing on minorities. Minorities make up over 92% of our campus and the major discipline issues are caused by this group. Getting minority parents more involved in the discipline issues is what I am focusing on. As I continue this research, I want to get as many parents and guardians involved as possible because I think this individuals will not only help with discipline issues, but academics as well. If we can keep these students out of trouble and in the classroom, I know this will have an impact on academics. I look forward to continuing this action research project.

I would like to share the progress on my action research thus far. My action research project is off to a good start. I want to know how increasing parental involvement will affect discipline. The first step in my action research project was to identify twenty students to use as a control unit who create discipline problems on campus. I started with ten seventh graders and ten eight graders. These students were on campus last year and had several referrals.  I created a club, The Rebound Club, to give these students a second shot to correct their behavior. I had these students to answers questions about their past discipline problems and what they were going to do in an attempt to correct these problems. There were a lot of answers to the way the kids said that they would correct their behaviors. The next and the main purpose of this research, increasing parental involvement, were to get the surveys out to the parents. This is the part of the research was difficult. There were many barriers. One is not having the correct information on file to send the information. During meet the teacher night, I had the opportunity to talk with some of the parents and explain to them the importance of being involved in their child’s education. One thing that I have noticed while doing my research is that parents really want to know when their child is misbehaving at school. This research is one that I think will not only help this school, but many schools across the district and maybe the state. I look forward to continuing this research and to find out the effect of parental involvement and how it affects discipline.

This first week of school was great. I am now in an administrative position, Director of Student Services, and I think I will be able to help more students in this capacity. At times during the week, I wanted to be in the classroom teaching. I did not know that I would miss it that much. I think we have a wonderful team at school and I look forward to making this school year a great one. I have started collecting data for my action research project. Parental involvement is something that is important for all schools. Great Week!!!!!!!!!!!!

ACTION PLANNING TEMPLATE
GOAL:	To examine the results of increasing parental involvement in discipline issues at school
Action Step(s)	Person(s) Responsible	Timeline: Start/End	Needed Resources	Evaluation
1. Identify twenty students as a control unit who create discipline problems on campus and have them answer survey questions on discipline issues.	Troy D Tatum and the students	In September, 2012, these students will be identified and answer the survey questions.	Pencil/pen, paper and copier.	Analyze the findings and develop a plan to involve parents in discipline issues within the classroom.
2. Give parents a survey to find out their responses on being involved in discipline issues on campus.	Troy D Tatum and the parents	In September, 2012, these surveys will be passed out during a PTA meeting. The student’s surveys will be completed and turned in within a week.	Pencil/pen, paper and copier	From this survey, changes will be implemented in order to get more involvement from parents.
3. The twenty students will be interviewed on a one-on-one basis to see what is causing their behavioral issues in class	Troy D Tatum	November, 2012	Paper and pencil/pen	With the parents now involved and having determined what are causing the behavioral issues; changes will be made in an attempt to change these behavioral problems
4. Analyze the data that has been collected.	Troy D Tatum, Assistant principal and site supervisor	January, 2013	Computer access to any discipline issues that have occurred.	Computer access to any discipline issues that have occurred.
5 Write a self-reflection on the effect of increasing parental involvement in discipline issues at school	Troy D Tatum	The completion of the action research project	Microsoft word and data collected	Self- Reflection and Evaluation on actions that need to take place after research is done.

Lessons learned from Week 2

One of the lessons that I learned from week 2 was offered by Dr. Kirk Lewis when he said that research should be practical. The reasons he gave why it should be practical also "hit home". I truly believe that when doing action research you should be interested in doing it, be focused on the outcome, and it should be beneficial to the students. I think that the research we are doing should be done to improve the education of our students. 


Talking with my site supervisor and getting his input on my action research project was very interesting. The research project is one that I have great interest in. I think parents should be more involved in the education of their children. Great lesson this week!!!!