I admit that in all facets of my life I am totally uncomfortable with mess! I need clarity and organization. I pride myself in giving explicit directions, and you won't find a crumb on the hardwood floors in my house. With that said, after reading Tina Cook's article, I gained a better understanding of what action research really looks like and what I would need to do in order to let my research be authentic and flow. The part in the article where Cook says "the part where we were submerged in data, thoughts, feelings, ideas, and theories that as yet had not crystallized can be perceived as the familiar awaiting the illumination of a punctum point," really resonated with me because I could feel exactly what she was talking about. AR will be an intricate process and I can see myself feeling as the quote describes above: waiting for the answer to show themselves. I am looking forward to collecting data but only in order to find a solution. I need to learn to appreciate the entire process and how that will allow me to grow as a professional.
One part of the article that really struck me was under the sections attempting to define the messy bit and it said that "a lot of it is casting around and then something grabs you." This is how I felt about trying to narrow down and choose a research question. I feel like that was a messy process for me, so hopefully that experience will prepare me to get through the mess of all of the research data points.
One thing that I am worried about is going through my TRJ. I can anticipate that my daily thoughts and observations will be lengthy and difficult to sort out, especially when I am discussing individual students. Like the article talks about, I also tend to have a need for a model, which the journal does not provide since it will be different for each person. Although I do not like mess, I can learn to live with it and will try to appreciate the entire process.
We will talk a little bit about how the difference between raw and cooked data--that should help. Love the comment about how the messiness makes the research authentic! That's exactly right.
ReplyDeleteI am feeling you about not being totally comfortable with mess, but I think it is good for us. In our teaching, we ask kids to do tasks that are challenging all the time and tell them that it is OK to be wrong sometimes. We need some practice doing that ourselves. In AR, it is not that we will get something "wrong", but that we are open to the idea of revising and improving throughout the process.
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