The Backbone of Action Research, Essay Example

Data sources are the backbone of action research, since the expectations and outcomes of this research depend on the data that the researcher is able to collect from his or her observed students. Since I was aiming at understanding the pace at which students will learn from individual and group work in the process of my action research, I benefitted much from both the regular learning comprehension assessments, and from the students’ subjective accounts of their learning process that gave me an opportunity to understand what experiences they have obtained from both individual and group work on the literature task I chose for the research. By means of using both qualitative accounts of students and parents, and by means of a formal qualitative assessment of their knowledge in the academic, education-based way, I have managed to create the conditions for effective triangulation of data, and to assess the learning progress much more adequately and precisely than in case only one way of data collection would be chosen.

Additional precision of action research outcomes was guaranteed by the fact that I included my own observations as a teacher into the research progress, so I have provided all perspectives on the research progress and outcomes from the viewpoint of all stakeholders. Overall, during my research, I realized that there are a large number of data sources that have to be efficiently utilized for the researcher to make the most of the research process. Hence, after using a number of sources and approaching them from varying scholarly viewpoints (though all of them are qualitative), I have obtained a number of perspectives in which the action research can be assessed more objectively and without bias.