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Preparing for an Action Research Plan

Action research has a very practical approach to discovering new and better ways to approach instruction in the classroom. To me, this becomes more of an active approach to trying out ideas at the classroom level with real time feedback and ability to make adjustments as we go. Teachers make adjustments on lessons from the beginning class to the last one of the day.  During this class, I believe I will spend the bulk of my time on the first stage of planning and hopefully begin the acting stage. It will take some time to complete the first three steps so I can narrow the focus of my topic down to precisely what I hope to improve in my classroom, gather all of the information needed, and review the literature to make the best plan to put in place in my classroom. I believe the more information I gather from my own data, other sources, and literature, my topic will become more refined and specific to best meet the needs in my classroom. I am always looking for different ways to improve student learning, so I think the most difficult step will be trying to focus on just one part I can improve that will have the greatest impact with my students. 
A beneficial part of the action research plan is that it is an ever-changing plan. Since the data should be monitored and evaluated constantly for improvements, my topic can be tweaked and twisted as we go along until it works best with each student or to accommodate a different outcome in the classroom. I’m not sure what I want to focus on just yet, but I know that I want to find a different strategy to help my students not only become stronger writers, but build confidence. Through my professional reflections, I can analyze the data and adapt the plan to best work with my teaching style and goals while figuring out what works the best with my students. The reflections will help me build upon the good to further success or identify a root cause so I can discard what just didn’t work. Reflections will also help me make the subtle changes that will benefit the different students I have in my classroom. 

 I’m not sure if I want to approach it from a classroom environment angle (like allowing students to listen to music while writing essays) or choosing specific academic strategy to try (like having students focus on using a thesaurus instead of a dictionary to improve word choice and spelling). I believe both of these can be measured with quantitative and qualitative data, but I’m afraid still limited on both kinds. I’m also concerned that neither of these topics will provide me with as strong of an impact in my classroom as I would hope. The more I think about what I want to improve upon in my classroom through this process, the more angles I think about, and the more daunting this task becomes. 
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