The Action Research Laboratory (ARL) is a model of professional development at Highland Park High School that provides teachers the means and encouragement to make substantive changes in their classes in order to increase student learning. Teachers, in teams of three, investigate how best to apply current research to their classroom practices. Teachers devise new and inventive ways to structure learning opportunities and to assess student learning and growth. In addition, teachers integrate into their practice the recursive process of action research: working collaboratively to set goals, collecting and analyzing data, taking action, and setting new goals.

The research challenge for this program has been discovering ways to document teacher growth and student achievement. Methods include both qualitative and quantitative approaches: interviews with teachers, students, and parents, anecdotal evidence, personal reflections of participants, surveys of students and faculty, and statistical studies.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PROJECT

Rationale

Action research has been defined " . . . as the voluntary, collegial involvement of teams of teachers at the same site as they pursue joint inquiries into areas of significant personal/professional concern" (Sagor 1997). Either stated or implied in this definition and of action research are the practices, attitudes, and systems that staff developers pinpoint as key components to sustained professional growth: personal meaning, social structures for learning, immediate applicability to work, and necessary resources.

With these key components, collaborative action research can also provide the platform for school reform efforts. At this time, though, few studies have been conducted that verify the effectiveness of collaborative action research as a way to implement school reform. The efficacy of action research as an instrument of organizational change remains at the theoretical level. Much of the literature concludes that, although it contains the ingredients of an effective means to creating school-wide reform, as it has been practiced thus far, collaborative action research remains relatively untapped for this purpose.

This project supports the professional development needs of teachers who are willing and eager to experiment with instructional practices. Through professional development of teachers, student learning is enhanced for the students in the classes of the participating teachers, for students in the entire school, and, through dissemination by publication and presentation, for students throughout the United States. Ultimately, this movement can provide the roots for sustained school reform efforts.

Goals

The design of the Action Research Laboratory (ARL) at Highland Park High School in Highland Park, Illinois, supports teacher efforts to meet the following goals while providing a framework for real, substantive, and sustained school reform. The four goals of the program are:

• to provide teachers sufficient time to be able to reflect on their classroom experiences and to consult with and share with other teaching professionals (collaboration);

• to provide teachers with the ways and means in which to entertain new ideas of instruction, curriculum development, and assessment (experimentation);

• to provide teachers with the support to put into practice what educational research says will best help all students learn (research-base); and

• to provide the ARL teachers, their department members, and the faculty at large a living laboratory that proves that best practices can and will make a "successful" high school better (teacher empowerment/school reform).

Description

The organization of the Action Research Laboratory provides opportunities for the continuous professional growth of teams of high school teachers from a different disciplines through regularly scheduled collaborative sessions with and among teams, consultations with the facilitator, classroom observations of other teachers, conference/workshop/visitation attendance, time to develop and carry out action research, and structures in which to share their progress with others.

Each participating teacher applies an innovative educational practice in at least one regularly assigned, standard level class. Through participation in these activities, teachers have developed their thinking and skills about effective educational practices, have affected the thinking and practices of other teachers, and have been a force for systemic change within the school.

The first ARL team, formed in 1995, began by developing classes that supplemented instruction with projects and experiential learning. That initial action research led them to their current focus on improving assessment practices. The second team, begun in 1996, has investigated how to design classes in which no number or letter grades are assigned; their purpose has been to emphasize learning by de-emphasizing grades. The third and fourth teams, begun in September 1997, have researched ways to test how creating a sense of community in the classroom affects student learning and ways to engage seniors in their final year of high school respectively. Team #5 is researching how developing a sense of belonging enhances student learning, and Team #7 (consisting of district administrators including the superintendent) has been researching ways in which they can encourage states of mind or “flow” in people they work with.

In order to create opportunities for fresh discussion and novel approaches, the teachers on a team must be from different disciplines. This construct promotes insightful questioning while requiring teachers to reconsider and support commonly held beliefs and practices about the structure, organization, and methods of their own disciplines and of the school. Few things can be assumed when only one teacher in each ARL team is a resident content-area "expert." Consequently, team members ask each other fundamental and essential questions; answers delve into the why's and how's of a specific subject area and of education as a system.

Research has demonstrated that students learn more, retain more knowledge, and make their knowledge personal and meaningful when they actively engage in their learning. Teachers are learners, too, and the Action Research Laboratory, using a constructivist approach to professional development, presents classroom teachers an opportunity to grow in their teaching methodology. The resulting professional growth increases the likelihood that these teachers will produce educationally sound and stimulating lessons, cohesive and meaningful curriculum, and enhanced teaching practices, including assessment.

The teacher participants in the Action Research Laboratory have been able to apply what they have learned from this project to all their own classes. Although the teachers test the practice(s) they have devised in a limited number of their classes, the long-range effect is a change in how they approach developing lessons, units, and courses, making student learning the center of all of their planning and activities. The ARL experience provides participants with the means to professionalize their practices. (See page 6 of this site.)

The ARL is a high profile initiative in District 113, and the means to disseminate the progress of this project have already begun. Teachers have reported out to building and district administrators, the entire high school faculty, and the school board. Some of the action research done by teachers in the ARL have been highlighted on a local cable television show, public television in Chicago, the Chicago Tribune, the Christian Science Monitor, and numerous professional publications such as the Journal of Staff Development and an Illinois School Board publication called "Teaching and Learning.

For the five years of its existence, the number of teachers involved in ARL has increased each year. When the participants have conducted their own collaborative action research, they are in a position to facilitate other action research groups. Consequently, the numbers of teachers directly participating in this form of professional development increases dramatically from three teachers the first year, six the second year, twelve the third year, and so on. As a matter of fact, four veteran ARL teachers are now facilitators for other teams of ARL teachers. This model could easily be replicated in other schools and districts, both elementary and high school, in order to provide a successful, meaningful way to structure professional growth in order to promote student learning and initiate school reform efforts.

Because the project is a laboratory, ARL teachers are expected to share a working model of these educational applications so that the entire staff of the high school  can benefit from the action research. The ultimate goal of the Action Research Laboratory lies in a strong belief that this project will improve teaching, foster student learning, and further the development of each department to such an extent that the high school, over time, will be transformed into a learning community. This model of professional development promises to be an effective way to move a school system forward by concentrating on teacher growth.

Because the ARL teachers see the experience as a laboratory experiment, all staff members participate in this research as observers of the project and as participants in an ongoing discussion about how best to educate students. Reaching out to other faculty members across disciplines is the key to creating that critical mass of teachers to effect educational reform at the school level. In addition, the Action Research Laboratory will offer other schools a model for reform that can enrich student learning through the professional development efforts of a committed group of teachers, the unit of change within school systems. These teachers are committed to disseminating what they have experienced to the education community through publication and presentations.

Evaluation

Evaluation of the four goals of the Action Research Laboratory takes place in these specific ways:

1)  As part of the process of action research, each participating teacher is taught to design and use tools to collect and evaluate information that demonstrates the results of the project each has chosen to pursue. This includes student surveys, process journals, course evaluations, and conferences/interviews. To assess the impact of the experimental practices on teacher efficacy, the participating teachers document their experiences. These documents are analyzed using a qualitative approach of reduction and interpretation. The facilitator also looks for significant themes that document the professional development of the teachers.

To assess the teachers' growth, notes or journals from meetings and narrative evaluations and video recordings of experimental practices provide qualitative measurements of cognitive and affective growth. Both written surveys of ARL teachers and directed interviews before and after participation in the ARL have provided other information for analysis and documentation.

2)  The students, as active participants in the ARL experiences, play a significant role in evaluating their own learning. They provide frequent and structured evaluations of activities and their own growth through journal entries, process evaluations, discussions, and interviews during the year and in follow-up studies. The ARL teachers analyze the results of these evaluations, as well as other information such as grades, as a way of informing their teaching and setting directions for continued professional growth.

3)  Parents of students in ARL classes have been asked to evaluate their children's progress through structured phone interviews conducted after the child has completed the class. The ARL teachers' own analysis of the results of this data provides them with yet another measure to inform their teaching practices.

4)  The staff at large has provided an interesting evaluation component as they observe, discuss, (and sometimes participate) in the ARL activities. The development of additional action research groups in the school has been a strong indicator of the desirability of this type of professional experience.

In the end, the Action Research Laboratory has had a positive effect on the professional development of the staff of the school. Indications of the attainment of that goal may be found in a correlation between the work of the ARL teachers and increased opportunities to improve student learning through:

•  collaboration and communication among teachers from different departments;

•  experimentation and risk-taking;

•  an understanding and appreciation of continuous improvement throughout the school system;

•  awareness of and application of research about best teaching practices; and

•  participation in a living laboratory that proves that best practices can and will make a "successful" high school better.

Finally, the teachers participating in the Action Research Laboratory analyze all this information to determine the success of the ARL experience for their own professional growth and to provide direction to the Action Research Laboratory in succeeding years. End of the year reports by ARL teachers have already begun to provide documentation of personal growth, increased reflection, and the professionalization of teaching while impacting the continued development of the ARL.

Work Cited

Sagor, Richard.  (1997).  "Collaborative Action Research for Educational Change." Rethinking Educational Change with Heart and Mind. ASCD Yearbook. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.