The wonderings of School Leaders----Week 2

School leaders have many responsibilities that they have to deal with daily. In the book The Passions That Drive Your Journey the author Nancy Dana describes nine areas that school leaders wonder. Staff development, curriculum development, individual teacher(s), individual student(s), school culture/community, leadership, management, school performance, and social justice or equity issues are the nine areas. (Dana, 2009, pg. 30)

What I want to speak on is staff development. Staff development is an important aspect in education. Teachers want to feel important, respected, and valued. Whenever there is a concern teachers want to feel that they can go to their administrator and receive the support that they are in need of. With staff development the leaders on the campus can provide the needed support or guidance. If the teachers are constantly growing the thought is then they will trickle down their knowledge to the students. The key word is development which is defined as growth. Teachers and administration don't need to be stagnant but needs to continuously grow not in size per se but in knowledge.

Dana, N. (2009). Leading with passion and knowledge. (p. 30). California: Thousand Oaks.

25 years from now...Educational Leaders and Blogs

Hhhhmmm 25 years from now seems so far away. Technology will be much more advanced in 25 years so I'm sure everyone will be more adapt to using technology.

How do I believe Educational Leaders will use blogs in 25 years?
As an educator/educational leader we have to change with the times of our students. We are now in the technology era and majority of everything is done with technology. My belief is that Educational Leaders will do their action research and then blog their findings and actions they will take following their findings. Instead of writing down their results of their inquiries they will blog about them. Not only can educational leaders blog about their results of findings but they can blog about questions or issues that may arise during the year.

Blogging is a new inventive way to stay in contact with others so that one may be able to voice their opinions on certain events. In the future I do believe blogging will grow. Technology continues to grow and I believe computer programmers will continue to make technology easier to use. Once individuals witness the pros of what blogging can bring it will only be a matter of time before everyone is blogging.

Action research and how I will use it!!!!

Research...Research?  NO!!!  To be honest when I hear the word research I start to hyperventilate.  During my time of reading the text my heart rate started to mellow out and I became calmer. 

Action research is the process of forming an inquiry then engaging in a study of his/her own practices and taking action for change based on what he/she learned from the inquiry.  This is an awesome way to gauge the status of effectiveness of a given practice.  Instead of solely basing an opinion on an outsiders research you can use action research to form your own opinions.


What I have learned from the text about action research is that it is actually freedom research.  There may be a specific area in the school that needs to be analyzed on its effectiveness in the school and action research can be used as a gauge.  I deal mainly with special education and my action research will be geared toward special education and the inclusion setting.  As an educator it is my responsibility to find different teaching methods that will be the most effective.  For my action research I will try different teaching methods and from the responses will gear my teaching method accordingly.  Administrators should use action research to determine what methods work best in their particular school rather than depending on what someone wrote in a book, journal, article, blog, etc.

Action research may be my new best friend!!!!