This document provides an overview of action research for students. It defines action research as an orientation towards inquiry that seeks engagement and curiosity through gathering evidence and testing practices. The document outlines five key principles of action research: 1) practical knowledge for everyday use, 2) naturalistic settings, 3) participative research, 4) change as a verb, and 5) critical reflection. It also discusses different types of action research on a spectrum from technical to critical. Students are then prompted to use the principles to evaluate sample abstracts and begin planning their own action research project.

1. Tansy Jessop
PGCLTHE 11 Jan 2016
@tansyjtweets
@solentlearning
Action Research:
is it the feather on the
sleeve of your jacket?
Tansy Jessop
PGCLTHE
11 January 2017

2. Today’s session
• What you know about it
• Key principles of action research
• Testing, testing – my three examples
• Can you spot it? Looking at abstracts
• Planning your project

3. Your knowledge of Action Research
• Chat to the person next to you and tell them what
you think it is
• Post three words that spring to mind when you
hear ‘action research’ on www.menti.com using the
code 97 11 53

4. So, what is action research? And is it a
thing?
• Kurt Lewin
• Frankfurt School
• Sensitivity training
• Organisational change
• Social psychology
• Father of action research
• ‘. . . one cannot understand an
organization without trying to
change it . . .’
(Lewin, 1946).

5. Four categories of understanding
Action research is not so much a methodology
as an orientation towards inquiry that seeks to
create a quality of engagement, of curiosity, of
question-posing through gathering evidence
and testing practices
(Reason and Bradbury, 2005)
It’s not a methodology

6. Four categories of understanding
• First purpose is to bring an action dimension
back to the overly quietist tradition of
knowledge generation which has developed in
the modern era;
• Second to expand the hold over knowledge by
universities and other institutions of ‘higher
learning’
• ..from a ‘language turn’ to an ‘action turn’
(Reason and Bradbury, 2006)
It’s not pure research

7. It’s not positivist
Positivist
• Reality out there and
external
• Experimental method
• Hypothesis testing
• Statistics and numbers
• Neutrality
• Universal truths
• ‘Tough-minded’
‘Post-positivist’/interpretivist
• Complex social realities,
dynamic human interactions
• Social and qualitative methods
• Generate hypotheses
• Words
• Interpretive
• Relative and multiple truths
• ‘Tender-minded’

8. It’s on a spectrum
Technical
• What works
• Functional
• Practical
• Problem-
solving
• Short-term
Practical
• Improves
practice
• Shapes practice
• Develops
understanding
• Self-reflection
Critical
• Critique of
settings
• Cultural, social,
historical remit
• Connect
personal and
political

9. Five key principles
1. Practical knowledge for everyday use.
2. Naturalistic settings in all their complexity
3. Participative research with subjects (Vs on them)
4. Change & action: a verb rather than noun
5. Critical reflection throughout the cycle of change

10. The aims of action research are to generate fresh
understandings and new practices: these are
provisional and invite review through a spirit of
continual reflection
(Cousin, 2009, p.155).

11. Is this action research?
• Use the five key principles to test whether the
abstracts you have fulfil the criteria for action
research.
• If so, what kind of action research is it –
technical, relational, critical?

12. Planning your AR project
• Read the trigger questions.
• Chat to a partner about what interests you.
• Search journals for three readings on the
topic.
• Start to develop a research question.
• What AR change could begin to answer your
question?
• Play around with methodology ideas.

13. A few methods to think about…

14. References
Burnes, B. 2004 Kurt Lewin and complexity theories: back
to the future? Journal of Change Management 4:4, 309-
325, DOI: 10.1080/146970104200030381
Cousin, G. (2009) Researching Learning in Higher
Education. Abingdon. Routledge.
Lincoln, Y. and Guba, E. (1985) Naturalistic Inquiry.
Newbury Park, California. Sage.
Reason, P. and Bradbury, H. Eds. (2006) Handbook of
Action Research. London. Sage.