Action Research as Reflection
Action research in one page
- A formal extension of reflective practice
- The teacher systematically changes their teaching using on-the-ground evidence
- The target is the teacher’s own practice, not a generic theory
Carr and Kemmis: defining features
- Carried out by practitioners into their own practices
- Participatory and democratic
- Aimed at the improvement of practice (praxis), not at proving or disproving theory
- Runs as a self-reflecting spiral: plan, act, observe, reflect
Bryant: questions to ask before starting
- Setting (where the activity is happening)
- Play (rules of the situation, both enabling and constraining)
A teacher who suspects that group work helps her quieter students has two options. She can leave the suspicion at the level of opinion and keep teaching as usual. Or she can run a small experiment: change the group structure for three weeks, watch carefully, write down what happens, and decide based on the evidence. The second option is action research in its simplest form.
What action research is
Action research is reflective practice given a structure and a method. It involves systematically changing your teaching using on-the-ground evidence that suggests the changes are heading in the right direction and improving student learning.
The target of action research is the teacher, not the change being implemented. The point is not to prove that some method works in general; the point is to find out whether it works for this teacher with these students in this setting. The result may not transfer cleanly to another classroom. That is acceptable.
This narrow focus is what separates action research from traditional educational research. Traditional research aims at general claims. Action research aims at local improvement.
Carr and Kemmis: action research as critical social science
Carr and Kemmis treated action research as a form of research carried out by practitioners into their own practices. Their framing has four parts.
Practitioner-led
The research is run by the people whose practice is being studied. A teacher researches her own teaching. The school principal researches their own school management. There is no outside expert delivering conclusions.
Participatory and democratic
Students, colleagues, and parents are not subjects. They are part of the conversation. This makes action research uncomfortable for teachers used to top-down planning, and useful for teachers ready to share authority.
Committed to praxis, not theory
Carr and Kemmis used the word praxis to mean committed action. Action research expresses a commitment to the improvement of practice. It does not aim to argue for or against a particular theory. The question is whether teaching gets better, not whether a textbook idea is correct.
A self-reflecting spiral
Action research runs as a cycle: plan, act, observe, reflect, plan again. Each cycle feeds the next. The shape is the same as the reflective cycles described elsewhere in this guide, with one difference: action research is more deliberate about collecting and reviewing evidence at each stage.
| Stage | What happens |
|---|---|
| Plan | Identify the issue, design a change, decide what evidence to collect |
| Act | Run the change in the classroom |
| Observe | Collect evidence: notes, student work, recordings, feedback |
| Reflect | Examine the evidence, decide what worked, plan the next cycle |
Action research is practical inquiry
Action research is best treated as practical inquiry rather than as scientific research. The standards are different. A teacher running an action research project does not need a control group, a large sample, or a statistical test. The teacher needs evidence that is good enough to support a decision about what to do next week.
This lower bar is sometimes mistaken for laziness. It is not. The point is fitness for purpose. The teacher is not publishing a paper; the teacher is running a small, careful experiment on their own work.
Bryant on questions to ask before starting
Bryant suggested that there are themes and aspects of practice worth questioning before reaching for any theory. Two stand out.
Setting
Where are the activities taking place? The same lesson runs differently in a quiet morning classroom and a noisy afternoon one. The setting shapes what is possible. Action research that ignores setting tends to produce changes that work once and then never again.
Play
Bryant treated practice as a kind of game with rules. Rules can enable (a clear lesson structure helps students know what to expect) and constrain (the same structure can make it hard to respond to a moment that calls for a different approach). Naming the rules of the situation, both the helpful and the limiting ones, is part of the early work.
A teacher who skips these questions and goes straight to “I will try this technique” often discovers later that the setting and rules made the technique impossible from the start.
Plan, act, observe, reflect, plan again
Each cycle uses the evidence from the previous one. The plan stage names the issue and the change. The act stage runs the change. The observe stage collects evidence. The reflect stage interprets it and decides on the next move. The cycle is the engine of the method.
A short example
A teacher notices that the same handful of students dominate class discussion. She designs a small action research cycle.
- Plan. For three weeks, she will use a “think, pair, share” structure before any open question. She will keep a tally of how many different students contribute.
- Act. She runs the structure in every lesson.
- Observe. She tracks the tally and notes which students start speaking who did not before.
- Reflect. At the end of three weeks, she compares the tally to the baseline week. She notes which students changed and which did not. She designs the next cycle.
The result may not be publishable. It is, however, exactly the kind of evidence the teacher needs to keep improving the lesson.