Methodology
I used an action research methodology primarily to bring about improvement in a problematic situation. My study did not prove or disprove a theory but rather related theory to practice and using the techniques of systematic enquiry to gathered data to inform planned actions. The theory referred to here was derived from my topic literature.
A clear methodology was something I was keen to strive for in my action research. I made a point of this in a posting to the goal sharing site 43Things:
Although I had used much action research vocabulary (cycles, plan do review, grounded approach etc) in my account of the research my learning facilitator pointed to a lack of any clear methodology apart from a mention of first person research. Therefore I added
"I used the model of action research proposed by Kemmis and McTaggart (as cited in Dick 2002)(1)
'plan --> act and observe --> reflect' "
( from my Module 3)
to the finished module and repeated some of the wording from my methodology justification (see above). The initial omission had been partly driven by word count and again by published module guidance.
I carefully stated how each cycle fitted into this model and showed how learning from one had fed into planning for the next in accordance with Kemmis and McTaggart (as cited in Dick 2002)(1).
Forward to:
m2control
m3questions
m4rigour
m5lit
back to index
(1) Kemmis and McTaggart cited in Dick, B. (2002) Rigour in action research. Session 6 of Areol - action research and evaluation on line. Available, last accessed 2/4/06
URL http://www.scu.edu.au/schools/gcm/ar/areol/areol-session06.html