The display of action research results and the writing of related research reports have always faced two dangers: first, being satisfied with "short stories" leads to the research reports being too "random" and losing the norms of "research"; Second, in order to pursue the "norm" of research, the charm of action research has been lost. Excellent action research reports often weigh between "norms" and "stories". It not only shows the normative process of action research, but also shows the personality and characteristics of action research itself.
First of all, from the "standard format"
As far as primary and secondary school teachers are concerned, some teachers prefer to do research rather than write research reports, mainly because they have not mastered the basic norms and routines for writing research reports, so that they feel embarrassed and shrink back. For these teachers, they need special training on how to write educational action research reports. It is not difficult to master the writing skills of educational action research reports. For some teachers, it may take only a little time to master the writing skills of educational action research reports.
It is best for teachers to strictly practice the classic format of action research report first, and then gradually play freely after mastering the classic format of action research report. Otherwise, teachers may lose confidence in action research because they don't know how to write action research reports, or they may discredit action research because they don't know how to write action research reports.
Although there are many styles and ways of action research report, the classic action research report mainly includes three parts. The first is "problems and assumptions"; The second is "process and method"; The third is "results and discussion". These three elements are actually the basic forms of educational experimental research reports. The classic action research report is close to the experimental research report because action research is a kind of "quasi-experimental research" originally.
That is to say, when action researchers don't know how to write an action research report, it's best to read and refer to the standard format of the Report on Educational Experimental Research, and then gradually master the basic requirements for writing educational action research by imitating the standard format of the Report on Educational Experimental Research.
Second, the general form of action research report
Although the prototype of action research report is experimental research report, the general form of action research report also includes three parts: questions and assumptions, process and methods, results and discussion, but the general form of action research report still shows unique style in some details.
(a) research questions and assumptions
The part of "Questions and Assumptions" mainly includes three elements: raising questions, briefly summarizing literature and researching hypotheses. (1) problem. For example, researchers encounter a problem: students don't like learning English and their English scores are low. (2) A brief literature review. How to solve this problem in the existing research, to what extent, and what problems need further study. (3) Research hypothesis. Researchers learn from other people's research ideas and form their own research plans or research hypotheses. For example, the traditional "listening and speaking first" English teaching is changed to "listening first" English teaching, assuming that "listening first" is conducive to improving students' academic performance and interest in learning. Therefore, the theme of action research is "Action research on the influence of listening leadership on students' English achievement and interest in English learning".
(B) the process and methods of research
The process and method of action research include three elements: process, method and research tools. (1) Report the time, place, people (subjects) and other research "processes" of this study. In which grade and class was the action research conducted? How many boys and girls are there in the class? How long did this research last? The reason why it is necessary to report the "research process" such as time, place and people (subjects) in detail is because researchers need to convince the public that the research is a real research conducted in a real place, not a fictional or forged research. (2) Explain the specific "methods" of the reform, and report in detail what specific reform measures or methods the researchers have taken. For example, when conducting the research on "Action Research on the Influence of Listening Priority Foreign Language Teaching on Students' Foreign Language Learning Achievements and Interest", researchers need to explain in detail what specific innovative measures this "Listening Priority" foreign language teaching method has and what are the different elements compared with traditional foreign language teaching. In addition, the research needs to report what "branches" and "cycles" have appeared in the specific research process. These branches and cycles make the process of action research present several rounds of research. (3) Explain the tools for collecting or interpreting data. Researchers generally use the "test paper" tool to measure the changes of students' academic performance before and after learning. In addition to "examination papers", researchers may also use "interviews" or "questionnaires" to detect the differences in students' learning interests before and after learning.
(3) Research results and discussion.
The results and discussion of the research include three elements: the change of academic performance, the change of learning interest and unexpected results, as well as the discussion of related results. (1) Changes in academic performance. By comparing the test scores before (pre-test) and after (post-test), we can see the changes of students' academic performance. In order to increase the persuasiveness of the explanation, researchers can use pre-test and post-test data for multi-angle analysis. For example, the comparative analysis of "average score" between pre-test and post-test; Compare and analyze the "average score" shown by the three measurements of pre-test, mid-test and post-test; Comparative analysis of "passing rate" between pre-test and post-test; Comparative analysis of "excellent rate" between pre-test and post-test; Compare and analyze the changes of performance of boys and girls before and after the exam, and so on. (2) Changes in learning interest. The change of students' interest in learning can be shown through interviews or some special questionnaires. Action research can certainly explore the "causal relationship" between things through measurement, but people's emotions (such as interest in learning) (students, parents, teachers, managers, etc.). ) in the field of education, it is often difficult to measure. Therefore, students can be encouraged to write down their experiences and feelings about educational action research (educational reform) in "diary" or "weekly diary". Then, select representative students' feelings to be included in the research results and discussion scope. (3) Whether there are unexpected results, and discuss the unexpected results.
Third, the action research report towards narration.
The so-called "narrative research" means that the researcher himself ("I") "narrates" a series of educational events that occurred in the course of his own research, including how the problems studied were put forward; How did "I" try to explain the problem after this question was raised? After designing the solution to the problem, what obstacles did I encounter in the process of solving the problem? Is the problem really solved? If the problem was not solved or solved well, what new strategies did I adopt later, or what new problems did I encounter?
When I describe a series of educational events in the process of research, I am already thinking or reflecting in the process of narration, which also transforms my experience teaching into a kind of reflective teaching.
Especially when the researcher integrates the interview content of students or the experience of students' diaries into the action research report, the action research report shows the style of "narrative action research". This kind of research report transforms the previous "argumentative" and "explanatory" research report into narrative text of narrative, prose, notes, biography and vernacular. Closer to readers or listeners, it is easy to "let people with similar experiences achieve promotion through identification".
That is to say, although the action research report can adopt quantitative methods, it can collect necessary data and make necessary statistical analysis. Generally speaking, however, it is best to make a simple statistical analysis with a simple "percentage", and then use a large number of "educational events" and "educational stories" to describe the changes before and after the action research.