Welcome!. Concordia University Irvine Welcomes You!

Welcome!

Concordia University Irvine Welcomes You!

History of Concordia University Irvine

• Established in 1976; Current enrollment = 4,300 students• Member of the Concordia University System of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS)—10 universities and 2 seminaries located throughout the United States• Has offered distance learning programs since 2001• Fully accredited by WASC• Since 2007, 11 Substantive Change programs approved by WASC, including Ed.D. program

Teaching is a calling…

Answer that call at Concordia University Irvine

CUI’s Teacher Credential Programs

Multiple Subject (K - 6th) Self-contained classroom

Single Subject (6th – 12th)Art, Biology, Chemistry, English, Geosciences, Math, Physics, Social Science, Spanish, Music, Physical Education

CA Teacher Credential Program

Education Specialist: Mild to Moderate Serving K- 22 years of age

Education Specialist:Mild to Moderate Program

Early Childhood Special Education, Added Authorization: Ages 0-5

Three 3-unit courses added to your already completed

Preliminary Ed Specialist Credential

• Edu 547 Brain-based Instruction• Edu 580 Educational Research• Two Elective Courses

• Capstone Experience (1 of the following)Independent Research or Action Research Project

16 additional units

M.Ed Master of Education All Preliminary Credential Courses PLUS

A total 46 units for both Credential and Masters. Degree must be completed within 5 years.

Doctoral Program Features

Accommodative learning environmentHigh contact with facultySmall cohort size and strategic groupings Distinct advantages of cohort membership Focused 3-year path to graduationExpect and assure scholarly researchStreamlined dissertation track

Doctoral Program Features

Individual Learning Plans (ILPs)Rigorous and integrated curriculum (Systems Thinking)Inspire ethical leadershipEducational trips (Washington, DC; People’s Republic of

China)Competitively pricedHigh Quality Faculty

D R . S T E P H A N I E H A R T Z E L LC O N C O R D I A U N I V E RS I T Y I R V I N E

Action Research in the Classroom

What is Action Research?

Research designed for the betterment of a closed community (such as a classroom or school).

Focus is on multiple stakeholders.Designed to be useful and accessible to practitioners.Designed for meaningful results within a specific

situation.

What Action Research is not….

“Lab coat” Experimental ResearchPure Qualitative researchIs not intended to be applicable to alternate situations

(although it may be).Is not generally ready to be published in peer-reviewed

journals.

How can Action Research Benefit Schools?

Empower teachers and administrators to evaluate new (or existing) methods.

Provides data for PLCs.Adds to a culture of consistent improvement.

STUDENTS CAN LEARN MORE!

How do you do Action Research?

Think about a problem area that you are having in your classroom/school.

Do you have an idea of a technique or procedure that might help?

Read about the problem & potential solutions. Get implementation and measurement ideas from the reading.

Plan your implementation & get permission from your principal. (As you will not be publishing this information, you will probably not need to go through your district, but your principal should know if you have to.)

How do you do action research? (2)

Data gathering Surveys Compare test scores Compare classwork/homework results Talk to students Talk to parents Talk to other teachers Observe (and note) classroom behavior

Quantitative methods

Perception SurveysTest scores Counts of behavior infractionsTime to complete tasksMEASUREABLE CONSTRUCTS

We tend to use averages to compare:

Qualitative Methods

Open ended questionnairesInterviewsObservationsFocus groups

Triangulation

After you have gathered your data, you are going to triangulate it before you come to your conclusions.

You want agreement with multiple data gathering methods as a way to increase your confidence that your intervention did or did not work.

If your results do not match, try to find out why they don’t.

Conclusions…..Somewhat

Conclusions – What worked and what didn’t?Will you continue your intervention?What changes should/could be made to make it

potentially better?How are you going to measure if it made it better?Start gathering data again to see if the alterations helped.

Spiral nature of Action Research

Questions?

Door Prizes

Thank you for coming!