The Use of Blogs - What Educational Leaders Must Know!

COMMUNICATION! Our species has survived, conflicted, connected, sympathized, and much more because of communication. ****NEWS FLASH**** Communication has evolved.

Sorry Methusulah, we're not using sticks in the sand or burnt wood on the side of rocks anymore. The tools have changed, yet the act is ever growing and necessary. Now we have something called the INTERNET. Maybe you've heard of it?! Blogs, wikis, web-site creators, voicethreads, and social networking sites are going viral as mainstream uses of communication. Viral - a term coined as the phenomina that happens as a video or some other form of communication through internet media becomes widely known throughout the world. Example (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OBlgSz8sSM) - Charlie bit my finger has been viewed over 237 million times and has just as many more views if you consider the parodies that resulted from its inspiration!

As educational leaders, it's up to us to grab the horns of this internet bull (a stock market term - aren't you proud of me?) and use it for educational communication practices. It may be sharing research topics, communicating ideas to parents, updating classroom homework for students to access online, or to promote friendly dialogue among students and teachers to create a healthy social climate for the campus.

This isn't something you can take slowly. That bull is getting away! HURRY!

Week 1 Action Research

Prior to reading "Leading with Passion and Knowledge: The Principal as Action Researcher," by Nancy Fichtman Dana, and "Examining What We Do to Improve Our Schools: 8 Steps from Analysis to Action," by Sandra Harris, Stacey Edmonson, and Julie Combs, I understood the basic idea of research. Traditional educational research is usually done by an outsider, a professional researcher that has no direct ties for the improvement of the particular class, school, or district in question. However, in action research, the researcher conducting the inquiry is directly involved with the school or district, and has an investment in the improvement of the campus as well as their own practice.

Action research allows the researcher to conduct self-evaluations and observe best practices. As a direct result, the conductor of the research either improves their practices or further cements the ideas into their already constructed framework of teaching practices.

Through the course of my study, I will be conducting an action research project within my campus. The following blogs will be a testiment to my research.