Draft Action Research Plan

7/31/2019 Draft Action Research Plan

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Can a Wiki Increase Collaboration Among Stakeholders on an Elementary Campus?

Dilene Witt-Nelson

Lamar University

I determined the need for this study based on comments from staff indicating that they would

like to be able to collaborate more but have difficulty in finding the time to do so. Our Campus

Improvement Plan had a technology goal stating that we would begin an Oak Meadow blog for

staff to communicate with one another professionally on multiple subjects. I also felt a campus

wiki would help improve communication and collaboration among grade levels. Teachers can

post documents or videos to a wiki to share lesson ideas or discuss what did or did not work in

their classrooms. Teachers can also discuss ideas for integrating technology into their

classrooms. The data proved that most teachers on my campus were not familiar with wikis:

59.4% said they were not familiar with a wiki, 21.9% were familiar and 18.8% were a little

familiar with a wiki. Of the 32 respondents, 90.6% said they had not used a wiki in their

classroom: only 3 respondents, or 9.4%, had used a wiki in the classroom. When asked if they

had used a wiki at home for personal information or professional development, responsesindicated that 15.6% had used a wiki at home, 71.9% had not used a wiki at home and 12.5%

were not sure.

Based on these results, I developed a plan to create a campus wiki with pages specific to

collaboration among grade levels. The wiki has PreK-2 collaboration page, 3-5 collaboration

page, Special Ed page, Speech page, as well as pages for our counselor, librarian and campus

book study. Data will be gathered on staff usage of the wiki. Copies of documents uploaded can

be evaluated to determine what types of items teachers are sharing . A follow up survey will be

administered to see if the original attitudes have changed.

There is also research to support the use of wikis for communication and collaboration.

Richardson (2010) states Like blogs, wikis are beginning to make inroads in just about every


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area of life. Corporations like Disney, McDonalds, Sony and BMW have started using wikis to

manage documents and information. MIT, Stanford, and other colleges and universities are

testing the waters with their faculty and students. Solomon and Schrum (2007) state that while

it is challenging to encourage teachers to use new technology tools. Using these new tools as

models and methods to teach them accomplishes two goals. It first provides practice and comfort

with the tools, and second offers the opportunity to experience firsthand the use of the

technology for meaningful and authentic activities. This confirms my thought process that if I

get the teachers to use the school wiki they will become more comfortable with the idea of using

one in their classroom.

I discussed this plan with my site mentor as well as our campus principal. Both felt this was a

good project and something that was needed for our campus. I was informed by my site mentor

and our district instructional technology specialist that a wiki had been set up for Oak Meadow

before but that it was not utilized. I suggested that perhaps it was not utilized because it was not

well publicized (I have been at Oak Meadow for 5 years and never knew there was a campus

wiki). My principal and I also discussed ways to get people to the wiki to look at it. For example,

putting information that they are required to read on the wiki so they have to go there on a

regular basis. The principal agreed to post her Weekly Bulletins on the wiki as a means of getting

teachers to the wiki. I also explained to teachers that this was a tool for us to use as a campus to

increase communication across grade levels. A few teachers were open to the idea but others

viewed it as one more thing they have to do. I am hoping to change this perception with

increasing the resources on the wiki. I believe if I get it started and post items for different grade

levels then other teachers will be more willing to use it.

Fortunately, this is not a project on which I have to rely on others to complete a portion of the

research or create the wiki itself. The responsibility for this is solely on my shoulders. There is

no funding involved because I am using Wikispaces sites which are free for educators. The only

thing I have to hope for is that the teachers will post to the wiki itself and therefore, hopefully,

attitudes will change by the time I create the follow up survey.


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There are those on campus that I will still need to convince that this is a useful project that will

help them in the long run. In order to do that, I will ask my principal to allow me to speak at one

of our professional development days during our teacher work week before school starts. I will

present the information including the purpose for the wiki explaining that it meets a need on our

campus improvement plan as well as creates an avenue for communication and collaboration.

If the teachers are open to using the wiki and realize it can be a tool for them, this will not only

meet the goal on our Campus Improvement Plan but will increase collaboration and vertical

alignment across grade levels. This can only improve learning for all of our students. One of the

reasons I felt so strongly about including a page for Special Education was not only to share

forms and information about Special Ed Manager (our Special Ed student information system)

but to share resources for teaching those with special needs as well.

Sources

Richardson, W. (2010). Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms. Thousand

Oaks: Corwin.

Solomon, G., & Schrum, L. (2007). web 2.0 new tools, new schools. Eugene, OR: International Society for

Technology in Education.

Documents

Draft Action Research Plan