BERA 2003 Conference

Heriot-Watt University – Edinburgh, Saturday 13th September

Design and Evaluation of an action research toolkit for teacher professional development

Authors

Steven Coombs: School of Education, Bath Spa University College, UK.

Rosie Penny: School of Education, St. Mary’s College, University of Surrey, UK.

Ian Smith: Faculty of Education, University of Sydney, Australia.

Abstract

There is no doubt that the action research mode of enquiry-based learning is one of the most important approaches that validates classroom research and on-the-job professional enquiry of teachers’ in schools and colleges. Indeed, action enquiry is supported by the UK DfES through applied research schemes such as the Best Practice Research Scholarship. However, the action research qualitative process is generally considered not to be as systematic compared to more traditional positivist experimental methodologies. This paper explores the need for a more systematic and transparent experimental approach to support teachers’ carrying out classroom-based enquiries and proposes the rationale of a professional development toolkit to help scaffold and enrich systematic enquiry. The systems thinking conversational science paradigm of Self-organised-Learning (S-o-L) has been applied to an action research paradigm from which the toolkit has been designed. Case study evidences drawn from teacher professional development prototypes will be illustrated from which a generic pedagogical design protocol has emerged.

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Introduction

This paper considers the case for introducing systems thinking tools to support action research

fieldwork. The systems thinking pedagogical framework is derived from the conversational

science paradigm of Self-organised Learning (S-o-L) proposed by Harri-Augstein and

Thomas (1985, 1991). This pedagogical framework was developed into a project

management action research toolkit by Coombs (1995) and further applied by Perry (1998),

Lee (2001) and Ravindran (Coombs & Ravindran, 2003) for their educational action research

projects. Since then, the tools have been further refined for critical thinking use by students at

Bath Spa University College, towards applied course work that requires educational research

investigation and enquiry within the workplaces of schools and colleges. Diverse examples of

these critical thinking scaffolds (Coombs, 2000) were developed so as to assist action

researchers involved in work-based project management, and these will be shared as toolkit

exemplars within this paper. The deeper philosophical basis and pedagogical rationale of

critical thinking scaffolds, and the linked concept of a knowledge elicitation system (KES)

(Coombs 1995, 2000 & 2001) are explored in the associated BERA2003 paper “Improving

personal learning through critical thinking scaffolds”. This paper, however, overviews the

systems thinking conversational paradigm of self-organised learning and then proposes an S-

o-L pedagogical framework for action research. This framework is then related to the

pedagogy of critical thinking scaffolds that is then used as a systems thinking S-o-L design

template from which to construct an action research toolkit that supports the qualitative

project management tasks of action researchers within their real-life social learning

environment.

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Understanding Self-organised Learning and the conversational science paradigm

This paper considers the benefits of reflective practice for the professional development

action researcher from the conversational learning paradigm perspective of Laurie Thomas

and Sheila Harri-Augstein (1985). They define human learning as “…the construction and

reconstruction, exchange and negotiation of significant, relevant and viable meanings” (p.2).

Their theory of the self-organised learner (S-o-L) is a personal constructivist theory (Kelly,

1955) of human learning that considers the design and use of reflective tools and processes,

which lead to an improved repertoire of inner-reflexive skills and builds upon Kelly’s (1955

and Bannister, 1981) Personal Construct Theory. Steven Coombs and Ian Smith (1998)

explored the person-based relationships between reflection and reflexivity. In their article

“Designing a Conversational Learning Environment” they identified a learning theory based

on "conversational constructivism" that provided a new insight into understanding the

relationship between thinking and learning. They summarised Harri-Augstein & Thomas’ S-

o-L conversational paradigm in terms of three core principles:

1. real personal learning depends on self-assessment and reflective evaluation through the construction of

internal referents;

2. the S-o-L practice depends on the ability of the learner to self-monitor and control the learning process

whilst developing appropriate models of understanding; and,

3. shared meaning is negotiated conversationally from social networks. Such social networks can be

understood as conversational learning environments that construct their own viability and validity,

resulting in a capacity for creative and flexible thinking. (p. 7)

A systems thinking S-o-L framework for Action Research

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Action research is underpinned by a systems-thinking process, which Elliot (1991) describes

as an action-reflection professional development cycle that determines the qualitative change-

management process of how the teacher might experiment with their curriculum. Thus,

action research is deemed to have a critical thinking process that puts the action researcher

into a reflection upon practice cycle that is supported as a form of systematic self-enquiry by

McMahon (1999) from which various support resources are suggested by McKernon (1996).

A reflective praxis represents the philosophical assumption that forms the foundation

methodology of action research for professional learning, and is supported by leading critical

thinkers such as Wildman (1995) and Schön (1987). This action research methodology

provides a work-based experimental rationale that generally seeks qualitative evidences that

demonstrate an improvement in one’s own professional development and working situation,

i.e. a social manifesto (Coombs, 1995) objective as opposed to the more traditional positivist

experimental paradigm that seeks generalisable laws via hypothesis testing (Coombs & Smith,

2003). Indeed, Coombs and Smith (2003) recently underlined the social learning benefits of

participatory action research by teachers’ operating within their own classrooms as a new

paradigm interpretation and validation of the Hawthorne Effect, that has long been used as a

criticism of a ‘researcher’ operating within their own social domain. However, given the

rationale that action research seeks only localised (not generalised) improvements with

supporting evidences supporting such change-management (Lomax, 1989) that also result in

change-culture within a learning organisational setting, then it appears to be relevant that a

consistent set of generic experientially content-free thinking tools could be recruited to assist

the action researcher to collect meaningful qualitative data as part of the project management

field enquiry process.

This idea that the action researcher is a self-enquiring experiential learner using critical

thinking tools to aid personal reflection is further underpinned by Harri-Augstein’s and

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Thomas’ (1991) notion of the self-organised learner, whereby an individual’s learning

capabilities can be enhanced through technology assistants that they refer to as an Intelligent

Learning System. Coombs (1995), in his PhD thesis; "Design and Conversational Evaluation

of an IT Learning Environment based on Self-Organised Learning", further elaborates this

notion of an Intelligent Learning System in terms of a Knowledge Elicitation System.

Whereby, information technology-assisted learning is considered in terms of its interactive

reflective learning capability with an individual learner that is socially extended to both the

action researcher and all the engaged field participants (Coombs, 2000a). It is therefore

understood that the quality of learner-learning that employs a critical thinking scaffold

process can be explained in terms of the learner being able to systematically manage their

own elicitation in the form of self-organised reflective construing experiences. From this

pedagogical perspective, knowledge is considered as being relative to the useras

learnervia focused technology-assisted reflections, construed and elicited by the person in

the form of meaningful inner learning conversations. This form of internal knowledge

construction from self-managed reflective experiences represents a new learning theory that

Coombs and Smith (1998) refer to as "conversational constructivism". Conversational

learning methods by the action researcher to support action research is also illuminated by

Jones (1989), but is only explained as systematic thinking enquiry by Harri-Augstein &

Thomas (1991) and Coombs and Smith (1998) who maintain that:

"…[critical thinking] tools used for activities which encourage, stimulate and focus meaningful

reflection can be viewed as knowledge modeling devices that facilitate learning in a social context.

This particular paradigm empowers learner control of the learning process using appropriate

conversational tools to achieve one’s learning goals and provides a valid learning theory that explains

the motivational role and educational value of a conversational learning environment." (p.27).

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Given this understanding of how reflective technology learning systems (Coombs 2000a) may

impact upon the personal learning capability of the learnercoupled with the demands of

higher education (EU DGXII, 1995 & Dearing, 1997), such as developing the professional

learners higher-order reflective skillsit can easily be seen how appropriately designed

learning technologies could bring considerable benefits to action research professionals

located within normal community working environments (Rodd & Coombs, 1997 and

Coombs & Rodd, 2001a). Indeed, the personal involvement of the teacher/trainer in

developing his/her curriculum through an action research project has long been supported by

educational critical thinkers like Stenhouse (1975) and Elliot (1991) who support the notion

of teacher as experimenter of his or her curriculum. Action research evaluation techniques

often involve the keeping of a reflective learning biography of main project events as a means

of project management review and self-evaluation of the important lessons learnt as they were

experienced on-the-job. This paper considers both the philosophical framework and

conversational tools to successfully engage in such action research activities.

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) software systems also offer a powerful

range of reflective learning tools to support the action researcher and can be both understood

and evaluated for effectiveness against the pedagogical design criteria of a knowledge

elicitation system that Harri-Augstein & Thomas (1991) have proposed as the following self-

organised thinking steps in order to achieve higher-order critical reflection and knowledge

elicitation:

1. elicitation of items of meaning;

2. sorting of their relationships, and

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3. display of the final pattern.

Coombs (1995) maintains that all well-designed and effective Knowledge Elicitation Systems

follow the above 3-step reflective learning design criteria and thus operate as a critical

thinking scaffold (Coombs, 2000).

Thus, ICT reflective-tools operate meaningfully as KES critical thinking scaffolds and can

therefore be designed to assist action research participants carry out a small-scale action

research project from within their own social and working environment (Coombs, 1997 &

1997a). ICT action research project management techniques included the generic use of: -

1. the Internet to research contemporary background information and professional literature

of a participant’s subject/professional development field;

2. email as an asynchronous critical thinking medium to share research questions and

concerns with project supervisors and other team members;

3. spreadsheets for quantitative data analysis and graphical presentation;

4. wordprocessing facilities to keep a computerized reflective log/account of key project

events and submit the final assessment dissertation; and,

5. bespoke conversational critical thinking scaffolds (adopting the three-step reflective

learning design criteria) using MS Word© and other standardised ICT software interfaces

– see the later exhibits.

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Looking at the real-life social context of action research, and its relationship to the social

dimensions of a self-organised conversational learning environment, one can see that action

research operates within a team-based social learning environment that integrates the

individual task-based activity with group learning collaboration and enquiry - as illustrated in

the action research S-o-L pedagogical framework given in Figure 1 below.

Figure 1: A systems-thinking based action research S-o-L Environment.

Figure 1 shows how action researchers operate as learners within a self-organised

conversational learning environment that provide systems/resources/technologies with the

flexibility and choice of enabling the action researcher to migrate from a situated open

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S-O-L

SOCIAL DIMENSIONCollaborative Learning Environment – Group

Learning

PERSONAL DIMENSIONSituated open learning

environment. Both individual & collaborative learning

opportunities

THE SELF-ORGANISED CONVERSATIONAL LEARNING ENVIRONMENT OF AN ACTION

RESEARCHER

Application of Toolkit to the social context of action researchReflective thinking Systems, Resources

& Technologies to support enquiry

Action Research Toolkit

Critical Thinking Scaffolds

LEARNING CONVERSATIONS

Conversational interactions across each

dimensional interface, i.e. inner self and other social beings within the real-life

project environment

The Self-organised Learner "S-o-Ler"

Group Learners & Social Collaborators

learning environment, as an autonomous learner, to that of a collaborative learning team-

based environment and vice-versa. The same pedagogical flexibility applies to opportunities

to transfer between a virtual and an on-site physical learning environment, or vice-versa, and

between a flexible learning environment to a more structured one. This systems-based

flexibility underpins the pedagogical design framework of an S-o-L action research

environment, thereby creating enriched knowledge-building opportunities via multiple forms

of personal and social interactions within a situated open learning environment, i.e. the action

research project field.

This S-O-L action research paradigm and systems thinking framework provides for a

combined collaborative and individualised learning environment. Collaborative learning vis-

à-vis self-organised learning may seem paradoxical, but is in line with the S-O-L

interpretation of social constructivism via conversational social networks. This is because

learning conversations must operate in meaningful real-life contexts, such as social networks,

and that these real-life social situations generate valid and motivational group learning

opportunities. In a sense, the collaborative S-o-L environment appears to be a pedagogical

paradox in that collaborative learning is actually about individual learning that operates within

and across a defined social domain context, hence the notion of an S-o-L conversational

group network.

Examples of a Project Management Toolkit for Action Research

The following exhibits illustrate some of the S-o-L critical thinking scaffolds that operate as

project management tools/templates for teachers as action researchers within their schools as

learning organisations.

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Exhibit 1: P-S-O-R Conversational Template for Action Research Project Management

Organizational Chart for Eliciting Qualitative DataAction Researcher: Vivien Lee Project Title: Evaluating critical thinking pedagogy to support primary school project work

through an action research approachOrganization: NIE/NTU Date elicited: 28/8/99

To derive a deeper description and understanding of the specific social context of the school.

To identify an action research team to include the Principal, key management and the related teaching team.

To ascertain and articulate the teaching and learning problems encountered by the school through interviews with the teaching team.

To translate the pedagogical problems into inherent professional development needs, backed with agreement by the Principal and management.

P - purposes

Observations and meetings with the Principal and management to define the school’s ethos, justifying the choice of action research.

Identification of the three main research instruments developed to improve the impact of learning for both the teachers (as curriculum designer and learning coach) and students following the literature review.

Use of critical thinking scaffolds by the teachers and yourself (PSOR, PLC etc) to help them rethink their curriculum and design new learning experiences/encounters through the use of LPs.

S - strategy

R - review

O - outcomes

Match between school’s and action research philosophy found to be highly relevant to the school’s needs.

Research design formulated to include case study evidences obtained from:

- triangulated interviews with Principal, teachers and students

- reflective evaluation of workshops,

- post-workshop survey by students

- personal journal- completed PLC,

PSOR templates etc.

Project review and evaluation process of the school-based action research case study project conducted.

Concentrate on review of teachers’ changes in practice and use of the LP as a pedagogical design tool via professional development workshop.

The leadership role of the Principal to support this change-management process within the school.

Qualitative planning phase. Experimental intentions & practice vision. Identification of

partners needs relative to social setting.

Actual on-the-job action research methods and techniques to be employed, including use of qualitative tools for data recording and analysis.

Identification of initial and subsequent findings. Use of action research

qualitative tools and procedures for eliciting findings from data evidences,

e.g. triangulation policy.

Reflective review of the findings relative to the strategy employed and original intentions underpinning the purposes. Redefinition of new purposes and strategies in the light of learning from first P-S-O-R recursive analysis.

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Exhibit 2: P-S-O-R Conversational Template for Action Research Project Management

Organizational Chart for Eliciting Qualitative Data

Action Researcher: Vivien Lee Project Title: Evaluating critical thinking pedagogy to support primary school project work through an action research approach

Organization: NIE/NTU Date elicited: 28/8/99

Preliminary interview with Principal and Subject Head for Social Studies.

Problem of students' "cut and paste" mentality when approaching project work - students unable to manage large chunks of information.

Students need to be taught critical thinking skills in selecting useful information for use.

Review of literature to understand critical thinking.

Familiarization with social studies curriculum.

P - purposes

Conduct of workshop to teach critical thinking skills to Primary 4 students.

Early stage of action research project requires use of personal learning contracts, project scheduler, spidergram, PSOR template and personal journal.

Data to be collected from students using work samples and questionnaires as well as interviews with teacher.

S - strategy

R - review

O - outcomes

Despite demonstration and hands-on use of critical thinking skills, the quality of thinking is still not evident.

Students still unable to transfer skills across disciplines.

Teachers also unconvinced about usefulness of teaching critical thinking skills through a non-immersive approach.

Back to review of literature. More than just critical thinking skills, it is attitudes towards thinking that matter.

Further conversations with school principal. New objectives of teaching across disciplines through use of Learning Plans established.

Preparation of teachers' workshop to inform partners about SOL and LPs - giving them ownership of process.

Qualitative planning phase. Experimental intentions & practice vision. Identification of

partners needs relative to social setting.

Actual on-the-job action research methods and techniques to be employed, including use of qualitative tools for data recording and analysis.

Identification of initial and subsequent findings. Use of action research

qualitative tools and procedures for eliciting findings from data evidences,

e.g. triangulation policy.

Reflective review of the findings relative to the strategy employed and original intentions underpinning the purposes. Redefinition of new purposes and strategies in the light of learning from first P-S-O-R recursive analysis. 11

Exhibit 3: P-S-O-R analysis of how CILL's S-O-L curriculum is delivered

The key pedagogic purpose is to integrate the principles of the S-O-L Learning Conversation with language counseling methods.

Another core purpose is to seek ways in which to provide both individual and collaborative learning opportunities in the CILL learning environment.

P - purposes

To employ a combination of human, reflective and IT-based technologies to assist the delivery of CILL curriculum projects. CILL helpers will operate as Learning Coach counselors within the learning environment and negotiate individual learning contracts with participants. It is intended that students will develop a combination of both S-O-L and 'Language' skills via meaningful curricula tasks. These tasks will be both negotiated and assessed by CILL's resident Learning Coaches employing both counseling and conversational scaffolding techniques.

S - strategy

R - review

O - outcomes

Students will gradually increase their S-O-L skills through the CILL learning tasks. They will negotiate a personal learning contract (PLC) from which to self-manage CILL-based curriculum projects. The projects are achieved through a combination of individual and collaborative working patterns developed via the CILL learning environment resources.

Individual S-O-L participants in CILL are appraised relative to learning tasks actioned and accredited via the PLCs as curriculum progress records. Pedagogic resources are regularly reviewed for effectiveness by the task supervisors and curriculum developers working in CILL.

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Exhibit 4: Example of a Project Management Spidergram Template to support educational action research

Personal Experiences (PE) referral sheet. Enter the topic, issue, subject or event you wish to think/explore about into the Focus balloon. Think deeply and reconstruct all the personal events of your experiences that relate to this focus and enter them as raw data labels/expressions into the PE balloons. Add extra balloons as needed. If a PE becomes a focus for a sub-set of experiences, then put this event as a new focus into another Spidergram conversational template. Continue as necessary until you have exhausted your focused brain-storming session!

FocusPE

PE

PE

PE

PEPE

PEPE

PE

PE PE

What are the evidences that

suggest the emergent themes of the

findings?

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Exhibit 5: Appendix 1 The Personal Learning Contract Conversational Template, CSHL©

Action Researcher's Project Evaluation ReportName Vivien Lee Tutor A/P Steven John Coombs Date 31/10/99Project Title

Evaluating critical thinking pedagogy to support primary school project work through an action research approach

My purpose is to impart a set of thinking skills which students may use to support the research process

during project work – enabling students to think critically when

dealing with massive information

loads. My vision was one where students could feel empowered and

confident and to have these tools

Given the constraint of my limited contact time with students and their general lack of interest in learning CT skills, a hands-on experiential learning approach will be used instead. Through learning plans that function as scaffolds, tasks are broken into manageable bits giving students control. Together with mini-projects, students will be immersed in a real life learning context.

Rather than teaching critical thinking skills out of context, an immersive approach was used instead.

Rather than skills, attitudes such as consensus seeking, persistence and flexibility were promoted through hands-on mini-projects related to the real world via a subject identified by the teacher.

Future vision of project On-the-job reflection of project Reflective analysis of project

Pur

pose

Out

com

eS

trate

gy

Through conversations with the principal and the subject head, I

determined the problems faced by the school. This was followed by a

survey of literature to identify the tools that students required. These

were tried out at a preliminary workshop for a sample of students

with the intention of identifying the relevant skills, the appropriate

Through self-reflection and subsequent follow-up with my supervisor, it was decided that students prefer more independence. The problem also lies with project work at the design stage. A workshop for teachers to introduce them to PSOR and learning plans will equip them to design tasks for project work. The templates introduced may function as tools that teachers may use to assess for evidence of critical thinking.

Rather than taking the teaching tasks into my own hands, the responsibility for imparting these critical thinking attitudes was passed on to the teacher who knows the class best.

This gave teachers ownership of the problem. With a vested interest in improving classroom practice, teachers identified the objectives for the lesson and considered how critical thinking could be imparted.

Through the feedback of the students – conversations, emails

and response during the workshop. Evidence of success - students continued use of the tools, good work submitted, interest and

enthusiasm. Further sharing with

the supervisor, principal and teachers will be necessary to

discuss which tools to disseminate

The success of learning plans will be gathered at a post-workshop follow-up with the teachers who will provide feedback on how their students responded to the learning plans.Greater acceptance and enthusiasm from both management and teachers. Convinced about the usefulness of LPs. Students also enjoyed the opportunity for discovery learning.

Semi-formal interviews conducted with teachers and students after learning plans were implemented.

A formal questionnaire was also completed by the student sample.

LPs clearly a better solution to support critical thinking.

Teachers self-initiating the problem solving process in view of the specific problems their classes encounter with an independent researcher such as myself being adopted as a resource person.

Teachers have a set of easy to use templates to facilitate reflection.

Would have been good if teachers had more time to reflect on the current classroom practice and increase familiarization with LPs.

To encourage teachers to integrate LPs as a tool for teaching on a regular basis, rather than as a once-off project.

ReviewReview

What is my purpose? What became my purpose? Describe essential differences

What actions shall I take? What did I do? Differences between plan & action?

How shall I judge my success? How well did I do? Essential differences

What were the strengths? What improvements are needed?

Exhibit 6: Interview Design Template

Project work Teams

Please complete the following information:

Project Title& Group

Interview Design Table

Key Purpose of Interview/Questions Rationale Interview Typee.g. to find out topic areas Initial exploration Unstructured

e.g. key topics identified as “loose focus questions” for respondent

Respondent exploration relative to focus questions.

Semi-structured

DateSC/document.doc

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The S-o-L templates illustrated in exhibits 1 to 3 show the action research application

of the Purpose-Strategy-Outcome-Review (P-S-O-R) procedure as described by Harri-

Augstein and Thomas (1991) and designed as a generic systems thinking project

management template by Coombs (1995). Exhibits 1 and 2 illustrate how the P-S-O-

R tool elaborated Lee’s (2001) educational action research project “ Evaluating

critical thinking pedagogy to support primary school project work through an action

research approach” for her main professional development Masters degree. Exhibit 3,

however, shows how the same generic tool was used to elaborate Ravindran’s

(Coombs & Ravindran, 2003) action research project for developing an S-o-L

paradigm within her Centre for Independent Language Learning (CILL) unit within

Temasek Polytechnic in Singapore. A more elaborate systems thinking template is the

S-o-L Personal Learning Contract (PLC) (Harri-Augstein & Thomas, 2001), which

includes the P-S-O-R routine within a three-phase action learning event-time

pedagogy that Coombs (1995) designed as an action research project management

evaluation tool:

Phase 1: reflective planning – the use of P-S-O-R to design the action research

project, i.e. a pre-emptive reflective learning project management phase.

Phase 2: on-the-job reflection – the use of P-S-O-R to monitor and evaluate the

action research project within the field and during the project cycle, i.e. reflective

action learning project management phase.

Phase 3: reflective closure – the use of P-S-O-R as a post-qualitative action research

tool to analyse and evaluate the completed action research project tasks, i.e. final

reflective evaluation of the action research project.

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Exhibit 5 illustrates a completed PLC template that provided an overall evaluation of

Lee’s (2001) action research professional development Masters project.

Other action research project management tools include Coombs’ (1995) Spidergram,

illustrated in exhibit 4, showing how a critical thinking scaffold can be developed into

a “loose thinking” but focussed tool for brainstorming and construing related events.

In the case of exhibit 4 the Spidergram has been adapted to provide the fixed focussed

question “What are the evidences that suggest the emergent themes of the findings?”

This question was posed for students working in small teams conducting an

educational action enquiry project at Bath Spa University College as part of their

Education Studies undergraduate degree programme. The Spidergram was used as a

project management tool at various stages throughout the student project cycle.

Exhibit 4 was used as a critical thinking tool to help each student team to elicit and

evaluate their research evidence findings. Exhibit 6 shows another project

management tool used by the same student teams earlier in the educational project

cycle to help them elicit and design their field interview questions.

Conclusions and future projects

This paper has briefly overviewed the pedagogical concepts of self-organised learning

as a pedagogical framework to support action research via critical thinking tools

operating as project management scaffolds. The pedagogical design criteria for these

action research ‘tools’ has been simply explained and applied to the generic S-o-L

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procedures of P-S-O-R and PLC from which working exhibits have been trialled in a

range of diverse educational professional development projects.

The systems thinking approach towards project management is widely supported by

critical thinkers such as Checkland (1993) as well as Harri-Augstein and Thomas

(1985, 1991) and Coombs (1995). Integrating systems thinking project management

with action research and the S-o-L paradigm was experimented with by Coombs

(1995) in his PhD at the Centre for Study into Human Learning (CSHL) at Brunel

University, from which the S-o-L action research framework was first identified. The

same work identified the concept of a knowledge elicitation system (KES) as a design

template for critical thinking, which was further explained (Coombs, 2000), more

fully, as a critical thinking scaffold to enable learner-learning. The idea that

technology can support action research reflection and evaluation was also discussed

by Coombs (1997, 1997a) and linked to European developments in adopting

telematics as a reflective learning environment. The six exhibits produced for this

paper show a small range of the conversational templates designed to support action

research project management, but all operate in common as critical thinking scaffolds

within the S-o-L paradigm. Future continuing professional development research

across several university centres will develop and trial more content-free generic

templates with the aim of producing a public domain comprehensive toolkit for en

masse application and validation of any work-based action research project.

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