Aim

The overall aim of this action research project is to illuminate working methods in the classroom in order to increase students’ target achievement. An additional aim was to develop research methods for cooperative research. The research question in this initial phase was: What are the rationales for teacher’s choice of approach in the classroom? 

Methodology/research design

In focus of the study was a compulsory school where 40 teachers recently started their master thesis. As a part of the education program the teachers observed each other as “critical friends” in the classroom. The task was to make several observations of, and critical reflections to, the colleague: a method we call shadowing. As a parallel process the two researchers used the same method for observation. During the periods of shadowing we met the teachers for following-up dialogues and for preparation we made comprehensive analysis of each shadowing session.

Findings

Since the study still is in progress we only present preliminary data and the in-depth analyses are still pending. Our results so far display that teachers have vague arguments for their approaches in the classroom. We used and developed a method of shadowing which in addition to documentation also included feed-back.