The role of conversation in collaborative action research

Abstract

The article examines the role of conversation in collaborative action research to understand how conversations among teachers can serve as a research methodology in which the sharing of knowledge and the growth of understanding occurs through meaning making processes. It begins with a review of three collaborative action research groups that use conversation as research. The article then turns to an examination of the three types of conversations used by the teachers in those groups: oral inquiry processes, collaborative conversations, and long and serious conversations. A look at some of the implications that conversation as a research methodology has for the establishment and sustenance of collaborative action research groups concludes the article.