Teacher Reflection on their Agency for Change (TRAC) tool is designed to help teachers
reflect on how they use their social networks to achieve the goals that matter to them.
Teachers can use TRAC in their professional inquiry projects free of charge. At the same
time they help enhance knowledge about professional communities, by agreeing for their
log data to be used for research purposes
Why is this important?
Inclusive communities are vital for both cognitive and affective outcomes in education,
especially for students from disadvantaged backgrounds, but they are also important in
themselves for learning to be and thrive together in our increasingly diverse schools and
societies.
Our research aims to understand how teachers interact with others create and sustain inclusive
learning communities, real or virtual, both for change towards addressing complex global challenges
in education such as inequality, and for maintaining continuity of learning during crisis. For example,
under Covid educators showed a great deal of ingenuity in sustaining relationships, and supporting
students remotely, involving families and various services, or forming on-line groups on social media
platforms. The crisis reminded us that people, rather than physical buildings make learning
communities.
What does TRAC look like?
The on-line log has three sections in which teachers reflect on a situation in which they sought support:
- WHAT they were trying to do or what kind of issue they were trying to address?
- WHO were the people they sought to involve and how?
- WHY they did or did not manage to do what they sought to do?
The aim is to enable teachers to report their experience in their own terms – in other words, how
they see the aims, contexts and outcomes of their agency for change.
To see what TRAC tool looks like you can register
here and fill out a demo version yourself or ask potential users to help you adapt the log for your own
research or professional inquiry project.
TRAC is particularly well suited for collaborative projects designed and implemented together by
schools and researchers. Schools and teachers can receive research-based feedback for their
professional development. For more information please see this short video: