Teacher Inquiry

Southern Colorado Writing Project Coaching Protocol

Summary: Teacher leaders designing professional development programs will find this nine step coaching protocol useful. The resource outlines a cycle for working with teachers and describes how to coach participants through the stages of brainstorming, developing, presenting, reflecting on and revising a presentation/demonstration lesson/inquiry workshop. In addition, it offers “how-to”...

A Cognitive Strategies Approach to Reading and Writing Instruction for English Language Learners in Secondary School

Author: Carol Booth Olson and Robert Land Summary: This article documents a longitudinal research study conducted by members of the UC Irvine Writing Project in partnership with a large, urban school district in which 93 percent of the students are English language learners. Over an eight-year period, 55 secondary teachers...

What Data-Driven Instruction Should Really Look Like

Author: Kathie Marshall Summary: This article argues for a teacher-led collaborative inquiry approach to data analysis, as opposed to seeing data analysis as a compliance process. Potentially a conversation starter for how teachers can use inquiry processes to regain control over instruction and improve student achievement.

Citizens in the Making—Inspiring Students to Engage in Transformative Civic Learning

Guests: Danielle Filipiak, Ben Kirshner, Ellen Middaugh, Nicole Mirra, and Paul Oh Summary: View this rich webinar about how and why preparing students for youth participatory action research (YPAR) leads to civic engagement, community improvement, learning, and literacy (cue the video to 16:52). Through this inquiry process, students gain an...

Site-Based Leadership Reforms the Writing Curriculum on the Other Side of the Tracks

Author: Nancy Remington and Robert McGinty Summary: Leaders from the Great Basin Writing Project in Nevada describe a long-term school partnership that gave teachers at Southside Elementary the opportunity to redesign curriculum and reshape the writing culture of their school. This inquiry-centered approach to professional development, designed and led by...

A Collection of Resources on Teacher Inquiry

Summary: This collection of materials on teacher inquiry was developed for a 2003 NWP Teacher Inquiry Communities Network online conference. A valuable resource for teachers who engage in or facilitate inquiry projects, the collection contains extensive and practical information on engaging in teacher inquiry including definitions, along with forms and...

Informal and Shared: Writing to Create Community

Author: Deborah Dean and Adrienne Warren Summary: How can we use informal writing to cultivate the meaningful interaction and deepened understanding that build the foundation of classroom community? Here, Deborah Dean and Adrienne Warren’s explain how a daily writing and sharing routine helped build community and bring meaning to the...

Hey Matt! There’s a Reason We Write Like Every Day!

Author: Molly Toussant Summary: Students often wonder why they have to write every day. In this piece, with her students as her audience, one teacher outlines and then elaborates the beliefs that guide her teaching of writing. Points of use for this article may be early in summer institutes or...

Courageous Conversations: Meeting the Needs of Racially and Linguistically Diverse Students

Author: South Coast Writing Project Summary: Although conversations about race and diversity are not easy, they can allow teacher leaders to examine and interrogate their beliefs and practices to determine the direction of their teaching and of their writing project sites. This article describes how the South Coast Writing Project...

Assessment in a Culture of Inquiry: The Story of the National Writing Project’s Analytic Writing Continuum

Author: Sherry Swain and Paul LeMahieu Summary: This article details the journey of teachers and researchers who worked together to create the NWP’s Analytic Writing Continuum (AWC), an approach to writing assessment that is locally contextualized yet linked to a common national framework and standards of performance. In addition to...