Unreliable Narrator Three Ways: Designing for Literary Reasoning for Multiple Levels Through Teacher–Researcher Collaboration

• In Event: 72.018 - Teacher–Researcher Partnerships: Advancing Research, Practice, Ownership, and Agency in Disciplinary Literacy Teaching and Learning

Abstract

Purpose
This paper explores two high school literature teachers’ adaptations to integrate design elements from a large, interdisciplinary research project they participated in, and how these adaptations informed researchers’ conceptualizations of project design principles. Through four years of engagement in a teacher inquiry network, these teachers participated in a collaborative investigation into literary argumentation. The project provided cultural data sets to support students’ reasoning about unreliable narrator (URN) (Lee, 2007; Rabinowitz et al., 1998). The teachers, our co-authors, redesigned the cultural data sets provided. This paper explores their design cycle to improve student understanding of URNs and capacity for literary reasoning. They implemented URN units in three settings; a 12th grade AP class, an 11th grade honors class and a 10th grade AVID class to support college readiness. We examine the resulting equity in student access to tools for literary reasoning.

Theoretical Framing
Constructivist theory underlies our study of a community of practice (Wenger, 1999). Guided by principles of iterative, design-based research (Barab & Squire, 2004), teachers and researchers collaborated to design learning environments, simultaneously advancing each participant’s professional identity, interests, and learning (Wood & Lieberman, 2000). With teachers’ voices at the center, we work against traditional barriers to education research (Schoenbach & Greenleaf, 2000).

Data Sources and Methods
Using teacher and researcher-created artifacts, teacher reflections on learning in the inquiry network, video of classroom lessons and post-lesson interviews, we examined the design choices and multiple iterations of URN units, tracing their impact on teacher and researcher learning. We analyzed how cultural data sets developed by the research project were redesigned by the teachers over time. Through a grounded theory based textual analysis (Bohm, 2004; Corbin & Strauss, 2008), we analyzed how these iterations informed the research project design principles and goals. Finally, we analyzed teacher reflections on participation in the project as well as post-lesson interviews to examine teacher learning over time, utilizing discourse analytic methods (Cazden, C, 2001; Bloome & al 2005; Rymes, 2009).

Findings
Our exploration of teacher assessment of student learning showed increased engagement with the literary texts, and for some, a real personal connection to the notion of unreliable narrator was apparent, highlighting the power of cultural data sets for introducing rhetorical devices in literature. The teachers designed more effective data sets, which they used to introduce URN to their students. Pragmatically, they radically constrained the class time spent on cultural data sets from what the research project initially recommended, with great success. Further, by bringing teachers into the design cycle from the beginning, we shortened the design cycle, resulting in four iterations of curricular resources in just three years’ time. Finally, teachers and researchers reported increased knowledge of important principles behind disciplinary reasoning with literary texts.

Implications
Our research supports efforts to empower teachers through a radically different form of professional development: participation communities of inquiry that contain diverse members of the education community. By engaging students in literary reasoning across grade and achievement bands we demonstrate that high-level disciplinary reasoning is appropriate for all students.

Authors

• Stacy A. Marple, WestEd

• Keren Robertson, Mountain View Los Altos Union High School District

• April Oliver, Mountain View Los Altos District