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Designing a Pathway to Support Teen Engagement in Writing

Sat, April 18, 2:45 to 4:15pm, Sheraton, Floor: Ballroom Level, Sheraton V

Abstract

Objective
The Learning Pathways Program is an inquiry- and design-based research project that seeks to inform how learning experiences can be designed and connected in ways that facilitate young people’s journeys towards understanding who they are, who they want to be, and who they can become.

Perspective
Making visible to youth the pathways that connect learning experiences to real and possible futures can nurture and inform their developing senses of identity, enable them to explore multiple interests and discover specific talents, and shape their visions of personally meaningful, rewarding, and attainable futures. And, in contexts where schools and families may be under-resourced and/or poorly positioned to guide, mediate, and mentor youth’s exploration of their interests en route to college and career, accessible and transparent pathways become critical to addressing barriers to youth engagement and achievement.

We define learning pathways as routes paved by learning experiences that are connected in ways that a) deepen engagement, b) develop specific sets of knowledge, skill, and habits, c) facilitate relationships with mentors, d) connect youth to interest-related social networks, and e) surface, shape, and support possible identities. If learning pathways are to play a supportive, mediating, and even powerful role in young people’s engagement in interest-based learning and attachment to possible futures, they must be defined and made transparent in ways that:

• highlight, nurture, and affirm possible identities,
• provide youth with social, cultural, and academic forms of capital, and
• address equity-related barriers to deep engagement.

Modes of Inquiry
This poster presents our development of a writing pathway that actualized the key concepts of our framework (i.e., identity, capital, and equity). The Writing Pathway Collaborative (WPC) was comprised of 6 youth-serving organizations (and our project staff) that had writing as a central aspect of their programs. Together, representatives from these organizations walked through a multi-step process to develop learning pathways related to specific genres of writing (e.g. non-fiction, fiction, poetry, theatre, and journalism). These pathways were then made available to youth through the Chicago City of Learning initiative, as well as intentionally accessed by some WPC members in normal course of their youth programs.

Using learning analytics, we are able to observe patterns in engagement in the writing pathway. Additionally, we developed some case studies of youth who engaged in the pathway with the support of a program or mentor either in an informal setting or at school.

Scholarly Significance
Learning pathways create avenues for young people to explore and connect interest-based experiences across spaces in ways that can build new personal narratives. If we design these pathways with intention, we believe that they have the power to make opportunities more equitable. The lessons learned from our work to develop a writing pathway will enable us to support more effective facilitation of young people’s access to learning experiences that support their development of new identities and their engagement in capital-building experiences that support their attachment to both communities that provide a sense of identity and belonging and new and positive futures.

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