Reconceptualizing Teacher Identity and Belief About Students' Agency Through Approaching Literature as Inquiry

• In Event: Opportunities for Identity Work in the Face of Risk and Resilience Through Literature

Abstract

Purpose
This presentation reports on the changes in a middle school ELA teacher’s epistemological stance and pedagogy toward Literature instruction through participation in the READI Literature Team’s design-based implementation research (DBIR) (Penuel, Fishman, Cheng, & Sabelli, 2011).

Theoretical Framework:
Instructional shifts predicated by the Common Core (National Governors Association, 2010) and subsequent standardized assessments (Gewertz, 2012; King, 2011) necessitate closer examination of opportunities teachers have to reexamine their orientations towards instruction and learning within the disciplines (Greenleaf et al, 2001; Moje, 2008). In response to the social dimensions of learning and variance between instructional contexts DBIR (Penuel, et al., 2011) brings together the expertise of teachers and researchers collaborating to create goal-oriented, learning environments that lead to ongoing and sustainable change.
As a member of the READI literature design team, the middle school ELA teacher who is the subject of this paper developed READI interventions to support students’ engagement with text-based literary argument, thematic understanding and specific rhetorical devices. The teacher instantiated the underlying architecture of the READI Literature intervention (epistemology, strategies, key constructs, ways of using language, knowledge of text structures) adapting them to students’ strengths, their responses to tasks and texts, and to student work.

Data:
Data include teacher reflections on implementations, changes made in subsequent iterations, audio-recordings of meetings, and student artifacts. The constant comparative method (Glaser, 1978) was used with open coding for key issues, recurrent events, or activities in the data. Axial coding was applied helping to identify patterns and themes (Spradley, 1980).
Pre-post literature assessments were examined for patterns of emergent understandings of argument (relations of claims, evidence and warrants) on the project’s seven dimension scoring rubric. Themes were analyzed within the written arguments.

Results:
The underlying architecture of the interventions and ways the teacher adapted it influenced not only student achievement but also the teacher’s own orientation toward teaching literature and perceptions of students’ capability and agency. The adaptations reflected in the instantiation of the architecture (e.g., specific cultural data sets (Lee, 2007), instructional scaffolds, social arrangements, and introduction of technology) promoted greater student engagement and learning. (See Wilcoxon signed rank pre to post test results in Table 1). Changes to teacher practice were concomitant with challenges to belief systems about literature and students.

The teacher deepened his understanding of module architecture design principles and their flexible translation across contexts (i.e. grade levels, demographics). The teacher rather than assuming the intellectual load for students, created and dismantled instructional scaffolds so students could grapple with making meaning and develop evidence-based arguments in Literature. Creating a classroom culture that normalized struggle engaged students at higher levels, increasing agency for their own learning.

Significance
Problematizing and reframing literature as inquiry created opportunities for the teacher to authentically engage with the disciplinary practices of literature. The teacher’s changing sense of Literature as a context for inquiry enhanced student agency and thus student achievement

Authors

• Rick Coppola, Chicago Public Schools

• MariAnne George, University of Illinois at Chicago

• Susan R. Goldman, University of Illinois at Chicago