Windows Into Disciplinary Literacy Collaborative Inquiry: What Improvements Do Teacher Teams Explore?

• In Event: Professional Development in Literacy Across Contexts

Abstract

Despite continued calls for teachers to collaborate around instructional improvement, these collaborations have often been understudied in terms of specific decision-making. This study follows the inquiry-driven collaborative work of 13 teacher teams to catalogue which instructional topics they chose and how they made decisions about moving from one inquiry to another. Most teams began with improvement topics about which they had outside workshops, but over time, inquiries became more context-driven. Teams moved to new topics when current inquiries presented new avenues for inquiry or when momentum waned on current inquiry work. These findings give nuance to how teachers actually choose to collaborate around instructional improvement, giving insight to teachers’ priorities and perceptions of relevant literacy domains.

Authors

• Christina L. Dobbs, Boston University

• Jacy C. Ippolito, Salem State University

• Megin Charner-Laird, Salem State University