While reading What Works?, I began to figure out my own path towards conducting a teacher research project. Furthermore, since I am exploring the idea of teacher agency in another class, I appreciated Strater and Sunstein's positioning of systematic inquiry as "both a form and a method for teacher resistance and for teacher agency" (xvii). I actually tried working on teacher research a couple of years ago; but, in the end, I found my inquiry to be too broad. Nevertheless, I did gain student data that enlightened my teaching practices during the process. From that experience, I've realized that this time around I should be more focused, practical, and consistent if I am going to follow through and achieve some useful results. Consequently, I would like to use this post to share my ideas and get your feedback (and hopefully encouragement) on this endeavor.
First, I'm interested in the idea of discussion in the classroom and how to resist the traditional notion of many teachers that quiet students = good students. Often, discussion in class can turn into more of an interview format, where teacher asks a question and a student responds; teacher asks another question, and another student responds. Thus, I would like to explore the quesion:
How do you create authentic, ongoing, active discussion in a classroom that is relevant to students' lives and goals, promotes a high-level of critical thinking, and provides opportunities for all voices to be heard?
Is this too lofty? I thought some subquestions would include:
How does mobility, attendance, race, etc. come into play in creating this type of environment?
What are the roles of teacher and student in a discussion?
How is the inherent power relationship of teacher and student mediated through the use of discussion in the classroom?
How do you get students to listen to each other's conflicting thoughts/opinions?
Does this create more open-minded individuals as a result?
What effect do discussions have on students' sense of agency?
If y'all could post comments/questions that would help guide me, I would really appreciate it. I know that I often think in broad terms, so I need help getting focused, and I don't know if we'll have time in class to work through this. I have a lot of ideas (that I won't elaborate on right now), but if you know of any books, articles, etc. that would help me, please let me know. Thanks in advance for your help!
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4 comments:
I love your questions, Angela! I'm interested in that idea of building genuine conversation, too.
One theoretical framework for that we're reading in sociolinguistics is Neil Mercer's "The Guided Construction of Knowledge." It explores the different kinds of talk that happen as groups build knowledge together.
In terms of more practical stuff, I don't know yet. But when you find them, please do share... I'd love to hear more about what you find!
oops, I posted the same comment twice. And now you have 3 comments... doh!
I'm going to echo a.r.'s comments and say that your questions are wonderful and I think any single one of them could serve as a focus question for an entire project.
Another thought (not that you need more) is what these sorts of questions do to teacher's perspectives of students and the work of the classroom. Since your initial wondering is about teacher's perceptions, this seems like an important focus that doesn't quite make it down to your list of sub-questions.
Martin Nystrand is someone who's done quite a bit on talk in classrooms, so some of his writing may help you narrow or refine your focus.
But I love the idea of poking at the notion of quiet=good. This seemed to come up in class last week during the discussion of workshop and "if it isn't workshop, what is it?"
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