Inquiry 2018

As the year draws closer and I reflect on 2017, it is time to consider what aspects of my practice I wish to work on next year.

This year I completed an intervention and dissertation on mathematics; specifically using differentiated approaches to accelerate the learning of all of my students in a mixed-ability setting. I learnt so much from this intervention and it has altered much of my mathematics pedagogy and use of my class site. 

However, next year I would like to focus on writing, as this is another area of the curriculum that some of my learners struggle with. As I will be teaching a year 7 and 8 class, I must ensure that my teaching will support the students to transition between intermediate and high school. It is also vital that I facilitate accelerated learning so that they can cope with the literary demands of college.

I would like to investigate the use of text analysis, peer and self assessment to make the connection between reading and writing explicit. In this intervention, I intend to start the week with a text analysis. The learners would first respond to the text as readers to gain an understanding of it, before I guide them to analyse a specific aspect of the text as writers. Smith (1983), states that effective writers are able to write like readers, and effective readers read like writers. That is, the students notice the techniques that writers use when reading and write with their audience in mind.
This analysis would involve a great deal of discussion, to provide scaffolding for the learners. These text responses would be shared on the students blogs as a short text or video. They would then select elements of the text to use in their own writing in the week, before discussing their ideas for writing with one another because "reading and writing float on a sea of talk" (Briton,  1970, p.164).

The students would self and peer assess during the week against a rubric that we would co-construct. At the end of the week we would analyse a student-created text just as we had at the start of the week.

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