Glenda Moss

Guided reflection protocol as narrative inquiry and teacher professional development

This research project explored the dialogue between narrative methods, reflection and professional development. The project was designed to engage participating writing teachers to write narrative stories of experience, participate in guided reflective questioning and dialogue as a process of teacher inquiry and professional development. It was framed by writing workshop, narrative methods and critical learning community theory for professional development. Participants wrote critical stories of experience implementing aspects of writing workshop and engaging in a reflective process of questioning and dialogue as a professional development process.

Teacher-Students Dialogue to Promote Critical Thinking

Teacher: Fifteen of you missed question 10 on our practice test yesterday. That question is testing to see if you understand double negatives. Lets see if we can figure out why we are missing that one. Look at your answer and think about why you picked the answer you picked. Raylon: I picked the one that sounded right. Yolanda: So did I. Marcus: I did too. Shakeisha: Me too. Teacher-student dialogue creates critical thinkers. PHOTO BY TOM ERB

Senior Projects in a Rural School

This article discusses senior projects in a rural school. Technology and a school-university partnership enabled high school faculty members to implement the Senior Project. The authors describe the process of change, the project requirements, and the learning that resulted for students and faculty.

Learning in Places: The Informal Education Reader

During an age of educational standardization and scripted teaching, Learning in Places is a refreshing reminder that learning happens everywhere that humans interact. Co-editors, Zvi Bekerman, Nicholas C. Burbules, and Diana SilbermanKeller remind readers that learning goes beyond local, state, and national curriculums, and takes place in spaces outside of schools: homes, workplaces, libraries, museums, popular culture media, street corners, malls, and the Internet. Learning is what humans do in relationship to one another and their environment. The contributing authors provide analysis of qualitative data collection from a variety of contexts, including dialogue transcriptions from conversations between family members in public museums and home contexts. In a chapter titled, “Beyond the Curriculum: Fostering Associational Life in Schools,” Mark Smith introduces readers to the nature and potential of informal education. Informal education is not preplanned and happens in the spaces where human activities occur. Central to the learning process are conversation and communication. Dialogue is a theme throughout the book chapters. In “Dialogic Inquiry in Classroom and Museum: Actions, Tools, and Talk,” Doris Ash and Gordon Wells ground their work in Vygotsky’s theory concerning learning activities within the Zone of Proximal Development. Through two vignettes, one in a museum and one in a classroom, it is easy to see the free-flowing dialogue within a family at the museum that leads to rich learning opportunities and the difficulty of fostering true dialogue in a classroom, where learning activities are planed for 25 to 30 students in a traditional classroom setting. Teachers