Shelbie Witte

“That's Online Writing, Not Boring School Writing”: Writing With Blogs and the Talkback Project

The Talkback Project used blog software to involve eighth-grade language arts students, preservice teachers, and parents in online discussion of young adult novels and their personal connections with them. The author shares the challenges associated with the project—including the implications of Internet safety and legal concerns associated with technology integration—but argues that classroom blogging provides positive opportunities for students to •Develop their digital fluency •Strengthen traditional literacy skills •Apply real-life 21st-century skills in a safe and monitored environment

Advocacy, Humanity, and Hope in the Face of an Education World Gone Wrong

Abstract If given the choice, would we, as teacher educators, enter the profession again? Would we embark on a career that is faced with an antagonistic national context that has permeated nearly every aspect of a teacher’s existence – from the media to the teachers’ lounge, from the lack of support from parents to the lack of respect from students, from the misguided policies and accountability demands to the blanket, uncreative curriculum? How can we, as teacher educators who are doubting our own place in the field, reasonably expect to make a difference in the careers of our graduates? This chapter explores how and why the preparation of English Language Arts teachers must focus on three tenets in the present context for education: Advocacy, Humanity, and Hope. By examining different approaches that both authors have used with teacher candidates through multiple vignettes, we will create a deeper understanding of both the realities our new teachers face and the ways in which they can efficaciously face those realities and help reclaim the profession of teaching. Our work will be grounded in a blended framework of critical pedagogy and progressivism and thus examine these vignettes through that collective lens.

An Exploration of Teacher and Librarian Collaboration in the Context of Professional Preparation

ABSTRACT Research has shown that collaboration between teachers and librarians has a positive effect on student learning, but can be difficult to achieve. In order to explore the incorporation of teacher and librarian collaboration into preservice education, two master’s level classes studying young adult literature, one in teacher education and one in library and information studies (LIS), were given an assignment that required them to work together to complete a week’s worth of lesson plans for a high school English class based on a commonly read novel. Student responses demonstrate limiting and enabling factors that affect integrating collaboration into professional preparation.