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Revising the Writing Workshop

for a Digital Age

Troy Hicks, Ph.D.Central Michigan University

St. Clair County RESAAugust 13, 2008

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Today’s Talk• Discussing Principles of the Writing Workshop as Relevant to Digital Writing

• Current Professional Development Work through Red Cedar Writing Project

• Implications of Current Work and Discussion of Emerging Technologies (Questions, Answers, and Tech Demos)

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Re-imagining EnglishToday, new technologies are changing the types of texts we and our students create and interpret even as they are influencing the social, political, and cultural contexts in which our texts are composed and shared. Since these technologies are influencing the development of individuals, institutions, and communities (and since individuals, institutions, and communities are shaping these technologies and their uses), it is essential for English educators to turn a critical eye toward the benefits and affordances; the limitations and liabilities of integrating these newer technologies into our teaching.

- Swenson et al. (2005)

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Writing Inst.

“Grammar of Schooling”AssessmentAttitudesGenres

Adol. Lit.

Literacy “Crisis”Curriculum

RelationshipsRelevanceRigor

Digital Lit.

Changing Technologies

Newer LiteraciesAccess and

Infrastructure

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Principles of the Writing Workshop

• Student choice about topic and genre• Active revision (constant feedback from peers and teacher)

• Author’s craft as a basis for instruction (mini lessons and conferring)

• Publication beyond classroom walls• Portfolio assessment

But… what does this mean in a digital age?

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The Pedagogy of Multiliteracies

In this book, we attempt to broaden this understanding of literacy and literacy teaching and learning to include negotiating a multiplicity of discourses... We argue that literacy pedagogy now must account for the burgeoning variety of text forms associated with information and multimedia technologies.

New London Group, p. 9

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Effective Professional Development

• Engaging in pertinent literacy practices that will be used in their classrooms

• Observing teacher leaders demonstrate these literacy practices

• Focusing on students’ needs and achievements

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Project WRITE Shared Readings

Images from amazon.com, lulu.com, and stenhouse.com

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Current Project Work• Monthly Professional Development Sessions– Focus on adolescent literacy, writing assessment, boy writers, digital literacies

• Project Wiki– Reading and Discussion– Developing Own Curriculum– Collaborating with Others

• Summer Workshop

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http://projectwritemsu.wikispaces.com/

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Implications / Emerging Technologies

• Questions and Answer Session• Demos of Teachers’ and Students’ Work

• Demos of Particular Digital Writing Technologies– Blogs– Wikis– Digital Stories– Other

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ReferencesNew London Group. (2000). A pedagogy of

multiliteracies: Designing social futures. In B. Cope & M. Kalantzis (Eds.), Multiliteracies: Literacy learning and the design of social futures (pp. 9-37). London ; New York: Routledge.

Swenson, J., Rozema, R., Young, C. A., McGrail, E., & Whitin, P. (2005). Beliefs about technology and the preparation of English teachers: Beginning the conversation. Contemporary Issues in Technology and Teacher Education [Online serial] Available: http://www.citejournal.org/vol5/iss3/languagearts/article1.cfm, 5(3/4).

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Photo Credits• In the Middle from

http://images.barnesandnoble.com/images/9870000/9878306.jpg

• Warriner’s from http://www.setonbooks.com/viewone.php?ToView=P-EN10-11

• Logos from Wikipedia, Edublogs, del.icio.us, YouTube, and Wikispaces are screenshots from the respective sites and copyrighted by those sites.

• Book covers from amazon.com, lulu.com, and stenhouse.com

• All other images: Troy Hicks or Red Cedar Writing Project, Michigan State University

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Produced by Troy Hickshickstro@gmail.com

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.