PLACE ll RETURN BOX to roman this ohockout from your rooord. TO AVOID FINES return on or More duo duo. DATE DUE DATE DUE DATE DUE MSU Io An Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Inotnulon Willa-9.1 Depanm. THE DEVELOPMENT AND DYNAMICS OF INTERSUBJECTIVITY: A SOCIOCULTURAL EXAMINATION OF A BEGINNING TEACHER STUDY GROUP By Mary Sue Rozendal A DISSERTATION Submitted to Michigan State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Department of Counseling, Educational PsycholOQY. and Special Education 1 996 ol a le educal lileraq in their general educati. 1 and so( mm: The soc pmVldeI Dallicip; the GFDL Observa ABSTRACT THE DEVELOPMENT AND DYNAMICS OF INTERSUBJECTIVITY: A SOCIOCULTURAI. EXAMINATION OF A BEGINNING TEACHER STUDY GROUP BY Mary Sue Rozendal The purpose of this study was to investigate the beginning development of a teacher Study group composed of three second-grade teachers, a special education teacher, and a university researcher. The group met to discuss literacy instruction for the second-grade general and special education students in their classrooms. The study group created a Ieaming community with the general and Special education teachers who were working in separate educational systems. The beginning development of the group was examined from descriptive and sociolinguistic analytical approaches. The descriptive analysis answered questions about the development of the study group over the year of meetings. The sociolinguistic analysis examined the discourse in a key meeting and provided insights into the moment-to-moment negotiations between participants. Data sources included: (a) transcribed audio- and video-tapes of the group meetings; (b) fieldnotes from the meetings and from classroom observations; (0) pre- and post-interviews; and (d) personal reflections recorded after the meetings and observations. chal ellor inlon proce revea syslel panlci the cm studenl educatr inSTI'Uct Ieaming dlfleren llllure 9 general in Order This study extends the research in teacher development and educational change by examining questions about the process of beginning a collaborative effort in an elementary school. First, the investigation of the group’s beginning informs our understandings of how participants in study groups begin the process of Ieaming together. The negotiations over the first year of the meeting revealed a process of balancing change with feelings of success in the current system. Issues of beliefs. roles, and leadership in the group influenced the participants’ conversations and Ieaming. Second, the investigation addresses questions of educational change in the current climate of special education reform. Many schools are including students with disabilities into the general education programs. It is important for educators to work together so that collaborative decisions about content and instruction, rather than mandates about educational settings, will support the Ieaming of the more diverse students population. The development of collegial relationships that uncover and negotiate differences between educators holds the potential for meaningful change and future collaboration efforts. This study suggests what is needed to support general and special education teachers’ initial efforts to examine their practice in order to meet the needs of diverse students in their classrooms. Copyright by Mary Sue Rozendal 1996 This work is dedicated to my parents. James and Eleanor Rozendal, with love and appreciation. aci tha lhei slro olhe SUPP TGCOS been me a treat ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Many people have contributed to this work and I would like to acknowledge them and thank them for their support. I would like to begin by thanking my family, especially my parents, James and Eleanor Rozendal, for their love and encouragement. Throughout my life my parents have been the strong foundation of our family and have repeatedly given of themselves to help others. Thanks for everything, Mom and Dad. I will always treasure your support and assistance. Next, my friend and mentor, Carol Sue Englert, needs a special recognition. As my graduate adviser and dissertation chairperson, she has been my support, friend. and guide for many years. Her work is an inspiration to me and to many others and I am grateful for the professional opportunities She created and guided me through. I also want to recognize and thank the members of my committee: Taffy Raphael, who has always provided wonderful feedback and encouragement; Chris Clark, who listened to my questions and provided many helpful suggestions for my work; and Stan Trent, who pushed my thinking about working collaboratively with teachers. vi anr lea. than roon Inylc thath Wonde Dave a alwaYS or card MlChlga Stan? y Thank y( dissfiinati Se breaks-lr l Also, I would like to thank members of the Michigan State University educational community. James Gavelek provided thought-provoking classes and Ieaming opportunities that changed how I think about teaching and Ieaming; and Susan Florio-Ruane contributed wonderful insights and assistance with the discourse analysis section of my dissertation. Next, other members of my family need special recognition. First, I must thank my sister, Sheryl, who put up with five years of ‘research talk” as my roommate and friend. Thank you, Sheryl, for bringing me back to earth when my ideas became too impractical, for attending concerts and activities with me that took me away from graduate school, and most of all, for being the most wonderful sister I could ever imagine. I also want to acknowledge my brother, Dave and his wife Lorelle, for their love and support. Thank you, Dave, for your always-helpful financial advice, and Lorelle, for brightening my days with a note or card to wish me well. I also wish to thank the dear friends I have come to know while at Michigan State. first, my very good friend, Cindy Brock Cindy, where do I start? You have become such a wonderful friend and I really appreciate you. Thank you for your prayers, encouragement, and Bill Knapp’s cakes! The dissertation process was just a bit less painful knowing we were in this together. Second, I owe so much to Virginia Goatley, who kept encouraging me through phone calls, and study sessions, and initiated card games for study breaks. In addition, I would like to recognize my research project friends, Tanja Bisesi, Fenice Boyd, Arthur Garmon, Troy and Mary Manage, Kathi Tarrant, and vii spenl and ti Joyce Urba You provided so much support for my Ieaming in my graduate school experience and I will always remember how much fun it was to work with you on conference proposals and research papers. lam looking forward to continuing our collaborations. Finally, I must thank the four wonderful teachers who allowed me to spend the year with them. I salute you for your commitment to your students and the excellent work you do as educators of our children. Thank you. Soli Deo Gloria viii EXa SUm ReSQ TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................................... xii LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................ xiii CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................... 1 The Dilemma of Special Education .................................................................. 2 An Alternative Approach to Change ................................................................. 4 Overview of the Study ......................................................................................... 7 CHAPTER 2 REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE ................................................................................... 11 History of the Separate Systems ..................................................................... 15 Calls for Reform of Special Education ............................................... 16 Teacher Study Group Approach ......................................................... 18 Sociocultural Theory of Learning ................................. . .................................. 19 Process of Learning ............................................................................... 22 lntersubjectivity ....................................................................................... 23 A Community of Learners ..................................................................... 27 Leadership in a Study Group ................................................... 28 Process of Learning in Study Groups .................................... 29 Motivation .................................................................................... 30 Evaluation in the Process of Participation ............................. 31 Collaboration in General and Special Education ................ 32 Examples of Teacher Study Groups ............................................................... 34 Action Research Group ......................................................................... 35 Reading Instruction Study .................................................................... 36 The Early Literacy Project ..................................................................... 38 Summary ............................................................................................................. 39 Research Questions .......................................................................................... 4O CHA CHAPT THEE» THROU CHAPTER 3 METHODS --- _ - ......................................................................................... 42 Participants . ..... -- ...45 Teachers......_--_-___. _________ -- -- - -_ - _ 49 Students ....................... - - -- 51 Students with Learning Disabilities - -- 52 At-risk Students - - - . - -..53 University Researcher -_ __ ..53 SettIng ....................................... 56 Physical Arrangement of the Classrooms ........ _-- -- 57 Context of the Meetings. .............. 63 Parental pressure _- _ - ---..64 Time constraints ...... -- ...... 65 Systemic constraints- - -- --67 Research Methods and Data Analysis ......... .----..69 Data Sources - - ----- -- - 73 Audiotapes and Videotapes - -_ __ _ 74 Participant Observation 74 Interviews -. ----- _- _ _ _ -- - -75 Conclusion .......................................................................................................... 76 CHAPTER 4 THE DEVELOPMENT OF INTERSUBJECTIVITY: LEARNING TO LEARN THROUGH CONVERSATION--- 77 Research Questions - - ________ - 77 Nature of lnteractions' In the Study Group ....... 79 Key Issues In the Meetings.-- 79 History of Interactions Between Participants' In the Study Group. 8.2 Background Meetings __ -------------- __ ------ -- 84 Participants’ Goals for the StUdy Group... ...... 8---7 Participants’ Roles In the Study Group ..... ....90 Transition Meetings ....................................................... 99 Development Meetings- .................................... 102 Beliefs of the Participants _ -- -- - 104 Beliefs about students- ..... 105 Beliefs About Ieaming and instruction ................................ 108 Beliefs about inclusion _ _ ----- 110 Ability to Make Changes in the System ........... 111 Conclusion ....................................................................................................... 1 1 1 CHAPTER 5 THE DYNAMICS OF INTERSUBJECTIVITY: ALIGNING STORYLINES AND UNDERSTANDING DIFFERENCES _ - -- 113 The Onus of Students’ Learning Problems... ............... _ 116 Episode #1: Initiation of the Writing Samples--- ----- 117 Negotiating the Floor .............................................................. 121 CHAP‘n lNFORN Congeniality vs. Collegiality - - ....... 122 Personal Agendas in the Conversation.-- 123 Episode #2: Writing Mechanics vs. Text Structure ....................... 124 Alignment of Contributions- 127 lntersubjectivity IS a Generative Process.-. - 129 Episode #3: What Students Cannot Do ------ - 130 Involvement Through Repetition ..... 133 Repetition to Move the Conversation ----- - 136 Episode #4: Relating Samples to Teachers’ Own Students ...... 137 lntersubjectivity as Connecting and Building on Contributions - . ...... 143 lntersubjectivity Without Agreement - 144 Episode #5: Writing Is a Gift -- 146 Episode #6: Instructional Changes -- 152 Expression of Beliefs: Disagreement that Leads to lntersubjectivity ..... 158 Responsibility for Instmction ------ .. .159 Use of Constructed Dialogue to Support Beliefs 163 Positioning ------------------------ --- - 164 Negotiating Beliefs About Instructional Responsibilities ............. 166 Repetition In the Face of Disagreement ---- 1 70 Assumption of Shared Understandings 171 Pauses 173 Recognizing Colleagues’ Instructional Efforts ................... 174 Repair ---...------ - - ------- 175 Conclusion ---- -- -. 178 CHAPTER 6 INFORMING OUR WORK WITH BEGINNING STUDY GROUPS 182 Conclusions -- 182 Leadership ----------------- - 1 82 Community is a Process - - 185 Motivation for Learning 186 Evaluation ------ -- ........ 1 87 Collaboration-- - - -- - - 188 Limitations -- -- 190 What Can Be Learned From This Study Group 191 Considerations for Using Study Groups to Support Inclusion ................ 193 APPENDIX A PRE- AND POST- TEACHER INTERVIEWS .......................................................... 195 APPENDIX B TRANSCRIPTION CONVENTIONS ......................................................................... 201 REFERENCES ............................................................................................................. 202 xi Table 1 Table 2 Table 3 Table 4 Table 5 Table 6 Table 7 Table 1 Table 2 Table 3 Table 4 Table 5 Table 6 Table 7 LIST OF TABLES W ............................................... 44 W ........... 46 W ............................................................ 52 WW .............. 80 Wm ............................................. 89 WWI! .............................................. 91 WW ........................................ 92 xii FIgur Figun Figure figure Figure Figure lfigure Figure FlQure FlQure FlQure Figure FlliUre Figure F'eure LIST OF FIGURES figure 1. Supports for inclusive education ................................................................ 12 Figure 2. The Vygotsky Space (Gavelek & Raphael, 1996, p. 13) ........................ 24 ngre 3. Karl’s fairy tale plan sheet. .......................................................................... 55 Figure 4. Forest School building. ................................................................................ 58 Figure 5. Sara's classroom. ......................................................................................... 59 figure 6. Jacqui's classroom. ...................................................................................... 60 Figure 7. Karl‘s classroom. ........................................................................................... 61 Figure 8. Naturalistic inquiry process (Lincoln 8 Cuba, 1985, p. 188) ................. 71 Figure 9. Percentage of participant turns in sample meetings. ............................. 92 Figure 10. Timeline of April 17 meeting. ................................................................. 113 figure 11. Features of a storyline ............................................................................. 115 Figure 12. Storylines in Episode #1. ....................................................................... 119 Figure 13. Storylines in Episode #2. ....................................................................... 126 Figure 14. lntersubjectivity in Episode #2 ............................................................... 128 Figure 15. Storylines in Episode #3. ....................................................................... 132 Figure 16. Storylines in Episode #4. ....................................................................... 140 xiii Figure 17. lntersubjectivity in Episode #4- - 142 Figure 18. Storylines in Episode #5. - ................................ 149 Figure 19. lntersubjectivity in Episode #5.-- -- -- - ___________ 151 Figure 20. Storylines in Episode #6. _____________ __ 154 figure 21. Positioning in a storyline. 165 xiv Dar CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION When teachers begin to observe each other and jointly analyze instructional problems, a new level of professional camaraderie develops. Teachers need emotional support and empathy as they go through the difficult process of change. Those involved in assisting teachers expand their teaching repertoires need to address these human issues (Gersten & Woodward, 1990, p. 14). Reform efforts aimed at improving education are taking place in the federal and state legislatures, universities, and local school districts. Reform leaders and researchers are recognizing that practicing teachers are an important aspect of educational change (Clark, 1992; Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1993; Hargreaves 8 Fullan, 1992; Sarason, 1990). Recent research suggests that effective reforms support lasting change in schools and involve teachers with opportunities to become members of a professional Ieaming community over an extended period of time (Fullan, 1991; Hargreaves, 1994; Short of al., 1992; Sparks, 1988). Many researchers have written about the professional development of teachers in teacher study groups where teachers and researchers meet to discuss current research and the teachers’ own practice (Allan & Miller, 1990; Englert et al., 1993; Englert a Tarrant, 1995; Hubbard & Power, 1993; Santa Barbara Classroom Discourse Group, 1992; Wells & Chang-Wells, 1992). Some teacher study group efforts involve teachers as participants in Ieaming about teaching, while others involve teachers as researchers about their teaching. Researchers also suggest initial group efforts 2 lack focus, but, over time, these groups may promote effective, long-lasting change (Englert 8 Tenant, 1995; Wells 8 Chang-Wells, 1992). The Dilemma of Special Education In addition to the broader educational reforms taking place in the United States, there is a dilemma in education that focuses on how teachers might best instruct Students with mild Ieaming needs such as Ieaming disabilities. Cuban (1992) defines a dilemma as being, “complex, untidy, and insoluble.” (p. 6) These are problem situations with value conflicts and entangled, ambiguous issues. Cuban differentiates between problems that have definable solutions, such as a behavior management plan for getting a class under control, and a dilemma that involves a more complex set of issues. A dilemma involves moral choices and might be addressed in different ways. Educating students who have difficulty Ieaming Is one such dilemma faced by teachers. Special education programs have been developed to help teachers meet the Ieaming needs of students who experience various difficulties. These interventions range from completely separate schools, to pull-out programs, to full inclusion where students remain in the same classroom as other students but are given extra supports. Special education programs that provide a separate system of instnIction, however, have been criticized as ineffective for Children with mild disabilities (Kirp, 1992). Critics maintain that such programs are fragmented (Martin, 1992), provide ineffective instruction (Allington, 1991 ), sustain an unequal system of education (Shapiro, Loeb 8 Bowerrnaster, 1993), and represent a legal bureaucracy (Skrtic, 1992). 3 The most recent response to these criticisms involve efforts to develop “inclusive schools” in which children with special needs are returned to general education classrooms with some special education support services (Paul, Yang, Adiegbola 8 Morse, 1995: Snell 8 Drake, 1994). Inclusion is being advocated by many educators, administrators, and policymakers on the basis of educational, civil-rights. and economic rationale. Fuchs and Fuchs’ (1994) article on the inclusive education movement describes inclusive education as differing from previous mainstreaming efforts such as the Regular Education Initiative (REI). They describe inclusion as a movement that is becoming radicalized in its efforts to “eliminate special education” rather than advocate for “cooperation between special and general education” (p. 304). Similarly, special education reforms are not included in the broader educational reform initiatives such as Goals 2000 (Hocutt 8 McKinney, 1995) even though special education reforms involve general education teachers as well as special education teachers. General education teachers are becoming increasingly responsible for educating special needs students, either as part of a team effort, or alone. Thus, it is a serious problem that issues of special education are not being addressed in the broader educational reform initiatives and that the two reform efforts are occurring as parallel rather than integrated efforts. In the broader reform efforts, however, both general and special education teachers are encouraged to begin collaboration (Paul et al., 1995). To facilitate this change, educators need to address questions about the struggles and negotiations that accompany the beginning of the change 4 process. Greater understanding of difficult negotiations that occur during the initial phase can inform efforts to develop a professional Ieaming community for teachers that effectively focuses on the instructional needs of special education students. Change takes time. Educational reformers often fail to allow teachers time to examine practice and make thoughtful changes (Perez, Danforth, Martinez, Houck 8 Colucci, 1995). Instead teachers are asked to cope with administrative mandates and decisions based on current fads and popular beliefs (Weatherly 8 Lipsky, 1992). Teachers need to be involved in the process of change and need time to work through beliefs and the risks associated with making changes in their practice (Fullan, 1991). An Alternative Approach to Change This dissertation focuses on an alternative approach to special education reforms that uses the teacher collaboration feature of the educational reforms to bridge the general and special education systems. The goal was to develop a school-based teacher study group involving three general education teachers, one special education teacher, and a university researcher. The educators met to discuss instructional issues that might bridge the differences between the general and special education. Prior to this study, the general and Special education teachers had few opportunities to discuss instmctional issues and I, the researcher, had no prior interactions with the teachers. The aim of this dissertation is to analyze the ways in which the study group participants negotiated meanings and beliefs across 12 meetings in a school year. In 5 setting up the study I argued that criticisms being launched against special education would be better addressed by first building bridges between general and special education so that teachers begin Ieaming about each other and supporting each other rather than having special education eliminated. In this way, instruction for students with special Ieaming needs would be strengthened by cooperation and discussion rather than weakened by conflict and dissension. Too often the supports in place for students are sacrificed in attempts to move quickly to an integrated educational setting. In other words, rather than eliminate the special education system, means for general and special education teachers to discuss the students they are servicing and the ways in which instruction for students with special needs might be more coordinated need to be provided. Initially, I had hoped that bringing together dedicated teachers, committed to improving instmction for students with Ieaming disabilities, would result in the development of collaborative instructional arrangements for literacy instruction, a de-emphasis on phonics skills in the special education instruction in favor of a more holistic approach to literacy, and a commitment to continue meeting and studying literacy instruction after the study had concluded. However, I was committed to working with the teachers without imposing my agenda and in doing so I found the development of the collaborative types of interactions by the teachers to be a much slower process, in which a variety of deep-seated beliefs needed to be discussed and negotiated. By engaging in the process, the teachers and I learned about one another and the different th is te I55 Inl ag) 6 perspectives we had about Ieaming and instruction for students, particularly special needs students. I saw that teachers, who on the surface appeared to have very similar beliefs and instructional practices, were actually very different. The teachers talked about the idea of inclusion and collaborative teaching arrangements between general and special education and they wondered how it might be implemented in their school; however, they remained very committed to their current system of pull-out resource room instmction for students with Ieaming disabilities and believed that it was benefiting such students in the general education classrooms. In the process of meeting with the teachers in the Study group and spending time observing teachers and students in both the general and special education classrooms, I realized that I needed to narrow the study to focus on the beginning development of the study group and to examine the discourse that made up the conversations between the teachers and myself in the study group setting. Therefore, the focus of the study shifted from an examination of the development and implementation of innovative literacy instnIction based on teachers’ Ieaming in a study group to a focus on the negotiations of the teachers participation in the beginning study group as they discussed literacy issues and instructional difficulties. To do this, I examined the year of meetings in an ethnographic analysis and then closely examined a breakthrough meeting in which teachers began to develop a sense of lntersubjectivity with and without agreement in their conversation. 7 The construct of “lntersubjeva framed the analysis as both a developmental and dynamic feature characterizing the beginning of collaboration (Matusov, 1996; Rommetveit, 1985; Vygotsky, 1978; Wells, 1993). The discourse of the participants in the study group, and their beliefs as shared in interviews and written reflections, were examined in order to answer questions about the development of the teachers’ Ieaming in the study group setting. Overview of the Study The organization of this dissertation provides information about the methods and results of this research and proposes issues to consider as educators begin collaborative efforts such as study groups designed to bridge the general and special education systems. Chapter 2 presents a review of the literature that sets the conceptual framework for the study. This chapter examines the literature on special education and inclusion to situate this study in the larger discussion of educational reform. The sociocultural theories of Ieaming that provided the basis for the use of a dialogic, ongoing study group format to support teachers’ Ieaming and development is discussed. Also examines is the literature on educational reform, particularly teachers’ beliefs, roles and the school context as factors supporting or inhibiting Change efforts. Finally, the literature on discourse analysis and in particular the application of this methodology to the analysis of conversation in teacher study groups is examined. . 8 Chapter 3, describes the context and methods for this study. As this is a qualitative study in a naturalistic setting of the school, the context plays an important role in the process and findings of the research. Therefore, this chapter describes the school setting, the process of the group’s formation, the methods used to answer several research questions, and the research methodologies used in the analysis of my data. Both ethnographic and discourse analysis methods are discussed and connected with the particular questions each will address. Chapter 4 focuses on an ethnographic analysis of the 12 meetings across the school year, containing reports of the influences on teachers’ Ieaming and development as expressed in the discourse of the study group meetings, observational fieldnotes and the interviews of the teachers. Factors are examined which contribute to the Ieaming process of the participants in the study group and the development of lntersubjectivity among the participants. While I make the case that it is important to allow teachers from general and special education to begin a dialogue in order to better meet the needs of special education students, I want to Show that the study group setting may not be a quick fix or perfect solution to the problems facing teachers In a world of special education reform. Participation in a study group alone will not solve the dilemmas teachers face as they wrestle with issues of instmction for students with diverse needs. However, I will describe how such participation in a discourse community of teachers and researchers may be a better beginning toward the integration of special needs students into general education rather 9 than a toodown mandate in which teachers are left to make superficial accommodations (Weatherly 8 Lipsky, 1992). Chapter 5 contains a two-level analysis of one meeting, on April 14, 1994. I examine the discourse patterns of intersubjectivity with agreement across the first section of the meeting. The teachers and I began shifting from a congenial style of interaction, in which participants simply accepted the contributions to the conversation without elaboration or challenges, to a more collegial style in which we discussed differences in our opinions and beliefs. The second level of analysis examines the discourse of the teachers when one contributes her beliefs about literacy instruction that conflicted with the beliefs of the other teachers in the group. This prompted a breakthrough in the development of lntersubjectivity as defined by Matusov (1996). While we did not reach the point of overlap in our ideas and beliefs, some assumptions of shared understanding were breached and we began to understand each other’s beliefs and the personal context behind our contributions to the group conversations, which Matusov calls 'intersubjectivity without agreement.“ Chapter 6 concludes by addressing the limitations of this study, the implications it has for the field of general and special education, and my goals for future research efforts with general and special education teacher study groups. It is hoped that this study will raise questions about what is needed to support teachers’ efforts at examining their practice in order to meet the needs of diverse students in their classrooms and should help define the parameters 10 for a follow-up series of case studies focused on the collaborative efforts of general and special education teachers (Miles 8 Huberman, 1994). CHAPTER 2 REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE The discussion of the development and dynamics of intersubjectivity begins with a description of how this study is situated in the broader field of educational research. Prior research and theory informs the questions posed and the perspective from which the questions are answered. This process of developing intersubjectivity between general and special educators is multi- faceted and the different parts of the process are necessarily intertwined. However, for the purposes of discussion they are examined separately. figure 1 provides an overview of the design of the intervention and situates the study within the framework of the broader issues of special education reform. This study, with its focus on intersubjectivity, describes the beginning of a study group designed to support special education reform efforts. As Figure 1 illustrates, inclusion or inclusionary practices are the goal of many special education reform efforts. Inclusion may take many forms of services for students, but the primary goal is that teachers from general and Special education begin working together in order to provide a cohesive Ieaming experience for students with special needs. Meeting that goal, however, involves a process of Ieaming how to collaborate and rethink traditional ways of teaching. The movement toward inclusion often begins with calls for reform. These calls have been coming from educators (i.e., Lipsky 8 Gartner, 1989; Stainback 8 Stainback, 1991), legislatures (i.e., Michigan Department of Education, 11 12 cal of specia = . cation reforu Inclusion and/or Inclusive Practices Context (where learning takes place) Content and Instruction (the “what" and “how" of learning) Sociocultural Theories of Learning (emphasis on discourse to support learning) Calls for Reform In Special Education Legislatures Popular Media General Education Special Education University Research Figure 1. Supports for inclusive education. 1992) Howe about SOCIOI leami instnli Figure with a learnil theory the ed ongoir paliiCi; and D1 to coll. QVOUp‘ Iearltir the 99 .3393, 1 3 1992). and the popular media (i.e., Shapiro, Loeb, 8 Bowerrnaster, 1993). However, the Inclusion movement is seldom grounded in a theoretical literature about teaching and Ieaming. In this study, the design of the teacher study group was based on a sociocultural theory of Ieaming which in turn, was designed to support the Ieaming of the participants as they reflected on issues related to literacy instruction for students with special Ieaming needs. The foundation level of Figure 1 represents the grounding of the research in a sociocultural perspective with an emphasis on discourse within a community of learners to support Ieaming. The next level in Figure 1, shows another key aspect of the sociocultural theory of Ieaming, the development of intersubjectivity between participants of the educational community. This is accomplished through participation in an ongoing discourse among the participants. lntersubjectivity occurs as participants in a Ieaming community develop an understanding of the beliefs and perspectives of each other. From this understanding, participants are able to collaborate and build knowledge that furthers the common interests of the group. lntersubjectivity is particularly crucial when the participants in the Ieaming community come from very diverse backgrounds or “cultures“, such as the general education or special education systems, or the university. In such cases, participants must negotiate different experiences, perspectives, and beliefs. Si th 14 As intersubjectivity develops in the reform process, talk about content and instruction for students with Special Ieaming needs is vital. figure 1 represents the negotiation of meanings related to two key issues: (a) content and instruction, and (b) context. Talk about educational reform has often focused on the context for Ieaming (i.e., full inclusion, pull-out, or the full continuum of services); educators, administrators and legislatures have made decisions about the setting for students’ Ieaming before considering content (what is to be learned) and instructional (how the content is to be learned) issues. The intervention in this study, however, was designed from the perspective that content and instnIctional decisions should determine the context for students’ Ieaming. Once educators are able to develop intersubjectivity about “what" and 'how" to teach a more diverse population of students, they will be in a position to consider where such Ieaming is to take place. In this way, how students are taught is not dependent on an arbitrary setting, but on a setting that facilitates the accomplishment of the instmctional goals that teachers have set for the students. This chapter is a review of what the research suggests about the development of intersubjectivity between general and special educators in the Ieaming community of the study group. First, the history of the dual system (general and special education) and mainstreaming efforts is described. Second, the sociocultural theory is explained as it relates to the participation of the adults in a teacher study group. Third, particular attention is given to the construct of intersubjectivity between participants as it is central to the analysis '- 15 of the discourse in the study group meetings. Finally, other recent Studies are described that have focused on teacher study groups as the avenue for change and educational reform. History of the Separate Systems In many school districts, special education is a separate system in which special education teachers have few opportunities to talk with general education teachers. It is characterized by smaller class sizes to meet the specific needs of students with special learning needs. Instruction in the special education settings has been characterized as reductionistic instruction designed for individual students who have not been successful in the general education system (Allington, 1991). Originally, this dual system of education was designed to address problems of access to an equal education for students with special needs. On the other hand, general education frequently consisted of large class sizes and instruction that was geared toward the “average” student rather than “individual“ students. Teachers had limited opportunities to collaborate and be involved in the problemsolving efforts of broader school issues. Students with difficulties in general education were often referred to and placed in special education programs because many teachers believed students with disabilities should be taught by special education teachers who had expertise and skills to teach special needs students. Similarly, the university culture has been distant from classrooms and teachers. Much of the research done at universities has involved decontextualized studies of Ieaming conducted in laboratory-type settings. (I! it inc & l 19: 16 Classroom teachers were seldom participants in designing and implementing interventions to improve their instruction and their students’ Ieaming. In recent years, this gap between research and practice has dramatically changed with the development of teacher-research groups, action research (in which teachers design and study their own teaching and their students’ Ieaming), and study groups where teachers and researchers meet together to discuss various educational efforts of interest to them as participants. Winn There have been many discussions about the problems with a dual system of education. Despite the expectation that a continuum of services would be provided after PL 94-142, these services have become disjointed. In fact, many educators proposed that this continuum of services is not an effective educational system (e.g., Allington, 1991; Lipsky 8 Gartner, 1991). Proponents of the Regular Education Initiative [REI] in the 1970’s and 1980’s pushed educators to reconsider general education classroom as the primary setting where students with special needs should receive their instruction to the maximum extent possible (Deno, 1970). Over the past twenty-five years, this concern has been amplified to include current calls for the elimination of the cascade of services in the special education system in favor of the total inclusion of special education students in the general education system (Lipsky 8 Gartner, 1991; Reynolds, Wang 8 Walberg, 1987; Stainback 8 Stainback, 1991). SE in: Sel edUC iOcO 18 education classrooms for their former students who are again failing in the general education curriculum (Bauwens, Hourcade 8 Friend, 1989). Other educators are calling for greater restraint and a more complete investigation of the ways to improve the instructional practices in special education in response to the calls for reform. These educators have argued for a retention of the continuum of services for special needs students (Bateman, 1994; Kauffman, 1991; 1993; Kubicek, 1994). Kauffman (1993) warns that structural changes in the educational system will be ineffective in improving the education of special needs students unless teacher-student interactions in general education Ieaming contexts also improve. Fuchs and Fuchs (1994) recognize that the global discussion of special education may not be the appropriate background for weighing the merits of inclusion. Special education involves students with a diverse range of concerns who have many different cognitive and social needs. Some students may not benefit from a reduction of separate services while other students, who may have had impoverished instmction and inappropriate social models in self-contained schools may be able to have more of their cognitive and social needs met in general education settings. W This study examined an alternative approach to inclusion efforts that focused on an intervention that brought teachers from general and special education together in a study group with a university researcher to discuss ways to coordinate the Ieaming experiences for students with Ieaming disabilities. Th Ql‘ 3U I93 Oth 19 This approach involved collaboration in a study group setting where teachers engaged in inquiry about instructional practices for students with Ieaming disabilities and other special needs. Although many reformers have proposed forming collaborative partnerships between universities and the schools (of which teacher study groups would be a part), few studies addressing these partnerships exist that combine special education, general education and university researchers in order to examine questions about what is needed to support collaboration between the diverse participants (Fager, Andrews, Shepherd 8 Quinn, 1993; Paul, Duchnowski 8 Danforth, 1993). Sociocultural Theory of Learning The sociocultural theory of Ieaming provided the foundation for both the design of the study group and the analysis of the results of the intervention. The teacher study group was a setting intended to support the development of teachers’ knowledge. In the sociocultural theory, knowledge is not viewed as something in the world that learners need to acquire, but rather it is seen as a construction of one’s understanding of the world through interactions with others. Knowledge is developed through the active participation by learners in Ieaming activities rather than through a transmission of knowledge from one person to another. The sociocultural perspective has its foundation in the ideas of theorists such as Vygotsky (1978), Wertsch (1991), and Mead (1934). In this view learners are active constructors of knowledge in dialogic interactions with others (Vygotsky, 1978). Wertsch (1985) expands this definition by saying, ESE WOI tog) Olhe Cleve UHdE leer”, 20 “The basic goal of a sociocultural approach to mind is to create an account of human mental processes that recognizes the essential relationship between these processes and their cultural, historical, and institutional settings“ (Wertsch, 1985, p. 6). Learning involves the relationship between a learner’s mental processes and the cultural, historical, and institutional settings in which the learner participates. This challenges the assumptions of traditional conceptions of Ieaming. Learning is not seen as the ‘transmission of decontextualized skills and items of knowledge which, having been acquired, may subsequently be put to use in ‘real’ activities“ (Wells, in press). Instead, Ieaming develops through talk and interactions with others. There are three assumptions that provide the basis of the sociocultural theory of Ieaming that informed the development of the teacher study group (Raphael 8 Hiebert, 1996). These three assumptions guided the development of the study group involving general and special education teachers. The first assumption is that learners construct knowledge through language. In other words, participants in a social context create understandings and knowledge together through the negotiations of meanings in language interactions with others. The social context, therefore, is the foundation for intellectual and social development. In the context of the study group, participants negotiated understandings of what and how to teach students with disabilities. The second assumption is that “higher psychological processes“ are learned through their meaningful use across multiple contexts. From the sociocultural perspective, a study group could be considered an ideal type of an an 21 Ieaming setting that would facilitate teachers’ Ieaming. A study group involves the use of language and dialogue to pose ideas, negotiate opinions, and respond to others. These ways of interacting are called “higher psychological processes,“ a term created by Vygotsky (1978) to represent what is learned through interaction as compared with what is learned simply through biological processes that develop without social mediation. Learning about content and instruction involves higher psychological processes and teachers’ interactions with other educators about these things is vital to challenging the existing practices of teachers and guiding participants to consider alternative practices in the multiple contexts of their daily instruction. The third assumption of the sociocultural theory is that learning is facilitated through interactions among learners and more knowledgeable others. In a study group, different participants at times may act in the role of more knowledgeable other. In some collaborative teacher efforts, such as the professional development model, there is an effort to insure that participants have equal status in terms of the recognition of both the more and less knowledgeable participants. In other groups, there may be an agenda or goal set by participants from a university or other professional development organization that bestows power on a leader who acts as the “more knowledgeable other“ in the setting. However, in the design of the teacher study group in this study, it was intended that expertise would be distributed among participants in a flexible way according to the particular backgrounds and interests of the group members. the SDI in ‘ Get 9% thei. 17 Many advocates of inclusion charge that inclusive schools should not require that any student leave the general education classroom to receive services or attend special education classrooms (Lipsky 8 Gartner, 1991; Reynolds et al., 1987). AS a result of the arguments for inclusion, several efforts are being made toward eliminating the special education system. Governments, such as the Michigan state legislature, are mandating inclusive education (Michigan Department of Education, 1992) and several special education schools in Michigan are being closed (G. Shuart, personal communication, 1996). These efforts at inclusion are primarily directed by administrative or legislative actions that mandate the return of special education students to the general education classrooms. Returning students with special needs to general education classrooms addresses the context or location for Instructing students with disabilities. Such efforts do not address the deeper, more profound changes in content or instruction that will ensure the academic progress of Special education students in those settings. There has been little dscussion about transforming the nature of instruction in general education to not only accommodate, but capitalize on the advantages inherent in a more diverse student population. In essence, special education students are being returned to the same educational settings in which they were previously unsuccessful without considering the development of new teaching practices. The mandated return of students to general education classrooms also forces the special education teacher to lose their expert role as they become aides and trouble-Shooters in the general lo 18 education classrooms for their former students who are again failing in the general education curriculum (Bauwens, Hourcade 8 Friend, 1989). Other educators are calling for greater restraint and a more complete investigation of the ways to improve the instructional practices in special education in response to the calls for reform. These educators have argued for a retention of the continuum of services for special needs students (Bateman, 1994; Kauffman, 1991; 1993; Kubicek, 1994). Kauffman (1993) warns that structural changes in the educational system will be ineffective in improving the education of special needs students unless teacher-student interactions in general education Ieaming contexts also improve. Fuchs and Fuchs (1994) recognize that the global discussion of special education may not be the appropriate background for weighing the merits of inclusion. Special education involves students with a diverse range of concerns who have many different cognitive and social needs. Some students may not benefit from a reduction of separate services while other Students, who may have had impoverished instruction and inappropriate social models in self-contained schools may be able to have more of their cognitive and social needs met in general education settings. W This study examined an alternative approach to inclusion efforts that focused on an intervention that brought teachers from general and special education together in a study group with a university researcher to discuss ways to coordinate the Ieaming experiences for students with Ieaming disabilities. i8 I84 Der SUCi 'Ean Oihe 19 This approach involved collaboration in a study group setting where teachers engaged in inquiry about instructional practices for students with Ieaming disabilities and other special needs. Although many reformers have proposed forming collaborative partnerships between universities and the schools (of which teacher study groups would be a part), few studies addressing these partnerships exist that combine special education, general education and university researchers in order to examine questions about what is needed to support collaboration between the diverse participants (Fager, Andrews, Shepherd 8 Quinn, 1993; Paul, Duchnowski 8 Danforth, 1993). Sociocultural Theory of Learning The sociocultural theory of Ieaming provided the foundation for both the design of the study group and the analysis of the results of the intervention. The teacher study group was a setting intended to support the development of teachers’ knowledge. In the sociocultural theory, knowledge is not viewed as something in the world that learners need to acquire, but rather it is seen as a construction of one’s understanding of the world through interactions with others. Knowledge is developed through the active participation by learners in Ieaming activities rather than through a transmission of knowledge from one person to another. The sociocultural perspective has its foundation in the ideas of theorists such as Vygotsky (1978), Wertsch (1991), and Mead (1934). In this view learners are active constructors of knowledge in dialogic interactions with others (Vygotsky, 1978). Wertsch (1985) expands this definition by saying, W (R. of ' as: Wor leg. othr dev. Undl 'earr SOCIQ 20 “The basic goal of a sociocultural approach to mind is to create an account of human mental processes that recognizes the essential relationship between these processes and their cultural, historical, and institutional settings“ (Wertsch, 1985, p. 6). Learning involves the relationship between a learner’s mental processes and the cultural, historical, and institutional settings in which the learner participates. This challenges the assumptions of traditional conceptions of Ieaming. Learning is not seen as the “transmission of decontextualized skills and items of knowledge which, having been acquired, may subsequently be put to use in ‘real’ activities“ (Wells, in press). Instead, Ieaming develops through talk and interactions with others. There are three assumptions that provide the basis of the sociocultural theory of Ieaming that informed the development of the teacher study group (Raphael 8 Hiebert, 1996). These three assumptions guided the development of the study group involving general and special education teachers. The first assumption is that learners construct knowledge through language. In other words, participants in a social context create understandings and knowledge together through the negotiations of meanings in language interactions with others. The social context, therefore, is the foundation for intellectual and social development. In the context of the study group, participants negotiated understandings of what and how to teach students with disabilities. The second assumption is that “higher psychological processes“ are Ieamed through their meaningful use across multiple contexts. From the sociocultural perspective, a study group could be considered an ideal type of thr re pn thr prt ins will tha in it lacil 0th mon PM have knov set t We knor Stud} amo, and i 21 Ieaming setting that would facilitate teachers’ Ieaming. A study group involves the use of language and dialogue to pose ideas, negotiate opinions, and respond to others. These ways of interacting are called “higher psychological processes,“ a term created by Vygotsky (1978) to represent what is learned through interaction as compared with what is learned simply through biological processes that develop without social mediation. Learning about content and instruction involves higher psychological processes and teachers’ interactions with other educators about these things is vital to challenging the existing practices of teachers and guiding participants to consider alternative practices in the multiple contexts of their daily instnIction. The third assumption of the sociocultural theory is that learning is facilitated through interactions among learners and more knowledgeable others. In a study group, different participants at times may act in the role of more knowledgeable other. In some collaborative teacher efforts, such as the professional development model, there is an effort to insure that participants have equal status in terms of the recognition of both the more and less knowledgeable participants. In other groups, there may be an agenda or goal set by participants from a university or other professional development organization that bestows power on a leader who acts as the “more knowledgeable other“ in the setting. However, in the design of the teacher study group in this study, it was intended that expertise would be distributed among participants in a flexible way according to the particular backgrounds and interests of the group members. ii if 22 BracesuLLaamino Figure 2 represents the process of Ieaming based on the sociocultural perspective. In interactions with others, Ieaming is thought to occur on both an interpsychological plane (between people) and an intrapsychological plane (within an individual). As seen in the figure, the four quadrants represent four phases of the Ieaming cycle. Quadrant l is the public/social quadrant in which ideas are presented and negotiated in conversations. This is the beginning of the Ieaming cycle and is the social foundation of Ieaming. Conversations, questions, interactions with print are a few examples of the kinds of language- based, public activities that begin the Ieaming cycle. From this public and social beginning, individuals appropriate the ideas shared and discussed in the public space of quadrant l. The social discourse becomes private as the talk initiated in the conversations of quadrant l are appropriated by individuals. This phase of the Ieaming cycle is represented by quadrant II. In this quadrant, ideas intersect with the individuals’ cultural and personal histories that include their beliefs, past experiences, and the other communities and cultures of which they are a part. The intersection of ideas transform what was appropriated frOm quadrant l as the individual makes the ideas their own through interpretation. Individuals in a group transform ideas presented in the public realm in different ways given the individuals’ histories and beliefs. The third step in the Ieaming cycle involves the publication of the transformed ideas. Individuals share the ideas that have been transformed with 23 others so that the ideas can be renegotiated and conventionalized for the group. As individuals publicize their transformations, the participants can appropriate and transform the ideas in a generative and negotiated fashion. At this point the process begins again and the cycle continues overtime (see the bottom section of Figure 2). Thus, there is a need for ongoing negotiations in order for different participants in a conversation to develop mutual understandings among themselves and to push the development of new knowledge. I | | . l' 'I The sociocultural theory describes the Ieaming process for individuals within a social setting. It is this process that provides the foundation for the piece of the study examined in this dissertation. The beginning effort of the teacher study group involved a process of developing a community of learners. Central to this process was the role of intersubjectivity among the participants in the group. lntersubjectivity is defined as the “mutual belief of the participants in an interaction that, by virtue of the uttering and uptake of communicative acts, they are jointly attending to the some aspect of the situation in which they are involved. (Wells, 1993, p. 6)“ In other words, in discourse, intersubjectivity occurs when the different participants in a conversation initiate and respond to ideas in ways that Signal that they are considering and understanding the same ideas and concepts. Rommetveit describes this process by saying, “The basic riddle . . . is rather how states of intersubjectivity and shared social reality can FiQUre J l Conventionalizatlon Transformation Private 'l‘. v“’l".~~'~. Past , f ' ~ . ‘ ~ e." 'f ~» . * s \ \ ‘ \ *7" ..... V I .. ~ ‘ ‘ i ’.?R ‘ ‘ \ [‘9' . . \ ‘ \ . 5‘“ ' s \ L ‘ ‘ I V \ ‘ s /"' ‘ ’ h . . \ \ ~ ‘ § ‘ \ ~ / \ ‘ \ . - s ‘ ' ‘ \ \ s \ \ ~ \ \ Present Figure 2. The Vygotsky Space (Gavelek 8 Raphael, 1996, p. 13). OVI 'sh. For 8her whet Dela] 25 be attained in encounters between different “private worlds“ (Rommetveit, 1985 p.187). Interactions in the public realm of joint activity (such as in a group conversation) are appropriated by participants into their private realm where past histories, beliefs, sociocultural experiences transform their experience to create individual understandings of the activity. Through continued publication of their ideas in future joint activities, negotiations and oonventionalization of these ideas can continue with other members of the community. Vygotsky (1978) says this process of intersubjectivity develops as a congruence between members’ individual ideas and those of other participants in the public realm. Matusov (1996), however, describes intersubjectivity as the coordination of participants’ contributions in the conversational activity. Considering intersubjectivity as coordination rather than congruence allows for members to understand others’ perspectives while maintaining their own, possibly alternate perspectives. lntersubjectivity results from group members fitting together or coordinating their different perspectives which may or may not overlap. Matusov (1996) explains that intersubjectivity has often been defined as “shared“ understandings and meanings by participants in sociocultural activity. For example, Wertsch (1985) says, “lntersubjectivity exists when interlocutors share some aspect of their situation definitions“ (p. 159). He continues, “Thus when interlocutors enter into a communicative context, they may have different perspectives of only a vague interpretation of what is taken for granted and what the utterances are intended to convey. Through semiotically mediated inte inte indi isc: pres inter. indi VII relatic does i aIIOwS i 26 ‘negotiation,’ however, they create a temporarily shared social world, a state of intersubjectivity“ (p. 160). Matusov argues that the conception of intersubjectivity as “shared definitions“ leads to a static comparison of individuals and their actions, perspectives and goals and focuses only on what is common among them. Analysis of individuals involved in joint activity thus focuses on the overlap of individuals’ contributions so that greater overlap presumes greater intersubjectivity and less agreement shows a lack of intersubjectivity. Matusov (1996) argues that “intersubjectivity as a coordination of individual contributions in joint activity more accurately captures the dialectic relationship between understanding and misunderstanding in joint activity than does intersubjectivity as Sharing“ (p. 29). This conception of intersubjectivity allows researchers to examine any joint activity involving both agreement and disagreement, and focuses the analysis on the coordination of the participants’ contributions. Matusov calls this type of analysis a “participatory approach“ to the study of intersubjectivity in which “misunderstandings, conflicts, divergent perspectives, opposition of ideas, resistance to communication and other disharmonious instances“ comprise alternative forms of intersubjectivity (p. 29). lntersubjectivity is not limited to a particular event, but is an ongoing process involving many different sociocultural activities. It “involves and exceeds immediate joint activity in the form of resulting experience from the joint activity: the participants learn new skills, roles, knowledge that are coordinated with the former joint activity. Thus, even an unsuccessful bid for joint activity, or 9ft hat iea The ieac 27 interrupted joint activity can provide a basis for future coordination of participant contributions and thus intersubjectivity“ (Matusov, 1996, p. 27). Therefore, Ieaming for teachers is seen as “an integral and inseparable aspect of social practice.“ It is closely tied to “engaged, dilemma-driven“ activity, in which “agent, activity and the world mutually constitute each other“ (Lave 8 Wenger, 1991, pp. 31, 33). Learning is not only the process of adding to the learner’s knowledge. Instead, Ieaming involves a “process of transformation of participation itself,“ which occurs as all of the participants in a conversation transform their roles and their understanding in the activities in which they participate“ (Rogoff, 1994, p. 209). The process of negotiating participants’ beliefs about instruction and the roles different teachers play in the instruction of students is a process that develops their beliefs, but also changes how teachers see themselves and others in the context of the school community. Wm One important aspect of the sociocultural perspective is the development of communities in which ongoing dialogue is privileged to support members’ growth and Ieaming. Historically, teachers have taught in relative isolation and have had few opportunities to interact in ongoing discussions about theories of Ieaming and instructional innovations (Deal 8 Chatman, 1989; Lortie, 1975). The formation of teacher study groups is one way that educators can participate in a community of learners to support their own continued learning about teaching (Hamilton 8 Richardson, 1995). ire r Oi 8U; deb 28 Rogcff describes a community-of-leamers model that is grounded in the sociocultural theory of “Ieaming as a process of transformation of participation in which responsibility and autonomy are both desired“ (Rogoff, 1994, p. 210). In this model, learning occurs as roles are transformed and understandings are deveIOped in the shared activities in which a person participates. A community of learners features a group in which all roles in the community are active, all roles are asymmetrical; they are unequal and vary within the community and across different communities, and the settings for Ieaming may be either informal or apprenticeship in nature. A community of learners is developed through the following processes: (1) leadership, (2) emphasis on the process of Ieaming, (3) motivation inherent in the activities, (4) evaluation during the process of participation, and (5) collaboration (Rogoff, 1994). Each of these processes is examined as they pertain to the design and implementation of the teacher study groups in this research project. | I l . . SI | E The first aspect of a community of learners is the facilitation of the community by a leader who understands how to support members’ transformation of their participation in the group. Leadership is one of the active roles in the community. It is not an authoritarian leadership, but one that supports the participants in the community to make choices and monitors the development of the participation by the individuals in the activities of the th Dir d9) Sim 29 community. The community is not led by dictation, yet it is not left completely to its own devices. In a teacher study group, the leadership supports teachers’ Ieaming and the changes they make in their group participation and in their participation in their classroom communities. Traditional staff development models where an “expert“ comes in for one day meetings or short term conferences are still the primary method of supporting teachers’ Ieaming. In this transmissive model an expert tells teachers what to do to improve their teaching and the teachers are expected to remember and do what they were told. Rogcff (1994) argues that this type of Ieaming effort may result in the memorization Ieaming of new ideas that could be rearticulated, but a community of learners in which teachers’ Ieaming results in changes in their participation will result in the teachers’ use of the knowledge and skills they have learned. Leadership in such an endeavor must be able to support the changes in teachers’ participation and use of their Ieaming. W A key aspect of collaborative interventions such as a teacher study group is the process of the staff development itself and the effects this process has on the teachers’ beliefs and classroom practices. AS Rogcff (1994) points out, the process of Ieaming is important for the participants in a community of learners to go through. Knowledge learned in other teacher study groups or staff development endeavors cannot simply be “poured into“ a newly beginning study group or staff devel0pment effort. However, the process of developing Di Si” 30 and making these changes take time and many teacher groups beginning collaboration efforts will not see massive instructional changes at the beginning of their efforts. Effective, long-lasting change seems to occur after a difficult beginning lacking focus and development (Englert 8 Tarrant, 1995; Wells 8 Chang-Wells, 1992). Hamilton and Richardson (1995) discuss school context and teacher belief issues that seem to support of hinder the development of study groups. It seems that these issues would be particularly apparent in a study group of general and special educators given the separate contexts of the traditional systems and the different beliefs held by the teachers in general and special education. AS both general and special education teachers are encouraged to begin collaborative efforts, we need to address questions about the struggles and negotiations that accompany the beginning of the change process and the development of a professional Ieaming community for teachers. I I l' I' The third aspect of a community of learners is the motivation inherent in the Ieaming activities and the responsibility members have for their own choices. This again differs from interventions that are mandated from administrations or governmental authorities. Even when a university researcher comes into a school to do a research project, the motivation for teachers’ participation is external to their own interests and thus the intervention is often short-lived. In a community of learners that effects changes in the members’ participation, motivation for making the Changes is mated in the members Ell Te. Lil Dra Tear 31 themselves. Accompanying the motivation for change is the members’ responsibility for the choices they make as a result of their Ieaming. In a study group that focuses general and special educators on the questions of instruction for students with Ieaming difficulties, the content, instmctional, and context choices that result from their learning together are owned by the teachers rather than from an outside source such as an administration or university researcher. The responsibility for those choices resides with the teachers and they have more ownership in the results of their efforts with the students (Sarason, 1990). In a community of learners evaluation is an ongoing process. As ideas are assimilated, transformed and publicized, individuals must be monitoring and evaluating their developing understandings and their interpretation of the understandings of others. Through this evaluation, members of a community of learners are able to develop intersubjectivity because they are being reflective about their Ieaming in the group process. One important feature of the community must be in place for this evaluation to take place. Members of the community must form collegial relationships in which ideas can be challenged, questioned, and negotiated. Little (1982; 1990) describes four aspects of collegial teaching relationships: (1) the primary talk between teachers is about teaching, both theoretically and practically; (2) teachers share planning and preparation of their instruction; (3) teachers frequently observe each other’s teaching; and (4) teachers train bit that 32 together and teach each other about teaching. Barth (1990) contrasts this with congenial relationships in which participants “get along with each other“ (p. 30). Teachers talk about social issues of the day and get to know each other’s likes and dislikes over a cup of coffee in the teachers’ lounge. Barth acknowledges the importance of congenial relationships in schools, but stresses the importance of collegial relationships to support teachers’ ongoing Ieaming and professional development. Teachers in a community of learners will form collegial relationships that support personal evaluation, and evaluation of each other in an ongoing effort to make improvements in their teaching efforts. (Jill I' 'G IIS 'IEI l' Finally, collaboration is vital to the facilitation of Ieaming in a community of Ieamers. One component of the attempts to bridge the separate systems of general and special education, coordinate educational services for special needs students with the general education system, and effect instructional Change to support special needs students’ Ieaming is to develop collaboration models between general and special education teachers (Bauwens et al., 1989; West & Idol, 1990). Early conceptions of collaboration focused on consultation where the special education teacher was seen as a consultant who was the expert and could inform the practices of the general education teacher. Johnson and Pugach (1992) recognize that this might still be a part of the collaboration efforts of teachers, but they recommend multidimensional collaborative relationships that are mutual, dynamic arrangements in which general and special education Te M: Cc Slrt SOIL 33 teachers play different roles. They note that general education teachers and special education teachers bring differing expertise to collaborative relationships. While special educators might be more equipped to make curricular adaptations in response to special needs of students, the general education teacher might be more familiar with large-group instnIctional techniques that may or may not facilitate certain adaptations. Johnson and Pugach (1992) describe four types of collaborative relationships embodied in both consultative and collaborative relationships: (1) prescriptive--in which one teacher is typically the expert and provides solutions to questions; (2)1acilitative--in which one teacher or group of teachers lead and guide the thinking of colleague(s) to help them devise a solution to their problems; (3) inforrnative--in which one teacher or group of teachers informs the practice and thinking of other teachers; and (4) supportive-4n which teachers mutually problem-solve and bolster each other through their collaborative efforts. Factors that embody successful collaborative relationships defined by researchers have supported several educators’ efforts to develop collaborative models for special and general educators (Bauwens et al., 1989; Simpson 8 Myles, 1990; West 8 Idol, 1990). West and Idol have developed a model called Collaborative Consultation, a service delivery model for special and general education teachers. They define collaborative consultation as collaborative structures that address mutually-agreed upon problems and work toward solutions. Collaborative consultation is a fluid organization of different am an, hi9) TNQQ deve 34 collaborative arrangements in a scth that fluctuate according to the various problems that might arise. West and Idol provide three examples of collaborative consultations: (a) teacher support teams, (b) individual support teams, and (c) student support teams. A school’s teacher support team would be made up of only teachers and is designed to specifically address problems that might arise in the school. This is an established scth team that would address both ongoing problems and new problems that arise. In addition to teacher support teams, a school might also have an individual support team that is made up of members of the larger educational community. Parents, administrators, teachers might all be members of this team and would also make broader school-wide decisions. However, other teams in the school would focus on less global concerns. If a student is having particular difficulties in school, a student support team might be created to address the particular needs of that student. This team might be a short term or long term organization depending on the needs of the individual students. In this way various collaborative arrangements would be created to address collectively the needs and problems within the schools. Examples of Teacher Study Groups Teacher study groups take several different forms and are developed for different purposes. In this section three teacher study group efforts are highlighted as representative examples to demonstrate the differences between models of study groups and set the stage for the study group intervention developed for this research project. The first describes action research groups Sin Dre 35 or “communities of inquiry“ developed by Wells as a result of a university course for teachers interested in researching their own classrooms (Wells , 1994a). The second is the Reading Instruction Study led by Richardson and Anders (Richardson, 1994), a university sponsored staff development effort that incorporated the transfer of control from the staff developers to the teachers in the group. The third study is the Early Literacy Project, led by Englert and her colleagues (Englert, et al., 1995; Palincsar, Englert, Raphael 8 Gavelek, 1989) in which teachers and researchers developed an innovative literacy curriculum for special education students. W Wells (1994a) describes an action research project that grew out of an Ontario Institute for Studies in Education course called “Action Research in Language and Learning.“ In this project teachers were invited to select topics for inquiry in their own classrooms while the university researchers provided professional and technical support for the teachers to cany out their research projects. The participants used the university class to develop a community of inquiry that supported the school-based inquiry projects done by the individual participants. The goal of this effort was to change schools through changing the practices of individual teachers as they both participated in a community of learners and created communities of inquiry in their own classrooms. Wells (1994b) describes his efforts to work with teachers to change students’ Ieaming experiences through developing inquiry-based Ieaming projects. They engaged in the same inquiry-based Ieaming experiences thrc teal owr enc no I app beir bacl inqu Silld mas 9er the c Siaff ‘ 36 through their university class and action research projects. In this way, the teachers were changing their practice as a result of their participation in their own inquiry community. However, Wells describes the difficulties he encountered when beginning this Ieaming experience with teachers who had no prior experience with inquiry-based Ieaming. Some teachers questioned his approach for the course, and as the leader he struggled with his commitment to being responsive to the students; I was certainly surpriseduand uncomfortably so--by my initial reaction to the skepticism that some course members expressed concerning the social origins of individual thinking. In contrast to my expressed commitment to reciprocity and to the validity of every individual’s beliefs and opinions, my behavior on this occasion revealed the authoritarian pedagogue lurking embarrassingly close to the surface, convinced of the superior validity of my own opinion and ready, when given the chance, to use the advantages accorded by academic status to ensure its (apparent) acceptance by my students. Malls, 1994b, p262-3) He concludes that leaders of study groups need to be responsive to the backgrounds of the participants in the group to develop a community where inquiry is shared by all members. Leadership for Ieaming must apprentice students into the community so that they are able to become “independent master craftsmen“. This apprenticeship involves working together to develop a product all participants feel is worthwhile. Only in the process of engaging in the discourse and activity of a learning community are new participants able to develop and grow. B l' l | |' El | The Reading Instructional Study (Richardson, 1994) was a large scale staff development effort that involved thirty-nine school teachers, principals, and 37 university researchers working in six middle schools. This study examined (1) the recommended reading practices determined by the participants meeting in study groups, (2) teachers’ use of the practices, (3) barriers to the use of the practices by teachers, (4) the effect of the staff development effort on the teachers, and (5) the effect of the practices on students’ reading Ieaming. The researchers used the “practical argument" staff deveIOpment model to assist teachers’ ability to be reflective about their practice (Fenstermacher, 1994). The practical argument links practice to educational theory, incorporates new knowledge into instructional efforts and examines the influence of teachers’ beliefs on their instructional practice. This study found that teachers’ resistance to change is restricted to changes that are externally mandated and that teachers’ instructional practices are constantly changing. These changes are evaluated by the teachers based on their personal beliefs and immediate needs and may at times be contradictory. In the intervention, the researchers set the agenda and content in advance with the goal of turning both over to the participants. This is a different approach than the previous study in which the group supported the action research of the individual teachers. Turning over the control to the teachers was a difficult process because the teachers were looking for the researchers to select the practices to be used by the teachers, but eventually the participants did take over the content and the agenda The process took longer in one school than another due to differences in the cultures of the schools (Hamilton 8. Richardson, 1995). 5D of Stu Olin lea: 38 The leadership in the groups was directed by the staff developers but differed from the “expert“ role typical of transmissive models of staff development. Instead. the staff developers worked with the teachers in the study group, each having different expertise to contribute to the conversations. The staff developers led as facilitators who modeled how teachers might reveal their beliefs and relate them to their practices. In addition, they negotiated the introduction of alternative theories and practices based on current research in the broader field of education. W The third sample of collaborative research effort involving a teacher study group is the Early Literacy Project (Englert et al., 1995; Palincsar et al., 1989). This collaborative research initiative developed and implemented innovative literacy instruction in special education classrooms in a four-year research effort. The collaborative project was designed to develop an altematlve to the special education literacy curriculum found in most resource and special education classrooms. It involved teachers and university researchers in the co-construction of an evolving literacy curriculum that was critical in altering special education teachers’ beliefs and practices, and resulted in the adoption of a literacy curriculum to support the literacy achievement of the special needs students. The focus of the Early Literacy Project was the development of a literacy curriculum for special education students through a collaborative effort with teachers and researchers. Special education teachers from up to seven SDE lite; 39 elementary schools in an urban school district met approximately twice monthly over four years to examine literacy instructional practices and develop a curriculum that supported increased student literacy Ieaming (Englert et al., 1995). However, this project also fostered collaboration between general and special education teachers who began implementing the innovative curriculum in both special, general, and inclusive education settings (see Englert, Tarrant. & Rozendal, 1994; Rozendal, 1993). So in addition to developing an enriched special education setting as part of the Early Literacy Project, special education teachers began collaborating with general education teachers to develop “inclusive” literacy activities for both general and special education students. The Early Literacy Project, that supported the gradual development of inclusive instructional practices and settings, provided the strongest support for the design of the collaborative teacher study group that was the focus of this research project. Special education teachers who began changing the content and instruction of their students in special education settings and seeing the improvement in students’ literacy Ieaming, also began collaborating with general education teachers to implement similar instruction in inclusive settings. In this way, the changes made in the content and instructional practices supported the development of inclusive settings for literacy instruction. Summary The intervention in this study was designed to bring the general and Special education teachers together to engage in the process of learning about literacy instruction. The expectation was that teachers’ developing knowledge de inr the gen bet and gene We dWell 40 would foster the creation of inclusive instructional practices and settings for students with learning difficulties who had been participating in a dual, pull-out Ieaming arrangement. It focuses on the beginnings of the group to answer questions about the process of beginning collaboration between general and special educators. The aforementioned models provide several key themes that informed the research, including (1) leadership in study groups must be responsive to the prior experiences of the participants in the group and facilitate new Ieaming experiences for the participants; (2) Ieaming is a process of participation in discourse and activity, rather an a transmission of knowledge between participants; (3) the context of the school setting is a factor in the development of the Ieaming community in a school; (4) the development of innovative content and instruction will support teachers’ efforts to begin collaborating between general and special education. However, the set of studies did not address (1) the beginning process of the first year of a study group; (2) the use of collaborative study groups between general and special education teachers to focus on developing collaboration between the teachers. The purpose of this study was to address these issues and inform educators about the beginning process or a study group between general and special education teachers. Research Questions There were two primary research questions that supported the analysis of the beginning of the collaborative study group. First, How did intersubjectivity develop over time within this study group? Supporting questions include (a) 41 What is the nature of the interactions between the participants in the study group? and (b) How do the interactions change over the course of the first year? The second research question that guided this analysis was, What were the key features of the conversations that demonstrated the dynamics of intersubjectivity in the focus meeting? Four supporting questions included (a) What were the conversational norms of the group? (b) What factors supported participants’ growing understandings of each other in the focus meeting? (c) What role did agreement and disagreement play in the meeting conversations? and (d) How did the talk change during the meeting? Chapter 4 addresses the first set of research questions and chapter 5 addresses the second set of questions. CHAPTER 3 METHODS The conceptual framework of this study supports not only the focus of the research, but is reflected in the study itself. The sociocultural perspective, which emphasizes the social aspects of teachers’ Ieaming, formed the theoretical foundation for the design of the intervention, a teacher study group in which teachers could develop their knowledge about literacy instniction for diverse students. This study extends the research in teacher development and educational change by considering questions about the process of beginning a collaborative effort. As both general and special education teachers are encouraged to begin collaborative efforts, questions about the stmggles and negotiations that accompany the beginning of the change process need to be addressed. The research questions asked what happens when general education teachers, special education teachers, and researchers come together to discuss instructional issues in literacy related to educating students with diverse Ieaming needs. Specifically, What was the nature of teachers’ beliefs and practices about literacy instruction and special education students and how did those beliefs change in the context of their participation in a teacher study group in which new concepts of literacy Ieaming were discussed? This study took place during the 1994-95 school year. It occurred in a nonpublic elementary school (Forest School) affiliated with a midwestem urban 42 ihi lea till this Mr 43 school association (Glendale Christian School Association).1 This association is parallel to the K-12 local public school district and contains five elementary schools, four middle schools, and one high school. it also has a special education program that provides services for students with mild to moderate disabilities. it shares resources with the local public school district and follows the same criteria for identifying special needs students. All of the teachers are required to maintain a current state teaching certificate and engage in ongoing coursework. Table 1 shows the enrollment and class size statistics for Forest School. There were two primary reasons for selecting this school and the teachers who participated on the project. First, the special education director of the school association was eager to have one of his schools participate in a formal research project since the association had been implementing different forms of inclusive education for several years but had done no formal studies about the process. He was interested in improving the instmctional support for the teachers involved in those efforts. Hence, the school principal and the teachers were willing volunteers and were interested in spending the additional time required to participate in this research. The second reason for selecting this school was that the school and the teachers had not been involved in any prior research efforts, unlike many other local elementary schools located near ' wereusedforthenamesoftheteacl'iersandstudentsincludedinthis study, th the ex tion of m name, in accordance with the research permission ranted for this stu by Mich an State University Committee for Research Involving uman Subjects. 44 Table 1 W Enrollment 711 Pre-Grade 8 64 Preschool 423 Grades K-5 224 Middle School (Gr. 6-8) Class size 17-30. Association guidelines limit sizes to: K-2-26,3‘6-28,6-8-30 Minority population 53 students (8.2%). Of these, 24 are adopted children living with Caucasian families. Teaching staff 43 teaching staff 42% hold master’s degree in some educational field. 45 the colleges and universities in the area. This provided an opportunity to engage in a study with teachers who were interested in developing their instruction but lacked the opportunities of having educational researchers nearby to support their efforts. The teachers were more like the general population of teachers who may be interested in improving their instmction for students in their classes but lack the means and resources to act on their interests. The timetable for the research project is shown in Table 2. In June of the school year prior to the study, arrangements were made to begin the study in Forest School. Interviews with the teachers began in August and September, and the study group meetings began in October. The teachers and I met approximately twice each month over the school year to discuss literacy instruction and student literacy Ieaming. Postinterviews were conducted at the end of the school year. Participants The process of selecting the particular teachers for the study began when I contacted several public and non-public schools to find a site for my study. When I approached Glendale Association’s director of special education, he suggested several possible special education teachers under his supervision who might be interested in being part of a research project. One teacher, Suzanne, from Forest School, was interested and agreed to participate in the teacher study group. June 1994 46 Table 2 W Selected site. talked with special education director, school principal, and teachers University approval for study August 1994 Initial teacher interviews September 1994 Initial teacher interviews Began meeting with Teacher Study Group October - December 1 994 Continued meeting with Teacher Study Group, approximately twice a month ‘ January 1995 Continued group meetings Began classroom observations February - March Group meetings, classroom observations ‘995 Assisted general education classrooms with their Publishing Center stories April - May 1995 Group meetings. classroom observations June 1995 Final group meetings, classroom observations Postinterviews with teachers Student interviews 47 The next step involved contacting the principal of Forest School to ask about her interest in having teachers from her school become a part of the research project. She did express interest and suggested three possible general education teacher participants from the school whom she contacted. They expressed a willingness to participate in the study. The teachers had a lower number of students in their classes, which might allow them more flexibility in developing and implementing new literacy activities, but they also had a higher than average number of students in their classrooms labeled Learning Disabled and receiving resource room support (pull-out special education services) and those considered "at-risk”. After I met with the general and special teachers, the principal, and the special education director to explain the goals of the project, the teachers agreed to be a part of the study. The three general education teachers were second grade teachers in Forest School whereas the special education teacher worked with K-5 students in the resource room in a pull-out program and supervised a paraprofessional employed to provide academic support services to students in the middle school. Permission forms were sent to the parents of the students enrolled in the four teachers’ classrooms. All but two of the students’ parents gave permission for their children to participate in the study. The children whose parents did not give permission were not included in any of the data collected. 48 Six students were classified as Learning Disabled in the four classrooms, according to the Michigan Rules for Special Education. In Michigan, a student is classified as having a Ieaming disability if he or she has a disorder in one or more of the basic psychological processes involved in understanding or in using language, spoken or written, which may manifest itself in an imperfect ability to listen, think, speak, read, write, spell, or do math calculations. The term includes such conditions as perceptual handicaps, brain injury, minimal brain dysfunction, dyslexia, and deveIOpmental aphasia. The term does not include children who have Ieaming problems which are primarily the result of visual, hearing, or motor handicaps, of mental retardation, of emotional disturbance. or of environmental, cultural, or economic disadvantage. (R 340.1713; Rule 13, part 1, as cited in Stegink & Bouman, 1990, p. 1) In addition, according to the Michigan rule, a student may be diagnosed with a learning disability when a multidisciplinary team determines that a child has a severe discrepancy between achievement and intellectual ability in one or more of the following areas: (a) oral expression; (b) listening comprehension; (c) written expression; (d) basic reading skills; (9) reading comprehension; (f) math reasoning; and (9) math calculations. (R 340.1713; Rule 13, part 1, as cited in Stegink 8: Bouman, 1990,p.2) Finally, the Assessment and Eligibility Guidelines for Specific Learning Disabilities states: \Mthin existing guidelines accepted by the Association Special Education Department, underachievement is considered due to a neurological dysfunction within the child. Learning disabilities may coexist with, but are not caused by, other handicapping conditions or adverse environmental conditions and they may be seen across a range of ability levels. (Stegink & Bouman, 1990, p. 3) In addition to defining the criteria for classifying students with Ieaming disabilities, the guidelines also define students who are “at-risk”: Students who are at-risk are those who significantly underachieve or who are at great risk for underachievement within the general education environment, but for whom no specific Ieaming disability is identified. to: tea gr; Stu Pro. on!) dew 49 These students may experience difficulty achieving within the general education classroom, but may not be eligible for, nor require direct instructional intervention by the Resource Specialist. (Stegink and Bouman 1990, p. 4) The definition continues to classify “at-risk“ students as such even after they have gone through the typical referral and evaluation process and have not shown evidence of a Ieaming disability. In such cases, the resource specialist (special education teacher) serves as a consultant to ‘help ameliorate leaming/perforrnance difficulties”. (Stegink and Bouman 1990, p. 4). Ieacbars Sara was an experienced second-grade teacher who had been teaching for 15 years. Eleven of those years she taught at Forest School where she taught kindergarten, first and second grade. Her highest degree was her bachelor's degree, but as required by the Glendale Association, she continued to take classes related to teaching. Sara felt her specialty area was reading, but told me in her preinterview she wanted to learn more about writing instruction. Jacqui was an experienced second-grade teacher who had been teaching for 18 years. She had taught fourth grade prior to joining the second- grade team and had taught second grade for one year prior to the year of the study. Jacqui had her master’s degree in teaching and had done a research project for her master's thesis. Kari had been teaching second grade for 10 years at Forest School, the only school and grade level she had taught. and she had been instrumental in developing the second-grade literacy curriculum. Kari had her bachelor's degree and also continued to take classes. She did not feel she had a specialty Pla Stu mm 5991 SM 50 area but she stated in her preinterview that was interested in working toward integrating the subject areas in the curriculum as much as possible. Suzanne was the resource specialist for Forest School. She was actually employed under the Glendale School Association Special Education Department rather than Forest School itself. She had taught for 14 years and had been at Forest School for 3 years prior to the year of the study. She had a bachelor's degree and had taken classes past her degree. Suzanne had her Michigan certification in both Learning Disabilities and Emotional lmpairrnents. As an employee of the Association Special Education Department rather than Forest School, Suzanne was only responsible for attending Association- wide Special Education faculty meetings not the school faculty meetings (although she often did). She worked closely with the Forest School principal to advise the principal on curricular decisions that affected the special education students in the school, but did not serve on school committees. Suzanne’s responsibilities involved testing and evaluating students who were referred to her as having difficulties in their general education classrooms. She met with multidisciplinary teams to develop Individualized Educational Plans (lEP’s) for the 16 students she taught. She also met with parents of the students while students were going through the evaluation process and each time the students were reevaluated. In addition, Suzanne coordinated services between the local public schools and Forest School for students who received special education services such as speech therapy from the public school system. Because of her varied responsibilities, Suzanne frequently had 51 meetings every day of the week after school. In addition she often had meetings before school and during the school day. Students The second-grade students enrolled in the classrooms of the three general education teachers were not the direct focus of the data analysis for this study; however, students were an integral part of the research because they were the focal point for all of the efforts of the teachers. Ultimately the students were the ones who benefited from the teachers’ efforts for improving instruction, and they became the focus of many of the discussions in the study groups. Of particular interest in this research, therefore, were teachers’ comments and observations about the students with Ieaming disabilities who were going to the resource room and about the at-risk students who attended the Ieaming lab. The at-risk students included students who were experiencing Ieaming difficulties but who did not qualify for resource room services and one student who had received services during his first grade year but no longer qualified. These students are described in the following section. Table 3 summarizes the type of services provided to the target students from each second-grade classroom. All of the students except Nick and Molly had been labeled as Ieaming disabled (LD), but Chris no longer qualified for direct resource room services based on the assessment done at the end of the previous school year in which he had received such services. He had made enough gains in his assessment scores to be “graduated” out of the resource room according to Kari. kn di se the prc sei phi 52 SI I I 'III . D. I.I.I. Six students from the second grade were assessed and qualified to receive services as students with Ieaming disabilities. These students spent 45 minutes in the resource room, four days each week The second grade teachers complained at the beginning of the year that these students were not referred to the special education team during the previous year and therefore did not begin receiving resource room services until a few weeks into their second-grade year. This also created a scheduling problem because Suzanne, the resource specialist, worked with students in small groups and each group progressed through a structured phonics program. New students who began services needed to go to the resource room together in order to begin the phonics program together. Table 3 General Type of Service Education Teacher Resource Room Learning Lab Sara Freda Nick Davidb Jacqui Tim Jack Kari Paul Chrisc aAttended with Jacqui’s students. bAttended with Karl’s students. cGraduated from Resource Room. lead an 0i 53 The second-grade students began receiving services at two separate times: two of Kari’s students and one of Sara’s students began services close to the beginning of the year and two of Jacqui's students and another student of Sara’s began later in the year. As a result, Sara had a student in each group and had an 80-minute block of time in which a student was absent from her class. The teachers also said that their students’ resource room times were the least desirable since they fell during the prime morning literacy time in the general education classroom; hence the teachers had to work their reading instruction around the time when the students were gone. mm Three students from the second-grade classes received additional academic support from a paraprofessional, Ms. Jackson, in the Learning Lab. One student, Nick, was from Sara’s classroom, and two students, Molly and Chris, were from Kari’s room. Jacqui did not send any students to the Learning Lab. The at-risk students met with Ms. Jackson to receive extra help on phonics or reading skills. The second-grade teachers were responsible for determining what the students worked on in the Learning Lab. Attendance in the Learning Lab was designed for students who met the aforementioned criteria for at-risk students. I I . 'l B | My participation as the researcher on the project involved three tasks: (1) leading the study group meetings, (2) visiting the teachers’ classrooms as both an observer and participant, and (3) meeting with teachers and students in met with 54 informal and formal settings for discussions, conversations, and interviews. As leader of the study group meetings I tried to be a facilitator, approaching the process of change and teacher development from their perspectives and to work with their abilities and interests to effect changes. I also visited each teacher’s classroom in various capacities. Each teacher and I developed a different style for our one-on-one interactions. In all classrooms I audiotaped lessons and videotaped occasional lessons, took fieldnotes, and interacted with students. In addition I modeled lessons in Sara's and Jacqui’s room. My work with Sara was ongoing after she asked me to model some instmctional strategies that I had discussed in our study group meetings and she continued to develop and implement some cooperative writing activities for her students. Kari and I developed a plan sheet for the fairy tales she used to help her students plan their stories (see Figure 3). Karl had developed this sheet to help her students as they wrote fairy tales, but she was dissatisfied with it so we modified it during one of her daily planning periods. Kari brought this sheet to the February 22 study group meeting and shared it with the other teachers. I also assisted Kari with reviewing and editing some of her students’ writing while I was in her classroom. Jacqui asked me to model an activity after Sara and I mentioned in a meeting some of the lessons we were doing in Sara’s classroom. Jacqui was struggling to envision how some of the literacy activities would be implemented with her students and I modeled how to brainstorm with her students before a 55 writing activity. I also modeled morning message with Jacqui’s students. a writing activity in which a student author composed a text with help from his classmates. The text was then edited and revised as a class. Most of my time in Jacqui’s room, however, was spent observing and taking fieldnotes. I also visited Suzanne’s classroom, although those visits were infrequent due to some scheduling difficulties. She did not have students on Wednesdays, one of the days I was able to visit the school. Suzanne said in her final interview that she wished I had been able to visit her classroom more often. We had several informal conversations in which we talked about her program, special education literacy research, and our beliefs about students’ Ieaming. Ho wIl vouusoa? Figure 3. Kari’s fairy tale plan sheet. I- to gr let be: Scl ellor 56 In all three general education classrooms l assisted with some group projects. such as the secondarade festival culminating a week-long study of India. I also edited a set of stories with the students and typed those stories for their school’s publishing center activity. This activity was a school-wide effort in which parents took one story from each student in the school and made the story into a book bound with covered cardboard. Students then illustrated the pages of their book and shared them with classmates or other classes in the school. The parents required that the stories fumed into them be error-free and in good handwriting. This concerned the second-grade teachers because they felt it would take a long time for their students to revise and recopy their stories. I offered to type the stories so that the teachers and students could focus on the story development process without having to spend a large amount of time recopying the stories for the final draft. Finally, I interviewed students at the end of the year and met with teachers after the interviews to give them feedback on the students’ responses to questions about their Ieaming this year. I talked informally with both study group teachers and other teachers in the teachers’ lounge during lunch and recess breaks and in the hallways during transition times. In these ways I became very familiar with the school, the teachers, and the students in Forest School. Setting Proximity of teachers to each other is a significant factor in collaborative efforts (T arrant, 1993). It is significant, therefore, to describe the setting of the Oil EC °Dl She "let 57 building and arrangement of the teachers’ classrooms to establish the proximity of the teachers to one another. Forest School is best described as a school arranged in sections (see Figure 4). Down a hallway to the right of the main entrance there is a section of classrooms. Just past the office on the left Is a short flight of stairs leading to another section of classrooms. At the end of that hallway, the classrooms continue down a hallway perpendicular to the main hallway. Finally, this hallway ends at a flight of stairs which joins the elementary section of the building to the middle school/media center building. All of the second-grade teachers had adjacent rooms on the lower level of the school building. This provided for a lot of interaction between the teachers and students as the classes intermingled when coming into school at the beginning of the day, going out for recess, and going home at the end of the day. The teachers frequently used the close proximity of their classrooms to borrow items from each other, ask instructional/procedural questions of each other, and discuss problems or concerns while supervising the children’s activity in the hallways. In contrast, the special education teacher's classroom was located at the opposite end of the hallway, past the main office, and up the short flight of stairs. She had few opportunities to interact with the second-grade teachers beyond meeting with them in the teachers’ lounge during recess and lunch breaks. BusineLAnanoamemthhemassmms Figures 5, 6, and 7 show the typical physical arrangements of each of the second-grade classrooms. The second grade classrooms were arranged in 58 Middle School Wing U er n Prima'y CIa oorrlr— 0"“ level classrooms ——o _ mi lsizml Faulty acqfl's Sarah Karl’s Lwnge Room Room Fbom I + II “"“l Schod Euranos Figure 4. Forest School building. 59 Date written Pocket Ch art losrosl: Met school lie to... Sestwork chart w my p“ 2 murals of story pictures with arrows . II a dot ch slktrsy ,——1 Center circle pi “ IOU S I wedges have I and flJ (clothesphson Teach er : 0°“ Km“ table at] _ n i I: i" a . ‘ Laurie F for pa rs - . E s w a s .-. eu'n cente M David IF] Meningeal: r - — Valerie '3 LJ D table w] w‘ “I“ :' baskets who is " :1 book.) Rachel Piano Door to ch ilo ren 's , D D h.“ lsbe ed: lss room table . I 'br r L shelves with math tabs 1 Figure 5. Sara's classroom. 60 Rs; Abhsbet pbts res above beard :7‘7 5° rafters . Mann chat try ' bots at floor snder board I’m Teacher We Dot under wild r stand lRick l j e a-.. Kent , banner hanging 1 Katy Jeff fromceiling Tin Lisa , pbtsres 'ar bsuies / "—1 under numbers Desk , _—-li ichsel Accordian 12:" ....l .... "I I,m I .... *m p f: g 7 Hye- : (. Innis IMIIII 1 Seek In»: I a plant - . nan. l Amber Pssl Stacey On door post: MI count, lit of :. . to a “I“ orderofnadents {or mashboy . nder ' ' .. 7 and ailbsthroosn tags ha" howflakes hangh from lights hanging in front of windows: ‘ phonics rules Computer 9 on Table e esw ems an er D I - ”Go whh Math“ Weave "Together Memory wt ”1.5.,“ Mg m ' e ‘ , II I M Figure 6. Jacqui's classroom. F'Qllre 61 Met Gert vhl Writes instrsaions ”3,, pg-..“ News B ‘ ‘ lpertshb I“ asdeatssi Calendar ...__. paint nsltiplc sepia oftrsde .....- . .. Itelves wl mes I bookshelm nagsshssu top lldet/fsble I over desk “have Us . tqether D WWII M Aasrslia thh nap and “I. Wk D picturesofsnhsh. Mann . cry wah chart sadenesth m aderaesth .es heard this k aria-t 1. Watud Mort :1“ ”’5 2. Phat lesrssl ”I." 3. Case desk sell ‘brt 'Orasaias grew ‘Pst away 'Phish i — here on loos es desks are Ihsskds sfheek sad stud-t ma beets. 0s hat of lass h vrhh e fastrsctgss ‘ ’t ’ hue-dc kiss on t 0°“ 'k and a ma Kyb lAbby Molhr 0 ale . Rick Ii“. Sites B Jacob In. Guy] (hue delves , andcr lemons ARI-Inst and box of tools Mable bk shaves will on closet docs Is hhthdsy - etc for each math .4! candles for birthdays] dedsle of spechls Figure 7. Karl's classroom. sh lhl Th1 Cla: fort bull. Iearl 62 several different ways throughout the year, but the arrangement of students stayed consistent with the examples. Sara’s classroom was usually arranged to promote whole class interactions. The student desks were arranged in a U-shape that opened up to the front of the classroom. Students’ desks faced the inside of the U and students sat in an alternating boy-girl configuration. Jacqui’s classroom was usually arranged in two-desk rows with all students facing the front of the classroom. The pairs of desks included one boy and one girl. During some observations, I noticed that two boys were separated from the class: one was at the side of the room, another was in front next to the teacher's desk. According to the teacher more students were placed to diminish the opportunities for them to be distracted by others or to disrupt other students. Kari’s classroom was characterized by small groups of desks arranged like tables. Students faced each other in each group. Some groups might mix girls and boys and other groups might be only girls or boys. Karl told me that she occasionally allowed the students to choose the arrangements, resulting in the girls and boys choosing to sit with students of the same sex. Each of the second-grade classrooms contained many wall decorations. The front (east) wall of each classroom contained a chalkboard, but in each classroom much of the board was covered with posters and Ieaming supports for the students. The south and west walls of the classrooms were filled with bulletin boards on which there were Ieaming centers, areas with different Ieaming activities for students to do either during special center times or when 63 they had completed their assigned work. The north side of each classroom was an outside wall with windows that faced the school’s circle drive to the front entrance. From these windows a ‘sister" public school could be seen across the street from Forest School. Occasionally classes of students would visit between the schools for special programs. In each classroom the teacher’s desk was located in the northeast comer of the classroom, facing south. Jacqui’s classroom was the only room with a reading loft, however, I did not notice any students using the loft during my observations. Context of the Meetings The context in this school setting was similar to what has been documented by others (Hamilton & Richardson, 1995: Lortie, 1975). The teachers were contendng with the broader social context in the school that created tensions for the teachers, as they were external to their immediate teaching situation. These pressures included parental, administrative, and school systemic factors. Several issues emerged as I reread and analyzed the transcripts of the study group meetings, informal conversations with the teachers, my comments, and the teachers’ interviews that pertained to that of the study group. The issues not only recurred across the transcripts, but also seemed to develop as teachers dealt with issues that concerned them, their beliefs, and the situation of the school context in which they worked. 64 W Because school was not public, parents played a vital role in the decisions made. Parents made up the school board and frequently came to observe in the classrooms. Parental support enabled teachers to do things they otherwise could not have done alone (i.e., the school-wide publishing center), but the teachers also felt a strong sense of accountability to the parents that in some cases determined their instructional decisions. In the meetings, Jacqui expressed several concerns about parents who had discussed their expectations for her as a teacher of their children: Jacqui: I would like to spend more time [teaching phonics] for those children specifically. Sara: Right. Suzanne: I would like to have a 20-minute block or more where I could just work with, with those [children] because, I think that, that he can take off but, he’s that much far behind. Jacqui: But then, we’re also baking at the whole, and I know specifically which [child] that Suzanne, you and l have talked about, that there is no way I’m going to pull him out and individualize him with a couple of other ones because his mom is so incredibly worried about him being singled out. And so, our distance is getting greater because she’s concerned with his self esteem and I'm concerned with [his reading]. (Meeting, 10/17/94) Jacqui based instructional decisions about what she could or could not do with her students on the strong pressure from this parent and others who had specific requests for the instmction of their children. Parents were also interested in this research project and several called me or talked to me at the fall parent-teacher conferences that I attended at their request. One parent told me about her efforts on the local public scth school 65 improvement committee. During the parent-teacher conference meeting she said she hoped this research project would examine the differences between this school and the public school so she could share the report with her committee and to this and requested that I send a copy of my findings to her. W5 A second contextual factor that teachers cited as a constraint on their efforts to make instructional changes in their classrooms was time, a constraint that had an impact on not only the meetings, but also on how teachers made decisions about students experiencing difficulties. Finding time to meet as a study group was a constant challenge. While the administrators had promised that the teachers would be given release time from other committees and school responsibilities because of their participation on the project, this never happened. Suzanne frequeme had meetings every day after school and the teachers were balancing their other responsibilities around our after-school meetings. The teachers were very gracious and worked hard to find times for meeting, but that often was a struggle. Time was also a factor that seemed to affect the teachers’ ability to meet their students’ Ieaming needs. Jacqui and Suzanne often indicated that they wished to do things differently, but were unable to do so because they did not have time to collaborate with different teachers or individualize instruction for students experiencing trouble. Hence the teachers were glad that Suzanne was providing time In the resource room for students to receive intensive phonics instruction. They felt that the students with learning disabilities in their 66 rooms had the most problems decoding unknown words and needed an intensive phonics remediation that they did not have time to provide. Jacqui described this in terms of being grateful for the pull-out services that Suzanne provided to her two students, Jack and Tim: Mary: So you feel, do you feel pretty comfortable with the structure for the curriculum and the opportunities that Jack and Tim have had this year . . . with the resource room and the pull-out? Jacqui: I am extremely pleased that they had their chance to go to Suzanne. Yeah. I feel that if I had to work time into my class day to give them the basic phonics training and just the way that Suzanne should work with them which is probably the way I would have brought, brought them back to basics, too. I would have done justice to them the way that she did with the small group, you know, two on one or three or one. And I probably would have had to pull time away from recess and other, more fun things, in order to do that one on one with them. . . . But I don't know how to find the time to give them much focused, intense training as she did. And so I feel that definitely, [she] probably made greater strides than what I could have. (Jacqui postinterview) General education teachers also expressed their need to have extra help from Suzanne. They also felt as if they were unable to spend the time working with individual students. At the October 26 meeting, Jacqui summed up the feelings of the other teachers in the group based on a conversation they had earlier in the day: Jacqui: Which is that, that as far as meeting every single one of their needs, I’m talking about the special low end students, not the higher ends, although those are a frustration too, . . . I need . . . to have them focus in on the instmctions. Focus in on what plan we’re coming up with, [and] I cannot give that to each and everyone of them. When I have the other 18 or 19 that are sitting there and waiting or you know, whatever, horsing around, while I’m trying to give them individual attention. Whereas, if I could take a core group out, that would be sent to Suzanne or another support person, they could give them that one to one instruction and just really get the basics down, then, they could come on back into my room. 67 I just, I guess after our discussion last week, the, the greatest frustration that I had was that lcan’t do it. I, I just can’t do it all. I’m trying to meet the needs of those guys down there, I’m trying to meet the needs of the, the middle group, plus I'm trying to find other things that are . . . for my achievers, high achievers. And, if the resource is available, then lam prone to go with that, that extra help, that extra aid, that extra person, rather than trying to keep all the kids in my class for the sake of keeping them, keeping them included in my classroom. Ijust, I just think that its unrealistic for. . . . Is that what we said? Other teachers: That’s fine, that's fine. Yes, yes. Jacqui: O.K. thank you. . . . I mean, you can‘t, you’re, you’re pulled so much so, why not be able to send Jack to Suzanne, at least to get those, those sound basics down, and then once he has those, not once he has those, but as he is developing them, he’ll fit into you know, what I’m doing with the children in the classroom. But, ldon’t have the time to, to work with him individually. (Meeting, 10/26/94) Time also became a factor at the end of the year when Karl referred a student who she was concerned about to Suzanne for testing. At that time, Suzanne and the assessment team for the district had finished all their new testing referrals for the year because they had to begin the end of the year evaluations. Kari’s student was added to the list of students to be evaluated at the beginning of the following year, and Kari was unable to get any help for him at the time he needed it. In these ways, time constrained the teachers’ ability to meet for study group discussions, inhibited the teachers’ ability to assist students in the general education setting, and even prevented students from receiving support services at the time they were stmggling with their Ieaming tasks. Win15 In addition to time constraints there were constraints in the school’s instructional system: Scheduling, program consistency, and instructional focus le. for the stu mal 68 in literacy were factors teachers needed to consider as they made their instructional decisions. The teachers had conflicting feelings about the pull-out program designed as the literacy instruction for the students with special needs. At times they mentioned their feelings that collaboration or inclusive instmction was something that just would not work in their school. Suzanne expressed this in the first meeting: I’ve gone into these conferences where they have these wonderful speakers about how wonderful inclusion is working in their school and, um, they’ve had all these training sessions of teachers and its all collaborative and everything is just great and it’s like very frustrating when I leave because its like, this just wouldn't work in my setting. (Meeting, 1 0/1 7/94) Suzanne worked with students at all times during the day. Students were grouped according to the time they entered the program or according to the specific phonics level determined by their evaluation tests, meaning that students from more that one classroom would attend her resource room class during any given block of time. The scheduling kept her from being able to work with a group of students in their general education classroom or using that block of time to collaborate with a general education teacher. Scheduling. Scheduling was an issue for the general education teachers who felt constrained by a schedule that removed students from their rooms during primary morning literacy times. The general education teachers tried not to teach their literacy lessons and do literacy activities while their students were in the resource room. The teachers accomplished this by doing make-up or individual work during the 40 minutes their students were gone; however, Sara struggled with this more than Kari or Jacqui since her two 69 students attended the resource room at different times and she needed to work around the 80 minutes her students were gone instead of 40. Sara said in her postinterview that this schedule “made a real awkward year.“ W. Because of the teachers’ commitment to saving the literacy lessons they did for times when the students with Ieaming disabilities were present, those students were receiving a full and rich literacy program with intensive remediation on the difficulties they were experiencing with decoding new words in the resource room as well as the holistic, literature- based experiences in their general education classrooms. Nonetheless, the literacy program in the two settings was very disconnected. The teachers did not attempt to integrate what one teacher did in one context with the work done in the other context. In the April 17 meeting, Jacqui commented to Suzanne about this lack of correlation (‘what you do and what we do has to be consistent"), but they did not come to an agreement about the necessity for coordinated instruction as I will describe further in chapter five. Research Methods and Data Analysis I used qualitative methodology to investigate the negotiations of literacy beliefs and practices among the participants in the teacher study group. Bogdan and Biklen (1992) describe qualitative research design as based on theoretical assumptions (that meaning and process are crucial in understanding human behavior, that descriptive data are what is important to collect, and that analysis is best done inductively) and on data collection traditions (such as participant observation, unstructured interviewing and document analysis). (p. 58) 70 This methodology was appropriate to use as I explored research questions that asked for a description of a phenomenon both in close detail and over time. The close detail questions focused on the discourse of the study group meetings that supported moment-to-moment negotiations of roles, positions, and ideas among the participants, whereas the long-term questions investigated the contexts surrounding the study group (i.e., the backgrounds, beliefs, and interests that participants bring to the group) and the effects of the negotiations over the year of meetings. Naturalistic inquiry (Lincoln & Guba, 1985), also called the constmctivist method (Guba & Lincoln 1994), shaped the overall design and implementation of the study. Figure 8 shows Lincoln and Guba’s outline of the process of naturalistic inquiry. This study reflects this process in its design and implementation. The research took place in the natural setting of a local elementary school, specifically the time teachers in the school set aside for teacher study group meetings where discussions about their teaching, and about students’ Ieaming took place. The natural setting for this study also involved me, the researcher, as the human instrument, who built on my tacit knowledge from previous research experience with teacher study groups and used qualitative methods (i.e., participant observation, fieldnotes, repeated readings of transcripts to generate themes, and discourse analysis) to understand the negotiations of the group’s participants as they discussed literacy instructional techniques for their students. The process of this study 71 I norm ] [QUAUTA'I'IVEMEMODSI - ”a?“ SAMPLING D-GN ““1 “’3‘“ Kim? I WWW] WGEN'I‘ ‘ “L . INDUCTIVB DATA ' to LCASE EMT I Whichibah [DIOGRAPHICAILY mm 1 I mnmr APPLIED | Figure 8. Naturalistic inquiry process (Lincoln & Guba, 1985, p. 188). 72 involved ongoing purposive sampling of teachers’ conversations about literacy instruction in their classroom, inductive data analysis, the development of theory grounded In the empirical data, and an emergent design that is questioned and tested with additional sampling, data analysis, and so on. This ongoing process involved the development of negotiated outcomes, a result of many influences and considerations. The reported findings are therefore an interpretation of, and a tentatively applied reconstmction of the negotiations of the participants in the study group meetings that might prompt future questions about what is needed to support teachers’ collaborative efforts to instruct a greater diversity of students in the educational system. The first level of analysis, described in chapter 4, is a descriptive analysis across the study group meetings. Case study methodology was used to describe the development of intersubjectivity between the participants in the group. Transcripts of the meetings, reflections written after the meetings, and teachers’ perceptions as reflected in their interviews were analyzed. Themes were developed from repeated readings of the data. and the meetings were categorized according to the developmental phases supported by the themes. The second layer of analyses focused on the discourse of the participants in the teacher study group meetings transcripts. Discourse analysis (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) of a key meeting (April 17) was used to examine in close detail the moment-to-moment interactions of the participants in the study group. This particular meeting stood out both when it occurred and in subsequent reviews of the videotape and meeting transcript as a meeting 73 where the interactions between the participants was different from those of those meetings. Because of the differences, it was characterized as a breakthrough meeting. The data analysis began by developing a detailed timeline of the entire meeting, providing some valuable information about the meeting. The next step was to consolidate the details into more general shifts in the conversation. This revealed the main parts of the meeting. Therefore, the analysis focused on shifts that seemed to occur in the conversation - where the floor (control of the conversation) changed -- other shifts signaled by extended pauses in the conversation. Next, I began a closer analysis of the meeting. Through repeated readings I looked for involvement strategies and types of positioning that seemed to be occurring between the participants; Data Sources Multiple sources of data were used to draw conclusions about the negotiations that shaped the way teachers formed a collaborative unit in which the development of innovative literacy activities and instmctional techniques were considered. Data for the study included transcribed audiotapes and videotapes 'of the study group meetings, transcribed audiotapes and videotapes of lessons from the classrooms, fieldnotes of the classroom observations, notes, and comments written after each study group meeting, pre- and post-interviews with the teachers, and postinterviews with the students. 74 AW Audiotapes were made of the teacher study group sessions, discussions held with the total class and smaller groups of students, selected lessons, and informal conversations with teachers and students in order to supplement participant observation records and for further data analysis. Each of the study group meeting tapes was transcribed for analysis. Videotapes were also made of selected teacher study group meetings and of selected classroom lessons to permit detailed analysis of the interactions of teachers, the classroom instruction, and the interactions of students. The video- and audio-tapes of the meetings were the central data source for both levels of analysis due to the emphasis of analysis on the conversations in the meetings. The close analysis of the focus meeting was facilitated by repeated readings of the audio transcript, and repeated viewing of the videotape data of the meeting. The video was particularly important as it revealed the nonverbal participation of some of the participants. Banicinamflbsmm I observed the four teachers during the study group meetings, taking notes on the discussions at the meetings and recording reflections immediately after participation. I also observed the teachers and students during their classroom literacy activities and took notes about the instruction and student interactions. Lesson activities were audiotaped and selected lesson activities were videotaped to produce a transcript of the discourse in the literacy activities. Teachers were resistant to videotaping their classroom activities and sometimes 75 videotaping seemed to distract students in a detrimental way during lessons. In those cases the videotaping was discontinued. There were no such distraction problems with the audiotapes so they became the primary record of the classroom activities. I also collected samples of the students’ written work Observations and discussions with the teachers and students contributed to my understanding of the teachers' concerns and discussions in the study group, and also allowed me to observe the implementation of the literacy instructional practices discussed in the study group meetings. Intanriens I interviewed the teachers before and after their involvement in the project (Appendix A). The preinterviews focused on an account of the historical aspects of the teachers’ instniction and the literacy instruction of special needs students within the teachers’ classroom. They also focused on the teachers’ attitudes toward literacy, instruction, collaboration, and students with special Ieaming needs in their classes. The preinterviews also determined the typical nature of the teachers’ classrooms in order to address generalizability questions. Postinterviews focused on teachers’ opinions about the study group and their participation on the research project. This interview not only prompted teachers to reflect on their Ieaming and participation on the project, but to suggest a plan for future efforts of the study group and how they would like to see the group develop. These interview data were triangulated with the audio, video, and written data and provided a limited perspective of the teachers’ 76 Opinions and understandings of the meeting conversations and the development of the study group. Conclusion Qualitative methodology was appropriate for this descriptive analysis of the first year of a teacher study group because it allowed a broad examination of the development of the group and a detailed examination of the moment-to- moment discourse in a key meeting. Both examinations contribute to understanding the kind of interactions that might occur within a teacher study group and raise questions for further study. CHAPTER 4 THE DEVELOPMENT OF INTERSUBJECTIVITY: LEARNING TO LEARN THROUGH CONVERSATION The beginning of a study group effort is important to examine because, as it is a long-term intervention, quick results in practice changes or in student outcomes may not be evident. The beginning involves becoming part of a community and initial results should include an examination of that community- building process. To that end this chapter examines the first year development (September-May) of the study group as participants discussed topics such as reading and writing instruction, classroom management, and literacy instmction in their general and special education classrooms. In this chapter I examine the factors that influenced the kinds of contributions the study group participants made to the meetings, the development of intersubjectivity among the participants, and the impact of participation in the study group on the teachers’ classroom instruction. Research Questions The primary research question that guided this part of the study was: How did intersubjectivity develop over time within this study group? Supporting questions include (a) What is the nature of the interactions between the participants in the study group? and (b) How do the interactions change over the course of the first year. To answer these questions I examined the key issues negotiated by the participants in the study group conversations. The issues include the roles of the participants, the focus of the talk in the meetings, 77 78 and the beliefs about students, instruction, and the teachers’ ability to make changes in their classrooms. For my analysis and discussion I focus on the individual contributions to the discourse in the study groups and the teachers’ responses to formal and informal interview questions. In this way, I am considering actual data records. rather than attempting to determine the individual perspectives or thinking of the participants in the group. Matusov (1996) advocates this perspective since in an analysis of joint activity, individual contributions to the activity transcend individual perspectives. Beliefs and perspectives are shaped through conversation and in order to understand a collaborative setting, such as a teacher study group, this conversational level of analysis is appropriate. The contributions to the study group discussions involved agreements and disagreements and both were key to the development of intersubjectivity between the participants. Agreement is often the criteria for intersubjectivity (Rommetveit, 1980), but I want to make this a problem as the only form of intersubjectivity, especially in a context where participants come from divergent backgrounds. Similarly, Matusov points out that while disagreements are often seen negatively as a ‘vicious cycle” in which conflicts are revisited and reargued, he argues they can be seen positively as taking the group in a direction ‘not foreseen or desired by participants” (p. 32). The negotiations of the participants’ differences in our study group was a factor I did not foresee, yet one that emerged from the data as important for the teachers to engage in as they began collaborative efforts across general and special education. 79 Nature of Interactions in the Study Group Whereas other researchers have examined the influence contextual factors have on study groups (Richardson, 1994; Short of al., 1992), I would like to examine the factors that affected the development of intersubjectivity as the study group developed during its first year. From a sociocultural perspective, these factors are key to the development of understandings between the participants in the study group and affect the types of interactions that support the development of new instruction and new methods of collaboration between educators. W Through repeated readings of the meeting transcripts, transcripts of the teacher interviews, fieldnotes and comments developed while I was in the school setting and immediately after the study group meetings, I found the meetings progressed through several stages (see Table 4). There were 12 meetings across 9 months of the 1994-95 school year (October- June). The April 17 meeting was a breakthrough meeting (Hamilton & Richardson, 1995) in which the conversational norms of the group shifted and teachers began sharing and negotiating their differences in ways that engaged them in considering alternate points of view. In this meeting the teachers surfaced their “assumptions of shared understandings” (Florio-Ruane, personal communication, 1996) and began the process of negotiating their differences. Prior to this meeting, the teachers’ presence in the same school and their work with the same children created a sense that there were shared understandings 80 Table 4 D'lll I. Stage Key Issues Discussed 1 0117/94 Background Mdmsforhesard; ‘I'heEeryUbrscyProjecNELH harem 1 0/26/94 Background Problemswidrflsshhntshsod’ studious sumac-trons Ars'clesonoolaborss'on Concernsabotshdiu Msgods 11/14/94 Background . I I' §gumm Mary’sroleinolessroorns Discussionofstudenfsineadtdusroom Phors'cs Desabtionof arts 1 2/7/94 Transklon anwmmm FbaringReoovery Progessinhedsserflonaspedofhessiq hssucs'ondstrsng'es Tlmeissues Csnbrlorhe of 1 [9’95 Transition reseadton grows TWW~WMMMW 212/95 Development 2122/95 Development 3/1 I95 Development 3/27/95 Development WWW-Mkbmfiuclnmumfianm 6/5/95 Conclusion Students-successessnd ' outoems 'W '0" Howcuriotlunwsstbveloped Wbmhm hchrsionlssuesmdexmt 81 between them about students and instruction. Thus, the implementation of activities developed together was not discussed and the relationship between the literacy instruction in general and special education was not considered in the talk that typically occurred between the teachers. These assumptions of shared understandings kept teachers from questioning each other and recognizing the discrepancies in their instructional system for students with Ieaming disabilities who were participating in both systems. The negotiations in the April 17 meeting, however, pushed their thinking about instruction for students with special Ieaming needs in their classrooms. I examine this meeting in close detail in chapter 5, to demonstrate the dynamics of intersubjectivity, but set the stage for this breakthrough meeting by examining the development of intersubjectivity in the meetings prior to the breakthrough. The analysis of the meeting data showed there were three stages of meetings prior to the breakthrough meeting: background, transition, and development (see Table 4). The background level involved the October 17, 26 and November 14 meetings; the transition meetings were the December 7 and January 9 meetings; and the development meetings were the February 2, 22, March 1, and 27 meetings. In the following section I describe the characteristics of the conversations in each of the stages, provides examples of the kinds of talk in the meetings that supported the developmental issues central to the community of the study group, and demonstrates how these issues ultimately influenmd the Ieaming of the participants in the group and impacted on the instructional activities of the teachers in their own classrooms. 82 After the April 17 meeting the teachers and I met two more times (May 22 and June 6) to debrief and evaluate meeting as a study group for the year. The teachers shared lingering concerns and projected what issues and topics the group might continue exploring if the teachers were interested in continuing to meet during the next year. As described in chapter 3, students with Ieaming disabilities at Forest School participated in both the general education and special education systems. In contrast to the phonics based literacy instruction in special education, the general education literacy instruction focused on reading and responding to tradebooks in units organized by genre. This program was developed by the second-grade general education teachers according to district guidelines for language arts instruction. The teachers did units on information stories, science fiction, biography, fairy tales, and mysteries. The units included reading books in small groups from the specific genre, completing teacher-generated response and skill oriented worksheets, and writing stories in the genre studied. The general education teachers also did some limited phonics instruction with their entire class. The history of the interactions between the teachers on the project was a key influence on the development of intersubjectivity in the meetings. The teachers’ ways of socializing and communicating in the school carried over into the norms of the study group meetings. This is the first thing that needed to be 83 negotiated as the group learned how to learn from each other in the study group setting. The second-grade teachers had a strong history of collaboration among themselves. One of the reasons these teachers were selected by the principal for participation on the project was their reputation in the school for working collaboratively and their willingness to plan and develop curricula together. Two of the teachers, Karl and Sara, had spent a significant part of their summer two years prior to this study, planning and developing the secondi literacy curriculum used in the school. The impetus for this development was the district’s design and implementation of new language arts curricular guidelines. These district guidelines were devel0ped by a committee that included Jacqui as a member; therefore, the general education teachers were very interested in their literacy program and had a strong sense of ownership in that curriculum. They conducted weekly planning meetings in which the discussion focused on planning the activities they could each do in their classroom and sharing ‘where they were“ in the units they were each doing. Their discussions were usually limited to listing potential activities and did not focus on the manner of implementing the activities because each teacher was free to do the activities in her own way. In addition, these discussions did not include the special education teacher since her phonics-based instmction was separate from the general education instruction. Interactions between general and special education teachers were limited. The teachers participated in separate faculty meetings. The special 84 education teacher participated in faculty meetings that involved only other special education teachers from the district while the general education teachers participated in building faculty meetings with the general education teachers from Forest School. Discussions that occurred in the teachers’ lounge or in quick meetings in the hallway focused on specific problem students and questions such as whether or not students should/could be referred for testing. how to handle behavior problems, and how to talk with parents about special education students in their classes. The only structured meeting times for the teachers were at formal child study meetings that were part of the referral process for students being recommended for special education. The separation of the teachers in terms of pedagogical emphases and opportunities to communicate influenced the kinds of roles and the types of communication patterns the teachers took on in the meetings. These issues shaped the topics teachers initiated in the study group meetings, their responses to new ideas and things shared by other participants in the meetings, and ultimately their ability to develop collaborative teaching relationships that bridged the separate systems. Background Meetings The study group meetings started off primarily with time for the participants to get acquainted with each other, share their interests and backgrounds, and establish some of the communication norms for the discussions. In the background meetings (October 17, 26, and November 14) participants focused on expectations for the project, shared information about 85 their students, and expressed concerns for particular students. The talk was generally very congenial as participants shared and accepted the opinions and descriptions of the others’ classrooms and experiences without disagreement or question. The October 26 meeting was typical of the three background meetings. It was characterized by an introduction time in which teachers discussed events that had happened in their classrooms that day and socialized about personal events in the school and their families. Fifty-three percent of the talk in the meeting focused on housekeeping issues such as scheduling meeting times, how teachers were dealing with project details such as parental permission slips, the difficulties of some of the project expectations such as reading articles for the meetings, and social discussions about their personal lives and interests. Thirty-five percent of the discussion focused on immediate pedagogical concerns such as problems with individual students, how teachers were stmcturing particular activities in their classrooms, and sharing of concerns about issues of inclusion and their beliefs that it was not working for others and wouldn’t work for them. This transcript, from the October 26 meeting, shows the teachers’ concern about inclusion efforts that were becoming very popular in other area schools: Jacqui: l was talking to my brother-in-law over the weekend who works for the Seaside district, and he works as a support person for the special ed. and [inclusion is] what they are doing. They have all these kids back in the classroom and he just goes from one school to other, one classroom to the another, you know, problem solving with the teacher and saying, “OK. this, this is what happened now,” you know, instead of instnrcting those teachers and saying, “You know, this is how you handle things,” or putting a support group together whatever. All he’s doing is 86 going back and fixing and then he has to go and meet these other eighteen and come back and fix again. It’s just, it is not working and its fnrstrating for the teacher. It’s just . . . Suzanne: Terrible. Jacqui: . . . horrifying for the child, and it’s, it’s horrible for Keith, too. I mean, you can’t do itl Suzanne: Right. There was an emotional component to the teachers’ concerns. Teachers were concerned that their instnrctional efforts would fail with their students. On the one hand, they were hearing about successful inclusion efforts at conferences, but, on the other hand, they heard stories told in their immediate circles of struggles, difficulties, and failures associated with inclusion. Suzanne explained her concerns in the first meeting on October 17 and added: And I think the other thing that stopped me is I found the pull out to be very successful. That I have made two years gain with students over time, you know, in a year. The teachers questioned looking at issues promoting inclusion such as collaboration between general and special education teachers and linking instructional efforts between the systems because they felt their program was successful with students. The remaining 12% of the talk in the October 26 meeting focused on new instructional ideas. Teachers observed part of a video of teachers implementing literacy activities from the Early Literacy Project (ELP) (Englert et al, 1995). Other new ideas were introduced in the form of videos, articles, and narrative descriptions; however, frequently during the background meetings the presentation of a new idea was intermpted by teachers’ concerns about time 87 constraints or procedural questions about the activity demonstrated. For example, at another point in the October 26 meeting, this discussion occurred where the video began and immediately was interrupted in order to discuss procedural questions. Mary: I did want to show you a video. Um, this is of morning message. It’s one of the, one of the projects that I think is pretty easy, or one of the activities that the teachers developed that is really easy to um, to put into practice. Jacqui: Did we read an article on that some place too? Mary: It’s, most likely included. So, this shows an example of [an ELP teacher] doing morning message with her kids and um, it might you know, start, start our discussion somewhere. (starts video) Jacqui: Oh, stop a minute! OK. You, you, um. Mary:Stop. Jacqui: O.K., um, what I wanted to know was, was um, [this] classroom, what kind of a set up was it, how many students? Give me a little background a minute. Mary: O.K. Sure, um, what you are seeing here is her special ed classroom. The questioning about who the students were, what the teachers’ experience was, the year was the video taken continued until the end of the meeting time and the video had to be postponed. Teachers seemed to need time to develop a frame of reference for the new information they were encountering and in this effort, locate themselves as able to do the same activities or explain why they could not do them with their students. This seemed to be a key aspect of the background meetings. El" I’G II II SIIG Each teacher came to the group with different interests and concerns. These were reflected in their interviews and in a discussion in the November 14 88 meeting. Table 5 shows the different goals of the participants as they came to the study group. The issues the participants hoped to address persisted despite their knowledge that this group was designed to focus on literacy instruction for students with Ieaming disabilities. Jacqui was interested in behavior problems and management of her class; Kari wished to study gifted students and ways of integrating curriculum across subject areas; and only Sara wished to study writing instruction. Suzanne was interested in issues of collaboration between general and special education but expressed her concerns about the inability for the teachers to implement any drastic changes because system’s constraints. She also was concerned about the transfer of the skills students learned in the resource room to the general education classrooms. My focus and interest was in literacy instruction, and Sara and I worked closely together because of our mutual interest in writing instruction. These goals and interests were also reflected in the teachers’ approach to classroom instruction. Sara worked to try some new activities in her classroom, stmctured her class in groups for writing, and attempted some of the modeling and scaffolding instructional ideas she was learning in the meetings. This risk-taking attitude was mirrored in her efforts with students. Sara often encouraged her students to take risks when approaching a new task and was concerned with her students’ reluctance to attempt new Ieaming tasks. She would say, ‘Take a risk!” when a student hesitated to answer a question or contribute an idea to the classroom discussions. In contrast, Jacqui and Karl 89 Behavior management for her ‘tough” class Learn ways to help ‘those children at the extremes” of ability Gain “better understanding” of instruction Learn “better ways to work with Ieaming disabled children” Get help with regular education children Learn ‘a better way to teach my writing” Dealing with gifted students How to integrate curriculum across subject matters How to assess reading Learn about “the interaction and instmction that happens between the resource room and the regular teacher.“ Gain “ideas for myself” Learn ‘how we might be able to improve that process of helping the special needs child make that transition in the classroom.” Begin dialogue with general and special education teachers Look at literacy instruction - current instruction and changes that might be made Develop some collaborative instruction between teachers 90 Suzanne were outspoken in their concerns about actually trying some new things and wanted to know details about how to implement activities and instnrctional ideas with their students. Similarly. they held firm control in their classrooms and were very directive concerning what students worked on. In the meetings they often took control of the dialogue and shifted the talk in the direction of their concerns and opinions about the bad behavior of students. El" I'Bl 'II SIIG Roles of the participants in the meeting were often distinctly defined. The roles were either assigned or developed from the kinds of participation in the meetings. Table 6 is an overview of how the participants saw the roles for themselves and others in the group as they described in their postinterviews. The roles teachers described for themselves became established in the background meetings and seemed to hold true throughout the first year of the group. The number of turns the participants took in the meetings was closely tied to teachers’ perceived roles. Turns may indicate times when the teachers held the conversational floor as described by Edelsky (1981) or interjected comments while another participant retains the conversational floor. Turns measure participation in the conversation, but do not measure amount of actual talk since some turns may be longer than others. Table 7 demonstrates the number of turns in the focus meetings and the percentage of turns for each participant. The graph in Figure 9 represents the Sara’s Karl’s 91 Karl . Willing to try thrrios that are suggestedandwlllmakethemwork. Suzanne o‘Asolidreso .— . person.‘ oThought she only needed to be at a 'pereentage' of the meetings WMMOM - talking because with her class. - Listener - Expressed ‘her beliefs asfaras working with specialized kids” QMMOM .~ - Leader! Instructor - Resource person ' value of her participation Suzanne’ . ”SW °°"°’"” M "W "i“ A: m" .. as...“ :éé::::::..i:;;:;:.1‘;::::'i.;;:;ii'::siif729?: that they had, frustrations. . Able to support each otherin someofthose [concerns and frustrations]. 0 Or just being frustrated together.“ ‘ Shading represents teachers' descriptions of their own roles 92 Table7 E I.. II . s I II I. Panidpam 10/25/94 1277/94 3/27/95 4/17/95 ii 95 ii % 1i % s 96 turns turns turns turns turns turns turns turns Suzanne 50 .123 126 .310 147 .313 146 .330 Sara 50 .123 53 .131 57 .155 57 .151 Jacqui 135 .341 72 .177 112 .239 93 .210 Kari 21 .052 10 .025 44 .094 24 .054 Mary 145 .351 145 .357 79 .155 113 .255 0.4 0.3 - —-l-— 02. .. .. Suzanne +Sara 0-1 —)(-Jacqui 0 §.. . _ +Kari 10/26 12/7 3/27 4/17 +Mary Figure 9. Percentage of participant turns in sample meetings. 93 percentage of participant turns over time. The teachers' descriptions of their own roles are shaded and teachers who described the roles of two or more participants as a group have the descriptions grouped in the figure as well. Participants described as leaders typically had more turns in the meetings and focused the conversation on things of interest to them. Teachers who described themselves as listeners typically had fewer turns in the conversations. Suzanne was the exception, however, because she and others described herself as a listener, yet after the October 26 meeting she had over 30% of turns in each of the group meetings she attended. As you can see from Figure 9, this was more than the other teachers in the group. Jacqui described herself as a participant who did a lot of the talking in the group. Occasionally in the group meetings she would express concerns that she was talking too much or characterizing the feelings of others in the group correctly. In the October 26 background meeting she contributed to the conversation almost three times as much as the other teachers. She voiced concerns about her students, shared frustrations with the behavior management of several students in her class, and shared concerns about parental pressures she was experiencing. Several parents had made appointments with her prior to the beginning of school to discuss their expectations for their child’s Ieaming experiences in her classroom. Jacqui felt she needed to make changes in her instmction to accommodate parental expectations. These contributions reflected her goals for the project as she was interested in developing better behavior management strategies for her class. Sara and Suzanne also 94 characterized Jacqui’s participation as sharing her frustrations with the group, while Kari looked to Jacqui as a leader in the group and one she could learn from. Sara was interested in making changes in her classroom lnstnrction. She viewed her role in the group as one of a learner who would try out ideas and cooperate with the project goals. Jacqui recognized this by describing her and Karl as teachers who were willing to try things and make them work in their classrooms. This seemed to contrast with Jacqui’s description of herself as one who worried about things not working in her classroom. Sara’s efforts to try new ideas from the study group meetings were facilitated by her interest in literacy instruction as a project goal. That interest matched well with the goals set up for the project and supported her efforts to work closely with me during my visits to the school. Sara took the initiative to learn from and extend the literacy activities discussed in the meetings. While all of the teachers invited me into their classrooms to observe and participate, Sara also asked me to model some of the writing process activities (i.e., brainstorming, organizing information, etc.) while adapting and trying out other parts of the writing process herself. As my role in her classroom shifted primarily to that of an observer, Sara would frequently come back to where l was sitting and ask what I thought of the lessons and the noisy work her students were doing. This usually occurred after she modeled an aspect of the writing process and allowed the students to work in partners to practice that aspect in their own writing. In Sara’s 95 classroom, students had worked as partners for center activities, but writing discussions were new for Sara and her class. I encouraged Sara’s risk-taking and often pointed out various partner arrangements that the students developed. For example, one of the special needs students partnered with a better writer in the class to gather information and develop their stories collaboratively. The two boys decided to move to a table so they could work side-by-side. The students supported each other by finding books on both topics, commenting on ideas they shared, and helping with mechanics such as spelling and punctuation. Sara voluntarily made changes in her instruction that supported students’ successful writing collaborations. Kari took notes for the official school record of the meetings. The other teachers appointed her to this position at the first meeting saying she was good at keeping notes and they did not want the job. She was less forthcoming in her contributions to the meeting discussions, but would answer questions when asked about her instmction or give her support to another teachers’ efforts. In her classroom also, students efforts were supported and encouraged in a way that put priority on the students’ esteem and satisfaction with their work. My concerns were that she was not getting a voice in the meetings. To that extent I tried to showcase her fairy tale unit in the February 22 meeting. However, Kari did not seem concerned about her limited contributions to the discussions in the meetings. She described herself in her postinterview as ‘one to just kind of sit back and let other people do the talking.” She was uncomfortable in the 96 interviews when questions focused on describing her beliefs about her instruction, but was very interested in discussing how her students were Ieaming. When I shared with Karl any difficulties or concerns that students discussed in their postinterviews with me, she commented that she wanted to think about those concerns and work out a resolution for them. Kari was an advocate for her students’ concerns. Her uneasiness in pedagogical discussions of the study group may account for her taking fewer turns in the meetings. In addition, the turn percentage only accounts for her verbal participation in the group. In videotaped meetings, her nonverbal communication was strong and she was engaged in the conversations with her gaze, nodding her head in agreement with other's contributions, and responding with facial expressions. These nonverbal contributions encouraged the speaker to continue and responded to the ideas presented by others in the group. In this way, Karl’s nonverbal contributions to the meetings showed her engagement in the ideas presented and discussed by the other participants. The three general education teachers had experience meeting together and discussing the activities done for their literacy units and other special instnrctional activities. Suzanne, however, played a separate role in the school and with these teachers. Her role in the school was typical of special education teachers. She was the teacher who evaluated students’ Ieaming, diagnosed problems students might be having with their Ieaming and help teachers solve problems in their classrooms. For students who attended her resource room, she prescribed a remedial Ieaming program to address the problems. Suzanne 97 continued to play this kind of role in the meetings. The other teachers turned to her for advice on how to help their students who were having difficulties in their classroom. As she said in her postinterview, she saw her role as' listening to the teachers’ fmstration with their students and contributing the “understanding I had“ about the students who were part of the resource room program. As an evaluator, Suzanne maintained a separate role in the meetings that she and the teacher's talked about in their postinterviews. Suzanne said she “felt a bit separate“ from the others in the group. Jacqui and Karl both felt that Suzanne only needed to be at part of the meetings. In her postinterview, Jacqui explained, I think that, that there were some times where we met where it was so much in the classroom, you know, what you’re doing as far as your curriculum, that Suzanne wasn’t necessarily used as a resource at that time and maybe we were not using her time wisely, by having her there. . . . That it didn’t really pertain to what she was doing with the kids in our rooms in her room (Jacqui postinterview). Jacqui was concerned for Suzanne’s time since she had a very tight schedule with her other responsibilities; however, it also demonstrated that by the end of the year the group had not yet developed the mutual understandings and need for collaboration that necessitated ongoing discussions between the general and special education teachers. As the evaluator and problem-solver, Suzanne’s input was not part of the ongoing instructional conversations for the general education teachers. The teachers did not see her as one who would contribute to the development and implementation of daily literacy instnrction in their classroom. 98 This was further evidenced when Suzanne described some writing “skeletons” she had learned about in a conference at the December 7 meeting. For the next two meetings Suzanne mentioned that she had forgotten to bring the skeletons, but there was no uptake or encouragement by the teachers for her to go down the hall to get the writing scaffolds, so Suzanne never shared them with the general education teachers. Suzanne did contribute many suggestions to the behavior management discussions which maintained her role in the school of problem solving individual difficulties teachers were having with some of their students. Despite the rule expressed by the teachers concerning Suzanne’s separateness in the meetings, Suzanne had a higher percentage of turns in the focus meetings than any of the other teachers .(see Figure 9). After having only 12% of the turns in the October 26 meeting, Suzanne had over 30% of the turns in the transition, development, and breakthrough meetings. In these meetings Suzanne often took more of a leadership role by questioning the teachers as they shared the literacy activities they were doing in their classrooms. She did not detail her phonics program at this time or any of the other activities she was doing with the students in the resource room. This shifted at the March 27 development meeting when Suzanne described her efforts to work on the Accelerated Reading Program with her students. This conversation was extended at the April 17 meeting and will be discussed further in chapter 5. 99 Transition Meetings The December 7 and January 9 meetings were labeled transition meetings because the discourse in these meetings moved from talk about teachers’ backgrounds and their students to talk about instructional ideas and possibilities. At the beginning of the December 7 meeting the teachers and I continued discussing instruction and particular student concerns. We then moved on to discuss the literacy ideas and activities that the teachers might consider implementing with their students. Suzanne suggested some skeletons for writing different kinds of stories that she had received at a conference which she offered to bring to the next meeting. I also brought a videotape from the Center for the Study of Reading (Anderson 8 Au, 1991) that we began watching as a group. This tape generated some discussion about the students’ backgrounds and the kinds of group writing activities shown in the videotape. We had intended to finish the tape at the January 9 meefing, but the issues of administrative evaluations and expectations took center stage at that meeting. The discourse in the transition time focused less on establishing participants’ backgrounds and roles in the group and turned toward talk about the project itself and concerns the teachers had about being evaluated as part of the project and by their administrator. They expressed concerns about unclear expectations for their participation on the project and acknowledged the risks involved with trying instnrction that was more responsive to students and less ‘implemented as planned.“ 100 Teachers were very concerned about the evaluations they received from people doing observations in their classrooms. Sara mentioned in her postinterview that she felt evaluated when I came to her classroom to take fieldnotes on her classroom literacy activities: lguess part of me felt that I always had to have something good when you came. . . . when you’re in there and I know that you’re just getting information, but you know, I guess all the other experiences that we’ve ever had [is] when somebody comes in [it is] because we’re being evaluated. and even though that may not have been the reason you were there, that feeling is still there. She continued later in the interview: And, as far as the classroom, sometimes I wondered whether you were in my room because, um, I was doing everything wrong. Suzanne also expressed concerns in her preinterview that my role as one coming into the school would be that of an evaluator: Suzanne: And I think I’ve had some, you know, worries a little bit about, because I’m not, my orientation is not very much whole language. You know, on how that will be perceived or what, you know, if that will be disappointing. Marszo me, or to the other teachers? Suzanne: Yeah, no, to you. Jacqui indicated in her postinterview that her participation on the project helped her to question what she was doing in her classroom and kept her accountable to a third party: I really questioned a lot of things this year. I questioned, you know, why I was doing what skills because I felt that l was being held accountable, you know what I mean? The transition meetings focused on several concerns that the teachers had, but the evaluation concern came to the foreground in the January 9 101 meeting when the teachers discussed a sheet of paper they had received from the principal titled, “Descriptions of an Excellent Teacher.“ This two-page. single-spaced list of characteristics included seven sections: (1) Personal Qualities and Traits, (2) Instructional Planning, (3) Directing Learning, (4) Classroom Management and Discipline, (5) Professional Growth, (6) Professional Attributes, and (7) Community Relations. The teachers were concerned that this was the criteria by which they were to be evaluated and were very upset about their inability to meet the requirements. Despite their knowledge of themselves as excellent teachers, the criteria that included community service work in addition to six groups of personal and professional expectations seemed impossible to achieve. The teachers complained that they were spending a majority of their time at school on weekends as well as during the week In my reflections after the meeting I noted that “both Jacqui and Sara were very demoralized by it. . . . and we spent a majority of the time talking about that.“ Suzanne, who wasn’t evaluated by the principal, mentioned that she did not understand the list to be used as a checklist but that she saw It as a set of goals from which the teachers could choose a few things to set as personal goals. The discussion was resolved when Jacqui decided she would question the principal about the list and how the principal intended to use it and have the teachers use it. As teachers were coping with the issues of change in this study group they were caught in a dilemma of conservation versus cooperation (C. Clark, personal communication, 1996; Cuban, 1992;). The principal had selected the 102 teachers for participation on the project because she considered them good teachers, and the teachers were successful in the school based on their current system of general and special education. They needed to retain the favorable consideration of the principal for their job evaluations, yet were being challenged to cooperate with an outside researcher on a project that was promoting change in the very instmctional system in which they were so successful. My comments after the January 9 meeting reflected my concerns about how to ease the stress the teachers were voicing. We were not able to schedule another meeting during the month of January and I decided to use the time to observe in the classrooms and look for ways to help the teachers. I felt as if my presence and project interests were adding to the teachers’ stress. My reflections continued, [The teachers] are overwhelmed with their own teaching responsibilities right now. And lthink that’s where their focus is. And so these instructional issues take the back burner, because I don’t think they find them to be as critical. . . . I think the theme for today is concerns that overshadow the work that our group is to do and this idea of what are we Ieaming about ourselves and about each other. (Fieldnotes, 1/9/95) I recommitted myself to investigate the classrooms and find ways to support the teachers during the month we did not meet as a group. Development Meetings The final stage was the development level in which teachers began sharing some of the changes they were making in their literacy instruction. In these meetings there was a change in the roles of the participants and the focus of the talk in the meetings. Jacqui began this shift in the Febniary 2 meeting 103 when she asked that the goals of the project be clarified. The general education teachers had been discussing this among themselves and Jacqui became their spokesperson. In response to my request to the teachers that they help me decide what we might read as a group from several suggestions that I had, Jacqui began, ‘I talked to the other ones about it because... I guess the way I feel right now, and I think I’m speaking for the other ones, too, is that we’re kind of floating“ (Meeting, 2/2/95). The discussion continued to negotiate an understanding of the teachers’ concerns, then shifted to focus on what teachers wanted from the project, rather than what they should be doing or performing for the project. I asked the teachers, “So what types of things would help you? What types of things could I do and could we do as a group that would really benefit you and be beneficial to what you’re doing in your classroom with your students?“ Instead of each teacher trying to focus on literacy instnrctlon, they were each asked what could be done to support their unique concerns for the year. I questioned each teacher to find out if there were ways that l and the group could support their efforts. With that change in focus, the discussions of the meetings shifted toward sharing teachers’ efforts to make changes in their instruction rather than focusing on what could not be done. Teachers began sharing beliefs about students and instruction in ways that supported developing understandings of other’s perspectives, or intersubjectivity. During this time I was visiting the classrooms approximately two mornings each week in order to work with the teachers who were interested in having me come to their classrooms. I took 104 fieldnotes, videotaped and audiotaped the literacy activities in the classrooms, and participated in the instruction by editing students’ writing or modeling some literacy activities such as morning news (Englert et al., 1993). The talk in the development meetings shifted from talk that was dominated by my voice to talk that was dominated by the other teachers. As you can see in Figure 9 my percentage of turns dropped below all of the teachers except Kari. This was a deliberate effort on my part as the leader who wanted the teachers to take over control of the discussion and purposely worked to ask prompting questions rather than dominate the discussions with my ideas. During these meetings Suzanne took the leadership role and questioned the other teachers as they described their literacy activities; however, she seemed to be excluded from the discussions of what I might do to assist the teachers and, since she had not shared concerns or difficulties she was having, no effort seemed to be made toward learning ways to support her efforts. This was a problem that did not surface until her postinterview in which she shared her concerns about not getting the same kind of support the other teachers received: I think probably more of your time was spent in the classroom than in here. Now you could observe my students in there as well, of course, and did, urn, but I think I would have, it would have been neat to have maybe more of, more of that connection. BI'I [II E |"| One of the key themes that emerged as a factor in the development stage of the meetings was the beliefs of the participants; a theme that influenced each stage of the study group meetings, but seemed to become central to the 105 development of intersubjectivity in the group in this stage of the meetings. Four issues emerged from the data as important issues to consider: (1) beliefs about students, (2) beliefs about Ieaming and instruction, (3) beliefs about inclusion and collaboration, and (4) beliefs about teachers’ self-efficacy or their ability to be change agents. My analysis of the transcripts showed participants’ beliefs were integral to the types of interactions that developed in the group. While the original intent for the study group meetings was to focus on teaching writing in ways that accommodated the needs of academically diverse students in their classrooms, many other issues were negotiated before discussions could begin on the stated objectives, and as shown in the previous section, not every teacher in the group was able to focus on writing instruction as their point of inquiry and discussion. The group participants came to the meetings with varied beliefs, expectations, goals and perspectives on teaching and Ieaming, and the instructional discussions in the group were often overshadowed by the teachers' efforts to negotiate an understandng of the positions and roles each played in the instruction of their students. W The teachers and I also held different beliefs about students which were reflected in the meeting discourse as teachers shared concerns they had about their students and we began to explore possible solutions to behavioral and Ieaming difficulties. Jacqui and Suzanne had structured their classrooms with a behavior modification focus or a strong teacher-controlled atmosphere for Ieaming. Jacqui commented in several meetings, beginning with the March 1 106 meeting, that she felt like a ‘dictator' in her class. She struggled with students who were unkind in the things they said to each other and felt she needed to have a firm control so students would not be hurt by what other students said. In contrast, Sara’s talk about students focused on the different ways in which she was working with them and the instructional efforts she was putting forth to assist students who were having difficulty In her classroom. Kari posed questions about her students to Suzanne and asked for advice to help students who she felt were struggling in her room. She also focused on students’ self- esteem and what they could do as teachers to help their students. With most of the teachers Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) seemed to be a priority issue in their discussions about the students who were having difficulties. All teachers seemed to blame ADD for many of the students’ difficulties and Suzanne frequently generalized ADD charaaeristics for students as explanations for their poor literacy performance: You think that it can be, too, though, for someone, some of the kids, like you said, as far as just physically getting down. Some kids that are ADD, for instance, they start out with lots of energy and really, they just can’t sustain it. They canndt. And the writing process is only more painful. You know, so one sentence is like probably not true for them to say this is a story, but it’s like that’s really all I could do. (Meeting, 3/27/95) And later in the meeting Suzanne continued: And kids with ADD characteristics don’t internalize it for a long time and they don‘t learn by prior experience. Oh, this happened so I better stay away from that or etc. It's like it’s brand new every time. (Meeting, 3/27/95) In contrast, Sara stated in her preinterview (8/10/94) that she does not reduce student to the expectations that go along with ADD label: 107 Well, I feel that that all students are capable of Ieaming something. It’s not that they just, you know, ldon't like to write them off. I'm not one to say, oh, I’m not one to say well, he's attention deficit so he can‘t do this. I think that you, I try to work with them no matter what type of problem that they have, to try to see that they can overcome and work with children like that. A central dispute in the meetings focused on who was responsible for the instruction of students with special Ieaming needs. One of the problems of special education is that it has developed into a system that absolves general education teachers of the responsibilities to teach students with diverse Ieaming needs (Cook, Weintraub 81 Morse, 1995; Paul at al., 1995; Pugach, 1987). As a result, general education teachers are taught, or develop the Opinion, that they do not have the knowledge needed for instructing students with special Ieaming needs and that they should defer to the special education teacher as the expert for making instructional decisions about such students in their classroom (Pugach, 1987). This was a perception that permeated the meetings and developed into the dispute that was central to the joint activity of the meetings. I was asking all of the teachers to think about how to instruct students with special Ieaming needs, rather than only asking the special education teacher. In addition, the special education teacher retained her rele as the expert on student difficulties by evaluating the student problems that teachers brought to the meetings. Teachers would ask her for advice on how to handle students’ Ieaming or behavior problems and she often responded to teachers’ questions by characterizing possible causes of the problems and how they might be addressed. 108 31.151” . I'I I. The teachers and l differed in our beliefs about the manner in which Ieaming occurred. The teachers seemed to be operating under the transmission model of Ieaming and at the beginning of the year asked if I would suggest things for them to do in the classroom for the project. In Jacqui's preinterview she described herself as ‘a sponge“ waiting to soak up information. She says she wanted “to absorb anything that you bring to me.“ However, she immediately qualified the analogy to say: I guess a sponge and a colander, too, you know, to take in what you give me and sift out what doesn’t work for me and hang onto what is important to my class. What’s going to help them out. This conception of Ieaming differed from the sociocultural perspective that I held (and described in chapter 2). I did not want to simply ‘give‘ teachers new ways of teaching, but wanted them to be an integral part of the development of new ideas for themselves based on ideas that I would bring to the group and ideas the teachers themselves would bring to the group. I knew that if I asked the teachers to do certain activities for me to observe and collect data about, there was less chance that the changes in the teachers’ instruction would be long-lasting (Englert et al., 1993). My beliefs were based largely on the literature I had been reading for my study on teacher development which advocated that teachers play a central role in their own development (Clark, 1992; Hargreaves & Fullan, 1992; Sarason, 1990; Short et al., 1992). I hoped that teachers would take on the responsibility for pushing their own Ieaming and the Ieaming of the others in the group. 109 Sara’s beliefs were more similar to the ideas I presented in the meetings than the other teachers’ with the possible exception of Karl. The difference between Sara and Karl, however, was a sense of dissatisfaction with how she was teaching writing and an interest in changing. Kari, lthink, was interested in working more collaboratively with the special education teacher since she didn’t have the same need as Sara for making drastic changes in her writing instruction. She was doing many of the things we talked about, but did incorporate group editing and peer collaboration in developing ideas for writing with the students. The teachers were unified in their commitment to instructing all of their students, yet they differed on the focus of their instruction. There were strong teacher beliefs about the discrete roles of the general education teachers and the special education teacher in the school and in the study group. For example, the teachers believed that the special education teacher's role was to diagnose students’ difficulties in school, teach phonics to the students with Ieaming disabilities, and advise the general education teachers on behavior management. The general education teachers looked to the special education teacher as the leader and expert in the group and often deferred to her opinion when discussing students in their classrooms. These discrete roles extended to the way the literacy instruction was structured for the students with Ieaming disabilities. General education teachers were committed to having the students with Ieaming disabilities participate in their literacy instruction and stnrctured their classroom around the 110 times when students would be in special education, but the teachers resisted efforts to link the differing instruction students were receiving in each setting: phonics instruction with drill and behavior management vs. holistic, literature- based instruction. During the year of my study students were never brought to the point in which Ieaming because it was important to learn became the motivation (intrinsic motivators) rather than the external motivators, where the products of Ieaming was the emphasis rather than the process of Ieaming in all classrooms. Teachers came to the meetings complaining that they were running out of time to finish all of the writing products that they had started, when in fact these stories had been finished, but not “published“. B I. I I I i l . Teachers felt inclusion was not an option for them with the current program already in place. Suzanne was not an advocate for collaborating with teachers in full inclusion settings because she pulled students from several classrooms at one time to teach them in the resource room. Suzanne and the other teachers were concerned about whether skills learned in the resource room would actually transfer to other settings and in the April 17 meeting, the other teachers assured her they believed transfer was occurring and students were becoming successful learners. In light of these beliefs, Suzanne had no reason to attempt inclusive instructional arrangements. She spoke to this at the October 17 meeting: “And I think the other thing that stopped me [from trying inclusion] is I found the pull-out to be very successful. 111 I began pushing the idea of the teachers developing ways in which they could extend literacy activities from the general education classroom to the resource room so that the special needs students might have some extra support for their efforts. This provoked a response from Kari that Suzanne might help one student by taking a dictation of the story. This suggestion was rejected by Suzanne who cited time constraints and her uneasiness in taking on the role of a scribe. Bill I III GI Ill SI I had originally wanted the teachers to develop collaborative structures prompted by their discussions in the teacher study group. I assumed that eventually teachers would work through the differences I began to see even in the preinterviews with the teachers and be interested in trying some collaborative instruction with each other. However, I did not appreciate how deeply entrenched the pull-out system was for these teachers and the difficulties they had working through the issues. Conclusion I want to make agreement as the only form of intersubjectivity a problem, especially if agreement happens in a context in which differing beliefs are masked in a spirit of congeniality. As I described in chapter 2, a study group is a Ieaming setting where participants have a dialogue in order to make meaning about a topic or topics of mutual interest. Meaning gained through these interactions, however, is different for the each of the participants (Rommetveit, 1980). As the individual participants are involved in the process of Ieaming 112 they are influenced by their histories, beliefs, and dispositions so that the meanings developed by the individual and the group are very different. In order to make sense of the process of teachers’ Ieaming as demonstrated in the joint activity of a study group, these differences were examined as they were shared and negotiated by the participants over the course of the year of meetings. The development of intersubjectivity is a key component to the beginning process of teacher collaboration in general and special education. My interpretation of this intersubjectivity is one that reflects my position as a participant observer, in which I was both researcher and a participant in the group. Given the differing backgrounds of the teachers and myself, I recognize that intersubjectivity is not the end product of the deveIOpment of shared understandings, but it is the coordination of individuals’ contributions to the joint activity of a teacher study group. The goal is not agreement as much as an understanding of the differing positions and beliefs of the participants in the group. lntersubjectivity may result in shared beliefs and perspectives, but more importantly we need to recognize that it may end in an understanding of the different participants’ perspectives while the participants maintain their differences. To this end the focus of the group may need to shift in order to accommodate the varying interests and beliefs of the participants so that this type of intervention is responsive to teachers’ needs and supports their efforts to become better educators of their students. CHAPTER 5 THE DYNAMICS OF INTERSUBJECTIVITY: ALIGNING STORYLINES AND UNDERSTANDING DIFFERENCES This chapter describes the analysis of one group meeting that examined the dynamics of intersubjectivity; that is, how the participants began to align their contributions to the discourse in the meetings and understand differing beliefs that they had about Ieaming and instmction and the dual system of general and special education in their school. Through a close analysis of the conversations in the meetings, the dynamics (or moment-to-moment negotiations) of intersubjectivity that included both agreements and disagreements among the participants is examined. Figure 10 shows a timeline of the April 17 meeting. This timeline highlights the overall discourse patterns and the transition of the talk in the T, - Talk about Writing Sanples (Invitation “'9 '1'" r Jan-LIL, T,-Transfer Break- Challenge& Break- dJfihflLMW 9"" Remit WaLL-U #2., Figure 10. Timeline of April 17 meeting. 113 1 14 meeting. This meeting had an introduction, two topic phases (T , and T2). and two attempts to wrap up the meeting. The main research question that guided this analysis was: What were the key features of the conversations that demonstrated the dynamics of intersubjectivity in the focus meeting? Four subquestions associated with the main research question were specified to understand the intersubjectivity between the participants as they contributed ideas to the meeting conversations. They were (a) What were the conversational norms of the group? (b) What factors supported participants’ growing understandings of each other in the focus meeting? (c) What role did agreement and disagreement play in the meeting conversations (d) Did the talk change during the meeting? If so, how did it change, what provoked the changes, and what was the effect on the conversation? To answer these questions I did an analysis of the discourse in the April 17 focus meeting by analyzing the transcript of the meeting, the video data from the meeting, and notes taken during and after the meeting (Glaser 8r Strauss, 1967) . Key shifts in the conversation were noted and these shifts became the points at which the meeting was segmented for loser analysis. The meeting was first divided into two distinct topic phases {I}, T2). These topic phases were characterized by a theme and contained the initiation, discussion, and closing of that theme in the conversation. The conversations in Topic 1 were divided into six episodes according to the secondary shifts in the conversation. Within each episode the talk of the participants was characterized by participants’ storylines (Davies 8 Hana, 1990), discourse strategies used by the participants, 115 and themes in the conversations. Storylines are topic threads created by participants in a conversation, organized through the conversation and around events, characters and moral dilemmas faced by the participants in the conversation (see figure 11). The examination of the episodes in the first topic phase revealed the moment-to-moment negotiations of the study group participants as they worked to establish common understandings. The second topic phase of the meeting involved more focused discussion and was examined thematically. The construct of intersubjectivity without agreement was central to this examination as the participants pushed each other to share their differing beliefs, surfaced their assumptions of shared understandings (that is, the assumptions that the teachers in the group held similar beliefs), and negotiated their newly discovered disagreements. STORY LINE organized through characters, & moral dilemmas conversation figure 11. Features of a storyline. 116 As I described in chapter 2, intersubjectivity is the coordination of the talk in conversation in ways that allow participants to deveI0p understandings of each other. Coordination may involve agreement or “alignment“ with utterances contributed by other participants, or it may involve disagreement in a way that recognizes other contributions to the conversation, yet maintains an opposing view. Agreement as the sole criteria of lntersubjectivity in conversation is problematic since it is also an aspect of congenial relationships between teachers (Barth, 1990). The teachers were reluctant to disagree in the meetings prior to the April 17 meeting and throughout Topic 1 of that meeting. They maintained a sense of congenialiry in the conversations that seemed to mask their differing beliefs. The Onus of Students’ Learning Problems In previous meetings, the talk about students had focused on the inability of the students with disabilities to do what the teachers expected them to do. The solutions proposed by Suzanne and other teachers in the prior meetings centered on behavior management strategies. These discussions tended to be dominated by one teacher, Jacqui, and her discussion about the problems of her students. After the March 27 meeting I began looking for ways to redirect the discussion toward instructional issues related to the teaching of writing in order to bring in the interests of other teachers. To accomplish this purpose, I brought two writing samples to the April 17 meeting «one that was very well written, and another that was very disjointed. These samples were produced by actual students associated with a different research project, and I hoped to lead 1 17 the discussion away from individual abilities to a discussion of the features of a well-written text. With the identification of those features, I hoped to encourage teachers to refocus their attention on the teaching methods to help their less- able writers to generate better texts. I believed that working from the teachers’ own ideas would allow me to support their thinking, rather than simply present a list of features for them to memorize and apply. E . | lll'l il' I. III IIIIII S l I began the official part of the April 17 meeting by describing my interest in analyzing two students’ writing, that is, to identify some holistic differences and features that the teachers might find in the writings. My intent, according to my personal agenda notes for the meeting, was to first, highlight other aspects of writing good texts besides the mechanics of producing the text, and second, to have the teachers develop some instructional scaffolds, or ways to support their students to become better writers. However, I began this episode of the discussion by describing the evaluative aspect of the activity. In the transcript segments of this chapter, individual turns are numbered chronologically as they appear in the text. Other transcript conventions are listed in Appendix B. As described in chapter 4, turns are simply a change of speaker in the conversation. 1. Mary: We've been doing a lot of talking about writing in this group. Um, We would look at a couple different examples of students' writing and these are actual student generated texts and see if we could come up with some of the typical problems that students have with writing. . . . 118 The baseball one, (reads) because it is a good score, because I can win a trophy, because I like trophies, I can put them in my room so my room would look nice. (finished) And then ballet, again, this is something that, these are like experts stories. (Reads)pne of my favorite days of the week is Wednesday. Why? Because from 4:30 pm. to 5:30 pm, I have ballet. It is fun. I'll tell you about it. Here we go. First of all, it is good exercise. It strengthens your muscles. Also it helps your posture. And good posture is very important. In other words, it is like I said, good exercise. Second, it is very fun. In ballet, at least in my class anyway, we do lots of fun things like make up dances. This year we are doing one that is neat. It may be long but it is really neat to watch. Third is my teacher. Her name is Diane Newman. She is very creative and very fun to have as a teacher. Now don‘t you think you should take lessons? (Finished) 2. Sara: Probably should. (everyone laughs) Karl: You and Gary ever taken ballroom dancing? 4. Sara: No, we’re waiting. When one of our kids, we talked about this the other day. We talked about this the other day. We’re gonna surprise em. We're gonna do like Suzanne. We're gonna take ballroom dancing when one of them is getting married and it has to be dance wedding. 5. Suzanne: Don’t do like we did and tell anybody. We shouldn’t have told everybody. We should have just gotten out there. Our kids would have just died. 6. Sara: That's what happened with Norma. Norma and Don did that with their first, I 7. Suzanne: Did they? I 8. Sara: so they started out dancing and there sat all four of their kids on the floor! 9. (teachers talking together, laughing) 10. Jacqui: Give me, give me a little more background as to these, are these children similar in age? 9’ Figure 12, and the other storyline figures in this chapter, illustrates the storylines of the individuals in this episode. Each participant in the group is 119 ' represented on the left side by either the first initial or first two letters of their name. The horizontal lines in the figure map the progression of the storylines across the episode and each shift is signified by the turn number next to the storyline representation. In addition, the individual storylines of the participants are signaled by the initials or letters of the name and a subscript letter. The key explains the topic of the storylines represented. finally, the movement of the participants to align or shift alignments in the conversation are signified by the convergence and separation of the horizontal storyline representations. Each 1* M. M 10 J. \ respondent J _ —. — __ - Su \ 2 Sa. ‘~ 5 Sa ._ - ... :2; I’— - K ,' 3 5' """"""" key """""""" I :Eanmans S I :M = Mary M.= Writing samples I :J . Jacqui J, - Student abilities I :S u =- Suzanne I :Sa . Sara 8a.:- Ballroom dancing I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I l Figure 12. Storylines in Episode #1. “ numbers refer to turns in transcript 120 participant's line is distinct from the others’ which facilitated the illustration of the alignment and distancing of the participants’ contributions to the conversation. The conversations in episode #1 reflected congenial talk between the group participants. In my initial explanation of the writing samples, I hoped to position the teachers as respondents to my interest in developing criteria for evaluating student writing and devising instructional scaffolds that would support students’ efforts in the teachers' classrooms. Immediately after finishing my introduction, it became clear that this framework was not one in which the teachers were willing or able to participate. They immediately initiated their own storyline to focus on the common personal interests between them (i.e., dancing). Thus, in Figure 12 you see turn 1 began with M. but that storyline abruptly ended as Sara, in turn 2, began a different storyline (8a.) to which Suzanne and Kari aligned themselves. After an initial series of turns by Sara, Kari and Suzanne about their interest and experience with ballroom dancing lessons (turns 2-9). Jacqui initiated a shift in the discussion to focus on the writing samples by asking, ”Give me, give me a little more background as to these, are these children similar in age?” Twelve turns followed as the teachers and I discussed how the assignment was given and the types of instruction the students had prior to this point. Jacqui was looking for the context of the samples and focused on the background of students who had generated the texts for the basis of her analysis. This was a consistent line of questioning for Jacqui whenever information or a video was shared in the study group. She sought to frame her 121 evaluations of individual students in terms of their backgrounds and abilities. However, the uptake that focused on student abilities did not focus on an analysis of the features in the ballet text and the baseball text which is discussed later, and the resulting talk did not lead the group to consider instructional implications for supporting their less able writers. II I' I' ll El The first theme characterizing the conversational norms of the meeting is the negotiation of the floor (Edelsky, 1981). The floor of the conversation involves the development of the storyline by one or more people in the group and the continuation of that storyline through negotiation as others provide uptake, or propose their own storylines for the conversation. Figure 12 illustrates the storylines of the individuals in this episode. The episode began with a “singly developed floor” (F,. according to Edelsky, 1981). At the start of the meeting, this type of floor was signaled by the introduction of the writing samples. The teachers acquiesced to this initiation of the floor by ending their individual conversations, turning their gaze toward me. There were no intermptions by others as I presented the ballet and baseball texts which allowed the singly developed floor to develop. However, the teachers’ responses to the writing samples abandoned the initial storyline that focused on the characteristics of good writers as shown in the comparison samples. Instead, they introduced their own experiences in a discursive tone similar to that described by Edelsky (1981) in her description of the second kind of floor (F2), “a collaborative venture where several people 122 seemed to be either operating on the same wavelength or engaging in a free- for-all" (p. 383). In turns 2-9, Sara, Kari, and Suzanne responded to the writing samples by discussing their own personal interests and experience with ballroom dancing. With these turns, the teachers temporarily abandoned the storyline I had introduced and shaped the discourse by engaging in talk that was collaborative and congenial. but only superficially related to the storyline established in my initial presentation of the students’ writing samples. G i H E II . H The series of turns taken by Sara, Kari and Suzanne also seemed to be representative of the moves often taken by teachers in other meetings, insofar as they represented teachers’ efforts to maintain congeniality among group members. Little (1982) discusses teachers' efforts at working together in terms of congeniality versus collegiality. Congeniality is a manner of working together in a school where teachers are reluctant to challenge each other even when they disagree. Instead, to keep peaceful relations with their colleagues, teachers accept each others’ ideas and ways of teaching without questioning or discussing differences between them. In contrast, collegiality describes an effort to develop understandings by questioning, challenging. responding and negotiating the different ideas and Opinions in a friendly, yet stimulating manner. Sara described her tendency to smooth things over in her postinterview when we discussed a personal conflict that we had had about my taking fieldnotes in her classroom: “Well, I’m someone sometimes that would 123 not, I/ I'm someone that sometimes maybe just smoothed over it, but I thought, I'm not gonna smooth over this the whole year.“ WWW Teachers communicated their own agenda as they shifted the framework to refocus on their own personal bonds and engaged in congenial rapport- building. Another abrupt shift was introduced in turn 10 by Jacqui. In this turn. Jacqui refocused the talk to introduce a topic of students’ backgrounds at it influenced evaluation. As discussed in chapter 3, this was very important to her during instructional decision making. She signaled this shift by asking. “Give me, give me a little more background as to these, are these children similar in age?“ Twelve turns followed as the teachers and I discussed how the assignment was given and the types of instruction the students had prior to this point. With Jacqui's initial request for background information. she had positioned the other participants in two respects. First, by shifting attention to the background of students who had generated the texts, she positioned others in the discussion to focus upon information that she valued in her own teaching evaluations. This was a consistent line of questioning for Jacqui whenever information or a video was shared in the study group. Jacqui tried to make sense of the instructional information in terms of her own evaluations of the performance of individual students. their Ieaming or social characteristics, and their backgrounds. Therefore, she shaped participants’ talk to address a specific issue that she valued (e.g., student abilities) rather than the issues 124 posed by me. the first speaker (e.g., analysis of what features in the ballet sample made it a well-formed text). This brought the discussion back to what students could or could not do, rather than to a discussion that centered on problem-solving about what features constituted well-formed texts and how such features might be taught. Second, in this conversational move, Jacqui began a line of questioning that established a different storyline in which she retained control of the floor by asking a set of questions relevant to her own interests. In this way she positioned me as a respondent to her inquiries and established a storyline about the importance of considering students’ abilities when evaluating their writing. This storyline. for Jacqui. continued throughout the episodes of the meeting. E' I “2,1!” I! I . I ISI | Maintaining the floor, Jacqui then shifted back to a discussion of the actual texts. Other teachers joined her discussion and the floor expanded to an F2. This shift began the second episode in the analysis of the meeting. The contributions of the teachers began with a focus on the problems of writing mechanics, but then transitioned to consider the holistic feature of “text structure.“ 11. Jacqui: It seems to me that this one (pointing to the ballet story) went. went more on the basis of what you, what you would call the skeleton. This is how I want to plan. And this. this, this little guy or whoever it was. seems like he's still fumbling as to I 12. Sara: He doesn't really get the idea of what exactly a sentence is. 125 i 13. Suzanne: Or a paragraph. l 14. Jacqul: Yeah. 15. Suzanne: This one almost sounds like it's right out of power writing. 16. Jacqul: Where they do first. second and third. Martin [Jacqui’s son] does that with the II yeah. 17. Mary: Okay. so the structure is different? 18. Sara: Well, this is more like the thing that you were talking about. That you modeled with the class. too. When they wrote about... 19. Suzanne: Main idea Figure 13 illustrates the conversation in Episode #2 as there are two main storylines begun by both Jacqui and Sara (J, and 8a.) and collectively developed as shown by the convergence of Suzanne and Mary’s conversational lines around Jacqui and Sara in the figure. Jacqui began with a storyline (J,) that recalled a previous conversation we had in a meeting about writing scaffolds or skeletons as Suzanne had called them. Sara redirected the focus briefly in turn 12 to writing mechanics. Her storyline was taken up by Suzanne (turn 13) and acknowledged by Jacqui (turn 14). However, in turn 15, Suzanne shifted the conversation back to Jacqui’s storyline about the structure of the writing by suggesting the ballet sample seemed to follow a “power writing“ structure (see the Su conversational line shifting to Jacqui's space) Jacqui followed this storyline in turn 16 and Sara also joined in turn 18. I entered the storyline in turn 17 by using a conversational strategy. called “revolcing' (O’Connor, in press), to connect with the teachers. This also 126 extended their discussion by providing the label “structure“ to describe the differences in the writing samples (“So the structure is different?) By adding a language label that characterized teachers’ descriptions of the student’s problem, I attempted to move the teachers to consider writing genre as a possible frame for characterizing students’ writing performance and guiding the teachers’ instruction. Moreover, l moved this particular storyline by contributing a question, which directly positioned the other participants to consider an idea which had been central to my original purpose for the writing samples (i.e., the M 1 1’ J h—"1 7 b J I- -— -— '—-\ ...... (7-27:2: / 14 - . 1 /- Su x‘ \ 5 /6 /’18 X 13 L — _ —J Sa 12.8%.. :';':"_"::'::;“ ..... .’l K 5 """""""" 12;; """""""" : :Eammnts Smnne—__ : l" a Mary I :J a Jacqui J, . Description of samples I :Su - Suzanne I :Sa = Sara Sab= Mechanics problems I Figure 13. Storylines in Episode #2. * numbers refer to turns in transcript 127 consideration of writing genres as basis for instruction rather than as a focus on students’ mechanics problems). Sara then connected this to a type of writing genre we had introduced to her students (turn 18). In this way, Sara interpreted the storyline I had introduced in terms of a more familiar teaching context that we had jointly shared and negotiated. lmportantly, this utterance also signaled Sara's interpretation of information in terms of an actual teaching situation and a teaching response. Instead of focusing on the attributions or characteristics of students, Sara positioned her response based on a teaching process and a set of teaching actions that she knew. This perspective will be repeatedly taken up by Sara in her later comments in the discussion. In this episode, the participants began to negotiate meanings in response to a precipitating teaching event or problem (e.g., the writing samples). The members of the group positioned themselves in terms of “what they knew“ and “what they understood or valued“ (e.g., issues of mechanics or story genre), as they began the process of aligning themselves around the idea that the structure of the two writing samples were different and what this consideration might mean for their instructional practices. !|' | I Q | 'l I' Figure 14 illustrates more clearly the connections made in Episode #2 between the participants’ contributions to the discussion. The circles represent the participants in the study group and the primary focus of their contributions to the discussions in Episode #2. The solid lines illustrate the coordination of the 128 Sara Relates issues back to instruction in her classroom Instruction -- what can be done? (18)“ \ Mary \ Text analysis -- , holistic features MW?” (structure, ec anrcs - - (1244) audrence,vorce) Jacqui / \\ Students’ / backgrounds Tami??? re (ability, experience) '\ Student 1 problems \\ S uza nne Labels student problems, characterizes ability based on label Karl listening, taking notes -- not active in discussion Figure 14. lntersubjectivity in Episode #2. “Numbers refer to turns in transcript. 129 different contributions around the storylines in which intersubjectivity seems to be developing. The connections among the participants reflect their various alignments with the storylines put forth by the participants in their talk. Jacqui’s and Suzanne’s contributions to the discussion represent agreement about student based writing problems; in contrast, Sara and my contributions represent agreement on the importance of responding to students’ writing possibilities. Sara, Suzanne and Jacqui coordinate on issues of writing mechanics. Kari does not contribute verbally to this conversation but was listening and taking notes during the discussion. l| |'|"|' G I'E Matusov (1996) has suggested that the development of intersubjectivity is a generative process. Ideas from one set of conversations may be retained and reintroduced in order to contribute to participants’ development of intersubjectivity in subsequent conversations. In this case, Suzanne connected her contributions to a prior study group meeting (power writing in turn 15). Similarly, Sara described an occasion when I had modeled writing instruction in her classroom and we had engaged in conversations about these structures (turn 18). The focus on instruction was a move typical of Sara’s contributions to the conversations. In this way, she not only moved the talk away from the students’ inability to do mechanics, but instead communicated her own beliefs about the self-efficacy of a teacher in instruction - that what she does can influence Ieaming outcomes. 130 W In the third episode participants began to share their beliefs and those beliefs were communicated in the storylines that each worked to establish and maintain in the conversation. In this episode the discussion about the text samples continued and included the basede text, however, the talk of the teachers reflected increasingly divergent perspectives about the role of the teacher in altering Ieaming outcomes for students (see Figure 15). In this episode, Jacqui and Suzanne focused on what students were unable to do, Sara related the samples to students in her class who wrote texts similar to the sample texts, and I talked about holistic textual features of the writing samples outside of students’ abilities. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. Suzanne: I think this person doesn't like to write and is going to do as little as possible. This one is I?! Sara: I look at this and I think this is my Nick and this is my Cindy. How exactly how she was talking. This is exactly how she wrote when she wrote her story. Asking questions or going on and . . . [ Suzanne: Kind of how she would talk. I Sara: Yes exactly. Yup. Jacqul: I'm gonna /?/ (she gets up and leaves the room) Mary: So the, we call that voice in writing. The students’ voice in their writing. That they write like they're actually talking. And also this idea of audience. I mean, [ Sara/Suzanne: Hm-mm I 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 131 Mary: you get the sense, that the person writing ballet is sensing that this is for a purpose, and she's writing for somebody to read. Suzanne: Right. Sounds as though “you should take lessons.“ i Mary: Yeahl Suzanne: I mean, you know . . . // Mary: So there’s a sense of audience there which is not part of... [ Suzanne: This is just drudgery. I mean, this is what teacher said I had to write (Sara laughs). How many sentences? Karl: Yup. How long does it have to be? I Suzanne: How long. . I Jacqul: (returning with a sheet of paper) Four sentences. Sara: Well, and when I'm writing I Suzanne: You know, we should I?/ Suzanne began this episode by characterizing the student who wrote the baseball story as not liking to write. This storyline was consistent with her contributions in previous discussions that the onus of the student’s Ieaming problem resided in the student. Suzanne’s storyline attributed the student’s poor text to his not being interested in writing and focused attention on the idea that the student was responsible for his own writing difficulties. This perspective was not taken up by anyone in the group and Suzanne’s storyline did not confinue. 132 Instead, Sara again connected the topic of discussion to her teaching experience as she began to relate the writing samples to students in her class who wrote in a similar manner (turns 21-23). Suzanne took up Sara’s storyline and extended it In turn 22. Likewise, I connected with the storyline constnicted by Sara and Suzanne and added the language of holistic writing traits (voice and audience) to the discussion (turn 25). This developing storyline continued from turn 23 through turn 31 as Suzanne and I built on each other's contributions and developed M 25 Mb ______ ‘ J "I 28 ‘x 20* Su. '. 1‘ \ 35 Su """"""" x ,1 32 S.U._‘T:..—_::-.':_-: Sa 21 Sa._ - _‘:'2_?_':"i - _ _ _/."f- _ - §§ - _ K /' 5' """""""" IE 6; """""""" I :Eam'gipams S I :M a Mary M“: Holistic features I :J - Jacqui I :31: a Suzanne Su. . Student unwilling I :Sa . Sara 8a,: Personal experienceI :K 8 Kari E Figure 15. Storylines in Episode #3. “Numbers refer to turns in transcript. 133 intersubjectivity about the holistic trait of voice in the texts. There is a growing sense of collaboration between the two of us, with verbal signs of agreement and encouragement as we seem to affirm that we are on the same wavelength (e.g., “hmmm', “right“, “yeahl“). Yet, in the middle of this evolving alignment of perspectives, Suzanne’s comment in turn 32 about the number of sentences as a focus for students abruptly halted the convergence and redirected the conversation back to mechanistic aspects of writing and tendency of students to produce only what is required. That had been her initial storyline In Episode #3. Both Jacqui and Karl took up this storyline and while this position brought Kari into the conversation for the first time, Suzanne’s successful attempt to refocus discussion on the student’s ownership of their writing difficulty narrowed the ability of the group to consider divergent perspectives and alternate teaching strategies that might have expanded their instructional repertoire. Suzanne did venture out to connect with the holistic features storyline that I proposed, but at this point in the meeting her attempted foray to consider a divergent perspective was short-lived in favor of returning to the teachers’ established beliefs about students and Ieaming. lnmlnmsntlbmuomflsoetition One of the key conversational norms demonstrated in this episode was repetition. Tannen (1989) talks about repetition as an involvement strategy and she describes it around four distinct features of repetition: (1) self versus allo- repetition-the repetition of others, (2) the range of fixity for repetition--exact repetition to paraphrase, (3) repetition as patterned rhythm-—where the meter of 134 talk is repeated rather than exact words, (4) and the temporal feature-from immediate to delayed repetition. Tannen also defines several functions of repetition: (1) participatory Iistenership, (2) ratifying the listener, (3) humor, (4) savoring talk, (5) expanding, and (6) participation in the conversation. Both self and alto-repetition were evident in Episode #3. Sara repeated the idea “how exactly“ to expand her statements in turn 21 (“How exactly, how she was talking. This is exactly how she wrote when she wrote her story.“). She repeated the word “exactly“ to specify that the student was writing in the same way that she was talking. Sara also expanded her narrative by building the phrase “how she wrote“ into “when she wrote her story.“ I repeated myself in turn 25 (“voice in writing“) and across turns 25 (“audience“), 27 (“sensing“), and 31 (“sense of audience“). The function of the repetition in my turns was also for the expansion of my ideas and to clarify the points I wanted to make. I introduced a new term, “voice,“ to the teachers when I labeled their descriptions of students writing as if they were talking. I said, “we call that voice in writing. The'students’ voice in their writing“ (turn 25). I then developed the second label I wanted to introduce to the teachers across three turns (25, 27, 31). I began with the broad term “idea of audience,“ then introduced the term “sense“ by talking about the student writer getting a sense for the purpose in the story. After Suzanne expanded on that contribution I pulled the terms together to articulate the second label, “sense of audience.“ In this way I involved the teachers in understanding new features for students’ writing that may be responsive to instmction by repeating their terms together as 135 a label for the developing ideas in the discussion. By repeating the teachers’ contributions I invited their participation in my storyline. In addition to self-repetition, this episode contained four instances of allo- repetition. These instances served different functions than the self repetition that supported the expansion of ideas contributed to the conversation. Allo- repetition supported participatory Iistenership and ratifying the listener functions. The first example centered around the idea of talk; that is, that the ballet story was written in the same way the author would talk Sara began in turn 21 by saying, “how she was talking.“ This was repeated by Suzanne in the next turn, “Kind of how she would talk,“ and by me in turn 25, “That they write like they are actually talking.“ This repetition served a participatory Iistenership function. Each speaker demonstrated she was a listening participant in the storyline by repeating the idea and the word “talk“ in her contributions. In addition, each person ratified the initial contribution by echoing what the previous speaker(s) said and became involved in the conversation. The recognition of other contributions in conversation is an aspect of intersubjectivity that Matusov (1996) called “coordinating contributions.“ Participants recognized what others had contributed to the conversation by repeating part of what was said. In this way, intersubjectivity began to develop. The dynamics in this episode involved making these connections to others’ contributions and coordinating the talk in the meeting. 136 The second instance of allo-repetition was a “delayed temporal repetition“, a repetition occurring later In the conversation (T annen, 1989). In turn 28 Suzanne repeated the phrase, “you should take lessons,“ that had been read In the ballet story (turn 1) and that had been the focus of the F2 floor described in Episode #1. This was a fixed link (exact repetition) back to the writing sample and she connected that phrase to the features of writing I described and labeled in turn 27 (“she's writing for somebody to read“). This coordinating contribution suggested Suzanne was actively trying to facilitate intersubjectivity between the participants. WWW Having done that, four turns later, Suzanne used the repetition strategy, ironically, to paraphrase her initial contribution In Episode #3 and moved the conversation away from the storyline that focused on the writing features responsive to instmction to her earlier storyline focusing on student responsibility for their writing difficulties. In turn 32 Suzanne said, “This is just drudgery. I mean, this is what teacher said I had to write.“ She paraphrased the idea that students were talking in their writing (turns 21 , 22, 25) by constructing a dialogue that characterizes the student who had written the baseball story. However, this was not the voice of a student with potential to learn about voice and audience in his writing but a characterization of students who have trouble developing a text as having poor attitudes. Within this episode we see repetition used to both engage participants in the conversation and expand the ideas being contributed. We also see the floor 137 change from Suzanne’s focus on students’ reluctance to write (turn 20) to a discussion of what students do when writing and the identification of those writing features (turns 21-31), then back to students’ reluctance to write (turns 32-37). The final instance of allo-repetition is one of simple participation. Jacqui had left the room during the conversation to get a writing sample from one of her students. By repeating Suzanne’s use of the word, “sentence“ as she returned to the room (turns 32 8 35), Jacqui engaged herself back into the conversation. E . | I! I' B l l' S l I :: It i :1] m. Qllm Students The fourth episode turned the focus of the conversation away from textual features as Jacqui focused the discussion on her student, Jack. During Episode #3, Jacqui left the room (turn 24) and returned (turn 35) with a story written by Jack that day. The story contained extended text and ideas organized in a narrative form, a breakthrough story for Jack who struggled with writing and wrote in a manner similar to that of the basede sample I had brought to the group. (Jacqui comes over to the head of the table and gestures toward the writing samples at her spot on the table) 38. Jacqul: But I want you to. . . . The other thing, Mary, is with those two, I guess as far as looking at them and knowing how to interpret, you know, I don't know the children personally but this little guy right here (she picks up a Kari’s copy of the Baseball story). maybe he knows. Maybe like Suzanne says, this is, you know, this is all I want to do and this is what I want to put down and that's kind of it. Minimal amount. And he has more potential. Then I’d go back and say this is not acceptable but let’s put a little more effort into it, that sort of thing. But maybe he's like Jack (holds up the paper she brought in), this is, this could be wonderful for him. 39. Sara: And this one’s typed out. Now maybe, I don’t know . . . 40. 41. 42. 43. 45. 46. 47. 48. 49. 51. 52. 53. 55. 138 , l Suzanne: I think it's just great. Jacqul: (showing Suzanne the paper) But you can see Jack still doesn't have an idea about sentences. Suzanne: No. Jacqul: (reads) Okay, here we go. I went to the biggest mountain in I Period / The world But it was raining so we did not get to playl After that, we went a movie and I got / Period / Some ice cream It wasgood and Iwent on . . . HetoId mejog/Period/Then Iwent back to the future I / Period / Went to the wild, wild west show // . Suzanne: I also think though that your ADD kids just don't know what a sentence is. Jacqul: Even though I had him read it back, he has to find a partner and read it to him, but he doesn’t, he doesn't interpret. But isn‘t this a stitch. I mean. it’s wonderfull There's so many ideas I Suzanne: But the ideas are down. Jacqul: The Ideas, it’s all there. And so this is, this is. . . I Suzanne: And the spelling’s not bad. I Jacqul: No. lthink this is wonderfull . Suzanne: It's really not. I mean, it looks messy but. . . I Jacqul: But he has no idea of sentence yet. So I know that I know, because I know Jack Mary: But the sentences will come. I Suzanne: Yeah. I . Jacqul: Right. Mary: He’s got the ideas down. Getting the conventions of the sentence mapped onto to that . . . 139 I 56. Jacqul: Right. I 57. Suzanne: Yeah. I 58. Mary: Because he's got these needs, and meaning wise, it's all there. He just doesn‘t know where to put periods. Right? 59. Sara: That’s with Gloria. She writes, she can, when she writes a weekend report, she can go on and on and on. And she’s got the ideas all there, but to put the period. That's why I was sitting with her today, too, cause she wrote something so I was trying to go over with her. Now read what you've written. Is that a complete thought? I mean, does it tell something complete? So she read it. Yes. Okay, I said, now what should go there? Period. Then she started her next sentence and she doesn‘t have the idea of lower case, the upper case letter to start a sentence either. Now, I don't know if that was the best way to do it but I was trying to drew her attention, that she doesn't need to go on and on and on and on. This episode marked a point of negotiation of two contrasting values for Jacqui and Suzanne. They were torn between wanting to encourage students who were performing as well as they believed they were able, and yet, they wanted to maintain the standards of writing as the criteria for determining writing achievement and these students had not met the criteria. Figure 16 maps the storylines in Episode #4. As you can see, Jacqui’s storyline about ability and mechanics was the one around which the conversation focused, but each participant contributed her own storyline as the conversation moved back and forth between the participants. At the end of the episode, the storyline shifted to converge around the meaning versus mechanics storyline that was an adaptation of Jacqui’s storyline. Sara continued to make connections between 140 the converging storylines and her ongoing contributions relating to her classroom experience. This continued to tie the ideas being discussed back to the teachers’ classrooms. The key negotiation in Episode #4, therefore, was the way Jacqui’s contributions highlighted a tension she experienced between not wanting to criticize a student’s work because it might be the best he was able to do, while recognizing it as lacking by her standards of good writing. This storyline was '1' 4O ‘1‘ ,’ 46 54 ' S u .' [4'3" [1; I S i59 Sa. 3 3'5 éa, "' ' '— K 5 """""""" R89 """""""" 'l : ' ' S E :M . Mary M,- Meaning vs. mechanics 1 :J - Jacqui J, - Ability vs. mechanics : :Su - Suzanne Sub -ADD and writing : :Sa - Sara Sag- Personal experience : ; Sac - Evaluation bias : :K - Kari : I Figure 16. Storylines in Episode #4. " Numbers refer to turns in transcript 141 initiated by Jacqui in Episode #1 when she questioned me about the backgrounds of the students before she was willing to evaluate their writing samples. This storyline was picked up by Suzanne in turn 40 and both teachers aligned themselves with each other and collectively developed an evaluation of Jack’s writing based on his lack of knowledge about mechanics (turns 40-42). Suzanne did move away from the collective ’mechanics’ storyline in turn 44, but her comment about the ability students with attention deficit disorder have to form sentences was still related to the “ability“ storyline. Her comments about ADD will be discussed in the next section. This episode also showed two efforts by Sara to enter the conversation. In turn 39 she commented that some of the differences in the teachers' evaluation of the two texts could be attributed to the differences in the texts' overall appearance since the ballet story was typed and the baseball story was handwritten. Sara’s observation was not taken up by any other person in the group, and therefore the idea was dropped from the conversation. Davies and Harré (1990) have argued that the uptake of a storyline is an essential part of positioning a storyline in a conversation. Edelsky makes the same point in her discussion of floor (Edelsky, 1981 ). In this episode, we see Sara offering another explanation for the participants to consider, but she was not able to assume control of the t0pic floor nor did her contribution impact the collectively developing meanings and interpretations offered by Jacqui and Suzanne. Later, Sara did eventually gain access to the floor by linking, through repetition 142 Sara Relates issues back to instmction in her classroom Expands-- Relates to her hstruction (59) I I Students’ '1 Ideas are In backgrounds Jfigfigft (ability, '\ expenence) mechanics sentences/ (nape. )51) I: text that: dong an a wonderful ‘ (38. 40. 45. 49) K8 I’l listening, taking notes -- not ach've in discussion Differences h original texts (39)' Mary Text analysis - holistic features (structure, audience, voice) Labels student problems, characterizes ability based on label \ ADD characterstic (44) Figure 17. lntersubjectivity in Episode #4. “ Numbers refer to turns in transcript 143 of the word “period“, her ’personal experience’ storyline to the discussion (turn 59). Figure 17 demonstrates the increasing complexity of the conversation as teachers moved away from simply agreeing with the contributions of the other participants in the group to building on other’s contributions and connecting with contributions without agreement. There were three topics about which Suzanne and Jacqui agreed: (a) Jack’s text was wonderful (turns 38, 40, 45, 49); (b) Jack did not understand sentences or spelling conventions (turns 41, 42, 45-49); and (c) Jack did have Ideas In his story (45-47). There were also two contributions by teachers not taken up by any participants. After Jacqui shifted her focus to Jack’s paper, Sara suggested the differences they saw in the sample texts could be influenced by one being typed and the other handwritten (turn 39). As noted above, this idea was lost in the conversation between Suzanne and Jacqui. The second contribution not taken up was Suzanne’s generalization about students with ADD - that they do not know what a sentence is (turn 44). It was a comment that proved Jacqui’s point that Jack’s story, although poorly written by writing mechanics standards, could be called “wonderful.“ Suzanne asserted that students with attention deficit disorder should not be expected to put periods in the right place in a story; therefore, the teachers were justified for feeling like this was a wonderful story for Jack Jack should not be held to the same expectations in writing mechanics. 144 This comment connected with an overarching theme for Suzanne that students with attention deficit disorder had academic Inabilities as well, but it was not coordinated with the teachers’ thinking about Jack. Jack had not been labeled ADD because his parents refused to have him tested for this. Suzanne and Jacqui told me in an informal converswon that they suspected Jack would be diagnosed with ADD if they had tested him. Suzanne’s generalization, however, in connection with the discussion about Jack assumed this classification for him and argued that students with ADD do not know writing mechanics such as features of sentences. This contribution was not taken up by any other participant in the group, which kept the idea from developing, but also demonstrated the teachers’ reluctance to question or challenge Suzanne about her idea to find out if that was really what she believed or the rationale behind her assertion. II I' |"|!!!'ll I! | For the first time in this discussion we see lntersubjectivity without agreement in turns 52 - 55. l repeated Jacqui and Suzanne’s contributions that Jack had ideas in his story and suggested that mechanics could develop after students learn that stories are made of ideas, reintroducing the holistic writing features discussed in Episode #3. I moved from my position of talking about text structure in turn 58 to restating the teachers’ position about Jack’s inability to place the periods properly in his writing. My repetition of the teachers’ contributions demonstrated that I understood their concern about Jack’s writing mechanics despite my prior contributions In turns 52 and 55 that downplayed 145 the focus of mechanics in favor of students’ efforts to put their ideas into text. This demonstration of understanding was the beginning of intersubjectivity, a recognition of altematlve perspectives in the conversation. This storyline for Jacqui and Suzanne also highlighted a key issue about their consideration of a student’s ability and performance. In this episode and throughout this meeting, the teachers were articulating their beliefs about teaching and Ieaming. Essentially, Jacqui and Suzanne suggested that teaching was the presentation of lessons to students who either learned them and performed successfully or to those who did not have the ability to learn and therefore they should be praised for their efforts. While the teachers were recognizing individual student differences, they did not seem to see Ieaming as a generative process - that is, what students produced as a result of instruction was merely a jumping off point that informed future instruction. In contrast, I was seeking to bring into the teachers’ experience a sociocultural perspective on Ieaming that advocated constructs such as the “zone of proximal development“ in students’ Ieaming (Cole, 1985; Vygotsky, 1978; Wertsch, 1991). It became clear in this meeting that the teachers viewed instruction as an all or nothing endeavor -- a teacher teaches her lesson and the students either learn or do not learn. Students who were judged to have lower abilities because of a Ieaming disability or attention deficit disorder needed to be praised for what they were doing, but that praise was tempered by the acknowledgment that those students still did not measure up to the teachers’ academic performance standards. My contributions, beginning in turn 146 52, pushed for more recognition that Jack would still be learning some of the things he was not yet performing. For example, in response to Suzanne’s assertion that students with attention deficit disorder do not know what sentences are, l repeated the idea that Jack could learn the conventions of a sentence within his efforts to put his ideas into text. Finally, Sara joined the conversation again by making a connection to her Instruction with a similar student who had trouble putting periods in her sentences. Consistent with her emphasis on teaching actions and response, she moved beyond simply characterizing the student’s problem, as Jacqui and Suzanne had done with Jack, and explained what she did to help her student learn about periods. In this way. a sense of disagreement in teachers’ contributions developed: Sara and Jacqui characterized the problem and evaluated Jack's writing as “wonderful“ based on their beliefs about what he could or could not do, while Sara moved beyond the characterization of the student as not understanding periods to an active instructional stance in which she articulated how to teach the student about periods. The onus of the problem in Jacqui and Suzanne’s case resided in the student, and in Sara’s case, in herself as that teacher, as she pushed herself to teach sentences to her student. E . I IIE' III .I. I G'II At this point in the conversation the talk continued, but Jacqui shifted the topic of discussion to some of her beliefs about students’ writing ability. The participants in the group learned that Jacqui believed writing is a “gift“, an 147 innate ability in some people. This belief was rooted in the experiences Jacqui had with her son who also had difficulty writing. Suzanne agreed by saying “I think a little bit, a little bit like that, too.“ Thus, teachers began to coordinate their beliefs, ideas and contributions to the discussion actively. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66. 67. Jacqul: I guess I have, this is going back to what I was saying before. I guess it's more my philosophy but I feel that in a / in a part, writing is a gift. Being able to write something on this order is a gift with, with some children, that they have received. And with others, it's not. It's like my own personal feeling about spelling is that with some children it's a natural ability, it’s an inborn ability. With other ones, it's gonna be a struggle throughout their lives. So my place as the teacher is to identify what they can achieve. And so that even though I would love to have 20 of my children in my classroom being able to do something like this, realistically God has not given them all those gifts. And I can push and I can shove and I can do as much as I can, but some of them are going to reach a plateau in second grade and that’s all the further they’re going to get. Mary: So you don’t think that type of a voice and those things can be taught? To some, The kids that aren't naturally bringing that out? Jacqul: It can be taught. Whether they're going to, whether they're going to accept it and go with it in second grade or whether they're still, they're going to have to be retaught and remodeled in third grade and retaught and remodeled in fourth grade . . . Suzanne: But that doesn't mean, I mean, you know. You can say the same thing about reading. Well, these kids were given the same instruction. One took off; one doesn't know a thing. Well, the instruction then wasn’t, you know, structured enough for that other person or it wasn‘t repeated enough. Or it wasn‘t, it doesn't mean a slower reader can’t eventually learn. [ Karl: But it might not happen within a year. . . I Suzanne: No. I Karl: or two years. I Jacqul: No. 148 68. Suzanne: No. Iagree with that. // Iagree with that. It's a slower process. 69. Jacqul: That you have to meet each child and you have to say this is working for them, maybe you know, having this kind of structuring, whatever, is working wonderfully for this one. It's not going to, so you have to change your interpretation of how you’re going to model for this one. And you can do it in three or four different ways and maybe they're still not gonna go beyond it this year (points to the baseball story). Maybe It's gonna be next year, maybe it’s gonna be the following year. In this discussion between Jacqui, Suzanne, Kari and me our contributions demonstrated a shift in our stances and the creation of specific alliances that were more visible than in the past episodes. Jacqui began the conversation by clearly stating her beliefs about writing abilities. This contextualized her comments about Jack in her perspective that writing is a gift and holistic features that make some stories more engaging are Innate. This helped the other participants understand why Jacqui’s contributions focused on the characterization of Jack’s writing abilities rather than on the development of teaching strategies that she might use to push him to become a more engaging writer. Jacqui’s explanation of her beliefs was a critical point in the development of intersubjectivity in the group because the other participants then could question her as they developed greater understanding of the beliefs behind her contributions to the conversation. Agreement with Jacqui’s stance was not necessary for intersubjectivity. Instead, understanding what Jacqui believed about this issue allowed the other participants to make sense of her 149 contributions to the discourse in the group and coordinate their own positions in light of her perspective. As demonstrated in Figure 18 I began by questioning Jacqui’s stance in light of my own beliefs that holistic features can be taught to students (turn 61). Jacqui restated my position, but reaffirmed her focus on student responsibility by saying students might not accept Instruction (turn 62). At this point, Suzanne contributed a perspective that differed from Jacqui and was more aligned with my contribution. She talked about the need for teachers to adapt their instruction and work to find a way to teach students with difficulties. Suzanne’s 61 60*Jd I " ‘— __———7-':'::._—.}:2.‘E:§Z 6.3.51.1; .......... .,:. ..‘65 V Su / 69 $8 /64 K /' Key """"""""" :W SWIM..— 1M =Mary EJ . Jacqui J,I a Writing is a gift :8 u - Suzanne Su,= - Change instruction :Sa 2 Sara Figure 18. Storylines in Episode #5. “ Numbers refer to turns in transcript 150 contribution demonstrated an opposing stance to Jacqui; that is, she seemed to be saying that teachers have a responsibility to find a way to help students be successful learners. This seemed to contrast with her previous focus on what students could not do (turns 63 8 65). While this shift represented a differing position than she took in Episode #4, Suzanne continued to describe the teachers’ role as having to try different kinds of instmction, rather than building on the knowledge that the students were demonstrating. Kari once again entered the conversation by taking a mediating position between Jacqui and Suzanne. Instead of agreeing with Jacqui or Suzanne, she attempted to bridge these viewpoints by suggesting that Ieaming might not happen for several years. On this point, Jacqui agreed and connected this with Suzanne’s final comment that students eventually leam. When Suzanne agreed with this position in turns 67 and 70, Jacqui summarized the coordination of their ideas in turn 71 by saying instruction may need to be different for different children, it may require several attempts, and students may not be successful for several years. As shown in Figure 19 this episode demonstrated the dynamic development of intersubjectivity that Matusov (1996) describes. Jacqui, Suzanne and Kari stated and negotiated their positions on students’ Ieaming and the teachers’ role in that Ieaming. Jacqui’s final statement coordinated their contributions so that all perspectives were represented. The next segment built on Jacqui’s statement as l shifted the conversation back to the writing 151 Sara Mary Holistic features can be taught Holistic features can be taught . (61 ). ' o ‘. o - 0" '- BUT. . . teach won't _work if student n't 9 Ability to write I . . accept It -- Onus on Onus on rs a gift student (60) (62) Teaczer '\ May take several years to see success (64, 66-70) Instruction should be changed if students are not Ieaming (63, 65) Ka rI Learning to write takes time Figure 19. lntersubjectivity in Episode #5. “Numbers refer to turns in transcript. 152 samples and asked Jacqui to apply her position to the children whose writing we have sampled. mm In Episode #6 l coordinated my interest in instructional adaptations for students with special Ieaming needs into the joint activity of the teachers’ dialogue. I also clarified my perspective and goals for asking the teachers to examine the ballet and baseball writing samples. 70. 71 72. 73. 74. 75. 76. 77. 78. Mary: Would you change the instruction then for that child? Jacqul: For this guy? I Mary: Yeah. Jacqul: As opposed to what this person is doing at this time? Mary: Yeah, I mean, what types of things would you do to help that child get over some of these humps that they seem to be having? Jacqul: Um . . . I Karl: That depends on the child, too, because like Jacqui has said, if this is an excellent product for this student, you don't want to be too critical . . . I Jacqul: and give a lot of praise. But also, I think if I Mary: No, I'm not saying being critical to the child. I’m saying, okay, now you as a teacher, where are you gonna go? What's the next step? What types of things are you going to focus on? to help the child, you know. You’re seeing where the child is but then you have to make instmctional decisions on what you're going to do next instmctionally for this, the child to get them to take a next step. . . . Are we talking about different things? (long pause) 79. 81. 82. 83. 84. 85. 86. 87. 88. 89. 90. 91. 153 Suzanne: I?I change your instruction for that one, additional or something. I Sara: I think I'd probably, probably go more one on one with him. And ask him a few questions so that he could maybe see that he’s answering in a sentence. You know, I'd probably tell him that he has a lot of good information and I would like to maybe, let's look at it to see if we can get III I would, being a second grade teacher, I would probably work on sentence, having them see if they thought It was a sentence or not. Jacqul: Because he does have. I Sara: He has ideas. I Suzanne: I think I would address beginning sentences with “because“ I Sara: Yeah I Suzanne: for one thing. I Sara: Yeah. Suzanne: If we took it off would it make sense? I Sara: Right. Suzanne: “Because it’s a good sport.“ Well, then, what sport are you talking about? Karl: (nods head in agreement) Mary: One of the things that, I guess some of the things I'm thinking about, too, in addition to what you're sharing is that I wouldn‘t change the story if it was this child's. I’m not, I mean, this is where the kid, the child is at this point. That’s great. I’m not looking at trying to improve that particular story but I'm, I’m looking at it and saying, okay, these are some of the things this child needs to learn about. About what a good writer incorporates into a story. Um, To make it more instructional decisions on what I want to look at for future writing. That's kind of where the comparison goes. That’s what I'm trying, that's what I'm trying to demonstrate with the comparison rather than 154 saying we have to remediate this particular child. On this particular story. 92. Suzanne: Oh. 93. Sara: But then . . . Oh, I see. So you, probably you wouldn't talk to him about it. 94. Suzanne: But you would take this for your beginning stuff to plan instruction. The storylines in this episode continued from Episode #5 (see Figure 20). Jacqui and Kari aligned themselves around Jacqui’s “ability“ storyline and Kari extended it by adding her thoughts that students should not be criticized if they are doing the best work they can do, given their ability. Jacqui agreed with her M w _ I96__ r‘--. I J . I / '93 95 , 92 , ,1 SI] \1 \ \\ 84 / ,’ 8a 1, \ sass; """" ’ 76 77 K I_K.‘.‘:::::::::::: Key """"""""" : : Shauna—— I :M = Mary M, - Incremental progress I :J . Jacqui I :50 - Suzanne I :Sa as Sara 8a,, a Mechanics instruction I :K . Kari K. . Should not criticize I Figure 20. Storylines in Episode #6. “ Numbers refer to turns in transcript. 155 and began to build on that when l interrupted her to clarify my position that, while it is important to recognize students’ efforts, as teachers we needed to be asking where the instruction needs to go from that point. This move was a direct attempt to take the floor and redirect the storyline back to instructional issues. In response, there was a pause after which the teachers began to negotiate instmctional recommendations for the student who wrote the baseball story (turns 79-91). This exchange showed there was alignment between the teachers, but disagreement between the teachers and me. The disagreement was triggered through questions and my attempts to clearly state what I thought teachers should do when they evaluated writing samples, namely develop ideas for pushing students’ future Ieaming. Just as Jacqui had prompted discussion in Episode #5 by stating her beliefs about writing ability when I stated that writing evaluations needed to focus on future instmctional decisions, Suzanne and Sara were able to both question and comment on my beliefs, thereby showing that they were understood the position I was taking in the conversation (turns 93 894) and developing intersubjectivity with me. The impetus for stating my beliefs came when I became frustrated with the way that my contributions to the discussion about these writing samples seemed to be so uncoordinated with that of the teachers. As shown in Figure 20, there was no alignment between the teachers and myself at the beginning of this episode. In my notes about the meeting I described my realization at this point in the meeting that I was attempting to have the teachers guess at my 156 perspective while I sought to reinforce and revoice ideas that overlapped with my position. My goal of developing intersubjectivity as agreement and shared meanings in the group was not happening and I realized I needed to clearly state my beliefs for the teachers to be able to dscuss them. I realized during the middle of [the discussion] that I had this agenda that l was trying to make them guess at, which Is the same thing . . . that I accuse teachers of doing [to their students]. Having an agenda and trying to make them guess what your agenda is. (Meeting notes, 4I17I96) Finally, Jacqui asked me to state my opinion about whether holistic features of writing can be taught. In my response to her, I recognized her position that it might take years for students to learn to write clearly. The writer of the baseball story might not devel0p into a gifted writer, but I maintained my position that the traits can be taught: 95. Jacqul: I want your answer on what I said. As far as how you feel about students and the writing ability. What do you feel? 96. Mary: lthink, I think that maybe the person with the baseball story is not going to ever, or not at this point, or soon going to write a story just like this ballet. Because particularly, because there’s a lot of, this is, this is exceptional as far as the voice and things. But I do think it can be taught. I really do. I think that it is something that can be modeled. There are activities that can be done to really um, promote that kind of a conception about writing. In the process of discussing ideas and beliefs about students. the participants in the study group were clarifying their positions, recognizing other contributions. yet maintaining their original stance that the of responsibility for student learning problems resided in the student. Jacqui remained committed to her stance that no matter what teachers do, some students with disabilities will not become good writers. She did recognize that progress might be made 157 over time, but was committed to her position that writing is a gift. .By her clear statements of her beliefs to the group, however, she allowed the other participants to understand the context of her contributions about Jack and the writer of the baseball story, thereby facilitating intersubjectivity (with and without agreement) between the participants in the group. Jacqui also facilitated the clarification of my beliefs and contributions to the conversation when at the end of the discussion she challenged me to state my beliefs about the potential for students who begin writing as the student with the baseball story did, and whether I thought that writer could develop the writing skills similar to the skills of the writer of the ballet story. However, in the development of intersubjectivity, participants in the study group must be willing to share their beliefs in order to align themselves with respect to the positions of others. In part, this positioning is influenced by the roles of the participants in the community, and the importance of maintaining congeniality among the key participants. Despite frequent conversations and demonstrations in her class In which Sara and I agreed on instmction that supported and students’ Ieaming, Sara aligned herself with the teachers in the group conversations so that her ideas about instruction were more closely aligned with theirs than mine. Without support and uptake from other members, such as Sara, altematlve perspectives and ideas that might have been articulated by myself or others were not legitimized in the community. Although Sara and I had extensive conversations outside of the study group meetings about instruction for students in her room, she and Kari seemed more hesitant 158 to contribute their beliefs about instruction to this group discussion. This dilemma of publicizing beliefs and giving authority to the ideas of participants is an important issue to consider when leading teacher study groups because if intersubjectivity develops as the result of participants coordinating their contributions to the discussion, the teachers who are not contributing are not able to have their ideas, beliefs, and perspectives included in the negotiations. Expression of Beliefs: Disagreement that Leads to lntersubjectivity The second topic phase of the meeting on April 17 (T 2) continued the participants’ negotiations but a disagreement arose between Suzanne and the general education teachers over the role of the special education teacher and instmction for students with Ieaming disabilities. Suzanne stated that she believed she was the one teaching reading to the students with Ieaming disabilities; however, the other teachers, who were adjusting their schedules to accommodate pulled-out students, also seemed to feel responsibility. Until this time the teachers maintained a spirit of congeniality by accepting what the others were contributing to the meeting discussions. This issue, however, was one that the teachers struggled with because of the difficulties they experienced when students were pulled from their classrooms when they would otherwise be teaching reading and writing. In the process of negotiating this disagreement, teachers clarified their beliefs and began to understand differences between them that they had previously assumed to be shared understandings. This was a key point in the intersubjectivity of the participants in the meeting. 159 B .I.I.I I I I Ii As Figure 10 on page 113 illustrates, I had begun to wrap up the meeting when Suzanne abruptly shifted the conversation away from the writing samples to a conference she had attended the weekend prior to our meeting. She emphasized the research base of the ideas she contributed, and she also addressed the issue of transfer of skills from a resource room context to the general education setting; an issue that had concerned her throughout the meetings: 97. 98. 99. (Pause after Mary stops talking. Kari is writing In notebook, Jacqui is leaning forward looking at Suzanne as she begins speaking. Mary also looks at Suzanne as she begins speaking.) . Suzanne: (in a low deliberate voice) It was interesting on Saturday. I went to an all-day conference at Cedar College. I?! (Suzanne reaches for a folder on the table labeled with Cedar College insignia. Reads the name of the presenter. Puts folder back on the table. Kari and Jacqui pick up cups, take drink, set them down while watching Suzanne.) Anyway, she made some Interesting comments actually. (voice is pitched higher and louder) She was saying that she thought a problem with the Reading Recovery with kids was that they were doing reading instniction in the classroom and then they were going to Reading Recovery and were getting an approach that was quite different. (Mary picks up pen and writes on notepad. Mary’s gaze Is down. Jacqui picks up pen, doesn’t write- gaze down.) And so they had to try and, you know, make that switch all the time. She thought the positive thing about the resource room was that they were total reading for the child. That they found and of course she was, she actually, you know had a bias too, but, um, came, It came out of the research. She actually did her masters degree with the person who developed whole language movement. Goodman? Mary: Yeah. Ken and Yetta Goodman. Suzanne: She got her masters with him and has completely switched over to code-based reading. (Kari nods her head, slowly and emphatically-from her shoulders-smiles. Jacqui 8 Mary write again) She got into a situation in an inner-city school, she was 160 teaching high school, supposed to be teaching Shakespeare and the kids couldn't read. 100.Mary: What do you mean by code-based? 101.Suzanne: Code-based would be a more phonetic, phonological base to reading instruction. And she said that she thought and she said that the code-based reading that they were getting in the resource room absolutely, Once they had the skills to read they read code . . . they read trade books, they read in the basal. It was no problem transferring it to the classroom. 102.Mary: At the high-school level? 103.Suzanne: No. No. 104.Mary: Okay. 105.Suzanne: This was at elementary level. But she does take the kids right back to it even when they are older. 106.Mary: Well, there's a lot of research that says phonics, I mean, when l was going through [college], too, they said phonics shouldn't be taught til they're older because there was some developmental aspect of it that they, people were claiming that kids couldn't learn phonics till they were older. 107.Suzanne: Yeah, no, she, her research, the research she was doing was through kindergarten, first and second grade. (Mary writes, Jacqui leans in with hand on chin, Kari sitting straight and still) And she would actually take the kids, the whole new research was on phonological awareness which is just the sounds. Where there, there, they would have the kids um, actually move chips for sounds, like if you had the word bat. IBI, IaI, III. And some of that training, every day. They didn't even hook to letters. They just did the sounds. And they started them right in kindergarten. Anyway, it was just really interesting and they had good results with It, but the point really that I meant for the group was the transfer wasn't a problem. Because they were Ieaming to read and once they learned to read, they, they read. (Kari nods, smiles) 108.Karl: Okay. 109.Suzanne: I don’t know. I/IWhich Is kind of, uh, um, not a bad rationale for a pull-out program. You know, if you really can accomplish that. I 110.Sara: Well isn't’ that what we are doing? I 11 1 .Mary: Mm-mm. 161 I 112.Suzanne: You know, it's sort of saying 20 to 25 % of the kids are going to have a hard time learning to read. 75% of them, probably no matter what you do, they'll read just fine. (4 second pause) Suzanne began telling the story of the conference leader who was a whole-language teacher, now disagreed with whole-language and programs such as Reading Recovery. Her argument against Reading Recovery was that students were getting one kind of reading Instmction with the Reading Recovery teacher and then going back to the general education classroom and having another kind of reading Instruction. Suzanne argued that resource rooms were the best way to address students' Ieaming needs because students received their entire reading instruction in that setting and the skills learned in the resource room transferred to the other Ieaming activities in general education. Suzanne’s narrative was the initiation of a second topic (T 2) for discussion that came after the wrap-up of the main topic for the meeting (T ,). I attempted to wrap up the meeting at five o'clock since that was our scheduled time to finish, and It was at that point Suzanne initiated the second topic. In an abrupt move to take the floor she began a narrative which established an F, floor (turns 97-101). The only comments that interrupted the narrative were contributions from me -- one a response to Suzanne’s question (turn 98), and the other a clarification question (100). In turn 101 Suzanne stated the point of her story -- that transfer of skills Ieamed in a resource room back to the general education classroom was not a problem. This prompted me to engage in a 162 short conversation with Suzanne, but the floor seemed to remain with Suzanne. The three turns I took were a clarification question (102), a response (104) and a supporting/extending reference to some personal knowledge about teaching phonics to older students (104-106). Suzanne’s next turn continued her narrative by clarifying that the students on which the reported research was based were lower elementary students. This supported the appropriateness of her narrative to the second- grade level of our own study group. At the end of the turn, Suzanne signaled that she was making an Important point in her story with the word, “anyway“ and restated her point about transfer not being a problem. Kari was the only person to respond and she nodded her head In agreement and responded by saying “Okay.“ (turn 108). Suzanne then pushed her point by saying this (the transfer of skills being “proven' through the report of this research) supported a pull-out program. The ensuing exchange, however, showed Sara’s confusion about Suzanne’s point. Sara asked, “Well Isn’t that what we are doing?“ (tum 110), referring to the pull-out program in their school. She was questioning Suzanne’s argument for the pull-out program because that was what she believed they were doing in their school. Suzanne didn’t respond to this question, however, and continued to maintain the floor by making a second point about students who do and do not have trouble Ieaming to read (turn 112). This seemed to tie closely to the storyline developed by the teachers in the first topic phase (T 1) of this meeting concerning teachers' beliefs about how 163 their Instruction influences students’ Ieaming. Suzanne second point was that for most students, whatever teachers did. students would learn. The onus of Ieaming, once again, was on the students. Suzanne’s comment, however, was not responded to by the other participants in the meeting. Instead there was a four second pause. I! [D | IID'I IS IBI'I Suzanne’s story contained an example of constructed dialogue that was used to support her beliefs (T annen, 1989). Suzanne retold the discussion in her conference where the speaker discussed both the ideas of separate remedial literacy programs for students with special Ieaming needs and her research findings that students transferred literacy skills between the remedial and general education settings, provided they did not participate in conflicting literacy instmctional programs. Suzanne used this constructed dialogue to support her beliefs that skills she taught In the resource room setting were used by students in the general education classroom because her students received their reading Instmction in the resource room. However, at least two of the teachers. Sara and Jacqui brought different beliefs to the conversation so they missed Suzanne’s point in the story - that a resource room is where students are pulled out to receive their total reading Instruction. As a separate program rather than a support to the general education program, the teachers would not have to coordinate their instruction. Suzanne's point that the skills she teaches would transfer, that is, be used by students in the general education setting, was key to supporting the dual 164 programs. Suzanne’s argument was that students will transfer what they learn in the resource room to the general education setting and use the reading skills they learned and that the general education literacy instruction merely supported the reading instruction in the resource room. E 'l' i In addition to constructed dialogue, an interesting conversational strategy in this part of the meeting was the use of positioning by the participants in the conversation. Davies and Harré (1990) propose the framework of “positioning“ to describe the moment by moment identities developed in conversations between people. Hans and van Langenhove (1991) expand this framework and propose that all conversations-written and crab-involve positioning. Positioning must be understood in terms of conversants’ intentions, their oral discourse, and actions in relation to the social context in which they converse, and the ways they conceive of themselves and the other participants within the conversation. Figure 21 demonstrates the idea of positioning In discourse. A speaker Initiates a storyline. Through the Initiation, the speaker positions herself and other speakers to either join her storyline and begin a conversation. The second speaker, however, responds by taking up the position created by the first speaker and joining the speech act, or refusing to take up that position. This negotiation of positions Is closely connected to a the developing identity of the participants in the conversation and the potential for developing mutual understandings among speakers. 165 A key feature of positioning is the acceptance or rejection of the positions created by a speaker in that speaker's storyline. A speaker not only positions herself when creating a storyline, but creates positions for others in that storyline as well. Conversation can occur if there Is uptake by another (or others) of the positions created. This uptake can be an acceptance of the position or an understanding of the position in a way that allows the person being positioned to negotiate the position. The negotiation involved disagreement and efforts to clarify understanding until both participants in the conversation agree on their positions and mutually continue the storyline or end the storyline. Davies and Harré (1990) describe the ways participants come to understand a proposed storyline and their involvement in it as two types of “extensions:" (1) Indexical extensions--involving past personal experiences, and (2) typification extensions-Involving cultural understandings. In both indexical and typification extensions, the participants draw on prior beliefs and experiences to interpret what is being spoken and their relationship to what is A smal slice of discourse: _ Isiah) ----- speaker#f a initiates speech action \Ajt/ ’rra. gm? ’gpetakaIISg331nsg, T BY -1 r 0 se 0 ‘, IS 0 LINE I ,1 ,' hfluencesandls 1 ,’ I. shaped by . speaker#2 = oonforrrs to #1 story he .ordoes not these moment- ' [STORYLINE | """""""" 00 1111618811011 I ’l ;esults inno 1 bgynanits -rmment .' .... Figure 21. Positioning in a storyline. 166 being spoken. The Indexical extension response occurs when a respondent connects the storyline with a prior personal experience which affords a connection with the speaker's storyline and a point of entry Into the conversation. In a typification extension response, respondents connect the ideas In the speaker’s storyline with their own cultural understandings of the same Ideas or constructs (I.e., mother/daughter). So in each, the respondent is able to understand the position created by the speaker for them and accept or negotiate their entrance Into the storyline. This understanding is based either on a prior personal experience or a culturally based understanding. This is key because understanding what another has said In a conversation not only Involves the content of the utterance but also an understanding of the storyline in which that utterance is embedded. In this case, Suzanne had created a storyline in which she was explicitly arguing a point (separate programs are justified because skills transfer between the settings) that Sara was having difficulty understanding. Sara’s response seemed to relate Suzanne’s narrative to her personal experience In the school (“Isn’t that what we are doing?“), yet her experience doesn't afford her the basis for argument that Suzanne seemed to be making. As a result, the conversation's first breakdown occurred followed by a 4-second pause. II II EI'I El III I. IB 'l'l'l' Jacqui seemed to share Sara's confusion. After the 4-second pause, she responded to Suzanne's narrative by referring back to earlier discussions in our meetings about making the instruction in general and special education more 167 coordinated for the students participating In both systems. In this way. Jacqui also connected with Suzanne's narrative but the pause after Jacqui’s question shows the breakdown continued. Jacqui was not connecting with Suzanne's goal for her narrative. 113.Jacqul: (Still leaning in, hand off chin) That also supports the Idea that what you do and what we do has to be consistent. (3-second pause) 114.Suzanne: Well, yes, although it wouldn't have to be totally the same. I 115.Jacqul Not totally the same. (hand back on chin) I 116.Suzanne: Right. 117.Jacqul: But It can’t be a totally different thing happening in the classroom from what you are doing I 118.Suzanne: No. although, see, the resource room, probably that's even how we see it, Is where I basically am taking over their total reading. (Mary looks up at Suzanne, Jacqui shifts her position to look more directly at Suzanne, Kari continues sitting straight back in chair without expression on her face) 1 19.Jacqul: Mm-mm. 120.Suzanne: I mean they’re doing some partner reading In their class, but you don't feel responsible for teaching them to read. (Jacqui nods her head) Do you? (tone rising as if surprised) I 121 .Jacqul: (still nodding head) Mm-mmJ/ (leans back in chair) I 122.8uzanne: You do? 123.Jacqul: Still, (chuckles) Even // I mean . . . l 124.Suzanne: You’re not. . . I 168 125.Jacqul: even though Jack and Tom are with you, I still . . . I 126.Suzanno: Well, and, and I shouldn't really say it that way either because really, in our program, the classroom teacher is ultimately responsible. But I wouldn’t expect you. but I feel like I'm the one really being intentional about teaching them to read. 127.Jacqul: Mm-mm. 128Mary: But I’ve noticed they do get pretty much, I know Sara’s talked to me about how she wants to have them In there, in the classroom for the reading instruction, and you structure your time so that they're not missing any reading in the classroom. 129.Sara: Well, I have the feeling that the more they . . . I 130.Suzanne: The more the better. I 131 Sam: The more the better and we're also teaching things like, well, and I know that Sharon does that. too, but especially these boys when they were at the beginning, just Ieaming to read, they still need to learn comprehension and stuff. And the ones that we had, um, they were very capable of Ieaming how to do that. Maybe not to read it but after I read the text, and then to answer the questions. And they were capable of doing that. (Jacqui sits back, hand still on chin. but not on table. Jacqui nods slightly while Sara Is speaking) 132.Suzanne: Yeah, It wasn't a comprehension problem. I 133.Sara: And granted some days. I do have to have my regular reading while they are gone. (Jacqui shifts In chair, hands in lap, gaze still follows speaker) I 134.Suzanne: And I think It is a good support in that you know, it’s more reading and they are hearing as well as seeing the word. I mean, I'm not trying to say I'm doing all the teaching of reading but I don't think it's been, historically, a big problem with carry-over from the resource room to the classroom. Do you? 135.Karl: (chin on her hand, leaning on table; shakes her head from side to side) I 1 69 136.Sara: Mm-mm [no] I 137.Jacqul: Mm-mm [no] (5-second pause) Jacqui broke the 4-second pause after turn 112 with a reference to Suzanne’s earlier comment about Reading Recovery being a bad program because It caused students to be Involved in two literacy programs, one pull-out and one in the general education classroom. Both teachers (and myself, who supported Sara's comment In turn 51) seemed to have missed Suzanne’s point In turn 12, that Is, her belief that the resource room model of pull-out Is most effective because the resource room teacher takes over the “total reading for the child“ (turn 118). Instead, Sara picked up on the pull-out aspect of the argument which she says they already do, and Jacqui picked up on the point about instruction in the two settings needing to be consistent. Jacqui and Sara's initial efforts at making connections to Suzanne’s narrative were either ignored (Sara’s) or negotiated with Suzanne (Jacqui). It was In this negotiation, where Jacqui seemed to be looking for an entrance into Suzanne’s storyline, that Suzanne needed to clarify her beliefs In order to sustain her point about literacy instruction for students with Ieaming disabilities in the dual setting of general and special education. She did this by stating that she takes over the total reading for the students, to which Jacqui disagreed with ‘Mm-mm's” and non-verbal communication. I brought Sara into the conversation using a constructed dialogue that referenced previous conversations she and I had about her Instruction. Sara shared her belief that 17o her instmction focused on comprehension issues, but she had also determined. before the special education tests were done on her students she was “worried about" (Allen, Michalove, Shockley, 8: West, 1991), that those students needed to learn the phonics skills taught by Suzanne. Suzanne immediately modified her position to conform more closely with what she seemed to be anticipating from Jacqui and what she heard from Sara and made a shift In focus back to her original point about the transfer of skills from the resource room to the general education classroom. Interestingly, in her second effort to pose this claim she reworded the idea from ‘transfer" to “carry-over and that was the label used In the rest of the meeting. In response, the teachers all agreed with her. E II . II E I D' | In the disagreement exchange between Jacqui and Suzanne, they engaged In repeated talk that did not completely disagree, but repeated some parts of the others’ talk while changing it just enough to maintain their own position. This was a switch from an F, floor to an F2 floor in which the two teachers were negotiating the point of Suzanne’s narrative In light of their own beliefs. Jacqui maintained Instruction cannot be different, while Suzanne maintained instruction does not have to be the same. Suzanne’s complaints about Reading Recovery seemed contradictory because her own program, a pull-out program, contained instruction that was completely different than the general education teachers. Jacqui seemed to be trying to looking for the point of argument in Suzanne’s narrative. Given the two separate programs, she pushed on the need to coordinate the instruction In the two settings. Ironically, 171 this Is the position I had taken in the group throughout the year, and the general education teachers, including Jacqui, continued to support the separate resource room program; however, the teachers saw the resource room as supporting their literacy InsthctIon and providing the Intensive phonics instruction their students needed (according to my Interviews and taped conversation data). In her efforts to make connections to Suzanne’s narrative, Jacqul aligned herself with that part of Suzanne's story. This forced Suzanne to restate her belief about the resource room teacher ‘taking over" the "total reading” instruction (turn 70). This clarified that she was not arguing for a coordinated pull-out literacy program; instead, she was arguing that since the resource room was the only place students with Ieaming disabilities were receiving reading Instruction, the programs could be different and students would still be Ieaming because transfer of skills would occur from special to general education. E I' I SI l l I | | l' Suzanne phrases her. statement of belief in a way that contextualized it In terms of a shared assumption with the group. She said in turn 118, “No, although, see, the resource room, probably that's even how we see it, is where I basically am taking over their total reading.” This positioned each person in the group as agreeing with her statement. However, Jacqui was unwilling to agree because of the struggles she and the other teachers had adjusting their literacy instmction to accommodate their students’ resource room schedule. 172 The general education teachers were committed to having all students present for their literacy Instmction. When Suzanne stated her belief about taking over the total reading for the child, Jacqui and l shifted position and gaze and Jacqui merely acknowledged the comment with a 'Mm-mm". I recognized Suzanne’s statement as one that the other teachers would question. In response to Jacqui’s lack of uptake on this point and the silence by the other teachers, Suzanne followed up by acknowledging the general education teachers do ”partner reading” In their reading Instruction (an independent reading activity that was only a small part of the literacy done In the general education rooms) and repeated her belief as a question, “But you don't feel responsible for teaching them to read. Do you?“ (turn 120). After meeting for a year and discussing student literacy this was the only activity Suzanne linked to the general education classrooms and It was an independent kind of literacy activity. Suzanne seemed genuinely surprised when Jacqui nodded to affirm that she did feel that responsibility. At this point Jacqui took a disagreeing position to Suzanne’s belief and storyline for her narrative. and Suzanne quickly modified her position to come more in line with what she supposed Jacqui would say. At the point of conflict, Suzanne began looking for a place of agreement. She modified her contribution to the conversation and the teachers began negotiating with her to repair the breakdowns in the conversation. 173 Eausas There were three major pauses in this segment of the transcript. The first two were very close together, separated by a question from Jacqui and the third comes after a bit of conversation. I think the first two pauses signaled a point of possible conflict between the teachers that they had not been pushed to face before. Kari seemed to be agreeing with Suzanne as evidenced by her non- verbal feedback (nodding) just prior to the first pause, but Jacqui’s question In- between the pauses Is the question that picked up on an opposite issue from what Suzanne has intended. Suzanne had just said, “Which is . . . not a bad rationale for a pull-out program” (turn 109) and had argued for the separate phonics instmction she does in her room. Jacqui, however, stated that Suzanne’s narrative “supports the idea that what you do and what we do has to be consistent” (turn 113). The second pause followed and was broken by Suzanne’s agreement, but It was a qualified agreement: ‘Well, yes, although it wouldn‘t have to be totally the same“ (turn 114). After that Suzanne and Jacqui seemed to be negotiating the idea of Instruction being not totally the same, but not totally different In their two rooms. Each seemed to be working not to completely disagree, but still maintained their position on whether instmction needed to be consistent or not. Suzanne then supported her claim that Instruction did not have to be consistent: “No, although, see, the resource room, probably that’s even how we see it, is where I basically am taking over their total reading” (turn 118). Suzanne was saying that the only reading instmction for students with Ieaming disabilities was taking I! 174 place in her room, so there did not have to be consistency between the programs. When I looked back at Suzanne's story, I saw this belief coming through, although at the time, no one seemed to pick up on her meaning. Suzanne’s criticisms of Reading Recovery were not that it was a pull-out program with separate instmction, but that students in the resource room received their literacy instruction in two separate programs instead of one program -- hers. So she was criticizing dual instruction, not the pull-out system. Jacqui and Sara also seemed to miss that emphasis in the argument. Sara asked, “Isn't that what we are doing?" (turn 110) and Jacqui pointed out that this supported the Idea that the programs need to be consistent. The negotiation pushed Suzanne to share her belief that she was the only one teaching the students with Ieaming disabilities how to read. And she revealed surprise that the teachers did not agree with her position. That Suzanne was not recognizing the reading instruction in the general education classrooms was significant for two reasons. First, she was not recognizing the literacy expertise of the general education teachers. I-ler comment just prior to the first pause was turn 112 where she said, ”You know, it’s sort of saying 20 to 25% of the kids are going to have a hard time Ieaming to read. Seventy-five percent of them, probably not matter what you do, they'll read just fine.” This statement was not taken up by anyone in the group. Suzanne saw the students who were having trouble Ieaming to read. Here she 175 was saying her instruction mattered, and the general education teachers' instruction did not, because no matter what the teachers did, the rest of the students would learn to read anyway. Second, the general education teachers had struggled all year with their schedule. They believed the resource room was supporting their literacy instruction by providing intensive phonics instruction that they believed the students need; however, they also believed the students needed to participate in the second-grade literacy instruction they provided. Banal: The second pause triggered new discussion that again focused on the safe subject of students. After a period of discussion and conflict In which the conversation broke down into three significant pauses, I picked up on Suzanne’s question about whether or not the teachers are seeing evidence of carry-over of the skills she is teaching. I did this by connecting it with prior conversations Suzanne and I had about this issue which signals that it was an ongoing concern for Suzanne. Jacqui continued to link the question to instructional issues (turn 141) but Suzanne redirected the question to focus on students. 138.Mary: What evidences are you seeing of carry-over? Suzanne and I have talked before. I think there's arty-over but it's hard to actually document the cany-over. 139.Suzanne: That's true. 140.Mary: Are you seeing evidences of that? 141.Jacqul: Do you mean In instruction? 142.Suzanno: In their progress, I guess. Or how do you . . . 176 I 143.Sara: Oh, In their progress, it's just phenomenal. I mean, I 144.Karl: The ability to analyze words. They really pick up on how you work with them and they can use that I 145.Sara: Yeah. And even before I had them tested, you know, I started with the phonics sounds and I could sense, I could sense that that's where these boys would learn to read before, you know. We had to go through the testing and everything but I knew that that's where, ‘cause then I was starting to get some, some, some progress. // And you know, the fact that Fred now can sit and partner read, and he generally, you know, he needs help once in a while, but it's amazing what he can read. And even Fred, it's amazing what he can read with a partner. 146.Jacqul: Even Tom, just, to the point where he could, I mean, there was a huge difference with, he wasn‘t even tracking words at the beginning. (points to paper on table in left to right motion) (3 turns) 147.Suzanno: . . . And he‘s a good sight-word learner and he uses context very well. (Jacqui is nodding) I 148.Jacqul: He uses context wonderfully. 149.Suzanne: So he, you know, the support of getting some um decoding In there, is really . . . I really think he does quite a good job. (2-second pause) Iwent with the three boys, Paul, did they tell you? In this repair segment, all teachers make contributions to the conversation and the talk is again focused on what the students were doing in the classrooms. The conversation continued in a congenial manner and the teachers all eagerly contributed to the discussion. Each teacher contributed an example of one or two students whom they had seen using the phonics skills taught by Suzanne. In response, Suzanne told the teachers that she had also 177 tried some reading instruction using the Accelerated Reading Program, a general education activity prior to that time. The special education students had been denied the opportunity to participate in this program due to the teachers' concern that they would not be able to read any of the second-grade books nor be succesle on the computer comprehension tests. In addition, the students had difficulty in completing classwork on time and this left them no time to do extra reading and go to the computer room to take the tests. This was disheartening for the students and they continued to ask their teachers throughout the year if they could participate. Furthering the students’ consternation was the competitive aspect of the program that rewarded students who scored a certain amount of points with their name on a poster in the room and tangible rewards such as pencils and stickers. These students were able to see and hear the reports of the successes of their peers in this program. Suzanne worked on a book with the students as a group and had just taken them up to the computer room for their first test. 150.Suzanne: So he, you know, the support of getting some um decoding in there, is really . . . I really think he does quite a good job. (2-second pause) I went with the three boys, Paul, did they tell you? 151.Jacqul: Mm-nuh [no] 152.Suzanne: Paul, David, and Kyle and we did our first ARP book today. 153.Karl: You know they didn’t tell me, Oh! 154.Sara: David didn’t tell me either. 155.Suzanne: Paul got them all right on Frog and Toad Together and so did um, David. And Kyle got one wrong. And Kyle had a, you know, he has such a /?/. He commented afterward /?/. But anyway, that was fun because it was the first time I had done it, too, and there was a little, couple, Greg was actually busy with Melissa, teaching 178 her the Internet and there were some girls up there, just on their own. They were the ones that taught us. They helped us. Now do this. And I'd say, don't do it for them now. He has to do it. . . I 156.Jacqui: Okay. I 157.Suzanne: So, and um, It really, Paul just took right off. 158.Sara: I think of that because lots of times when they do go up there, even the new ones that go up there, we send them with a partner and they teach them. 159.Suzanne: So the other three are ready to go either tomorrow or Thursday. If we can get through the book again tomorrow, I want to go through It one more time with them. Then we’re going to take the test. Conclusion This meeting was an important step for the development of Intersubjectivity in the study group, not because the teachers developed a shared belief about the Issue of who was responsible for teaching the students with Ieaming disabilities, but because a key difference in their beliefs was contributed to the discussion and they began the process of understanding each other's beliefs. This meeting also highlighted the discrepancies that the students were dealing with every day. Because both Suzanne and the general education teachers felt they had primary responsibility for teaching reading to students with Ieaming disabilities, there was no impetus to work together or to make the instruction consistent in the two settings. The discussion did not promote changes In the system or in the Instructional arrangements of the second-grade teachers. However, the differing beliefs about instruction were brought to the discussion and the beginning of intersubjectivity, or 179 understanding others in the community, occurred. There was a long way to go before this beginning could effect changes in the system. This was evidenced by Suzanne’s summary of her feelings at the end of the meeting. She continued to hold onto her beliefs, tempered only slightly by the discussion: 160.Suzanno: I really do like the group to really, um, know more what’s going on in the classroom. But I'm pretty comfortable about the transfer of the skills. And I don't know how to really document that because I, you know, you could say, ‘Well, how do you know the resource room did that? They were just ready to team.” I don't know, except that once that remediation is In place, the progress started to happen. That’s the whole thing. You know, I guess that's not real scientific and I think It's a combination. It's not, I don't mean to take full credit, ‘cause I don't think that's true, but I do think that there is transfer with that. This meeting began as a typical meeting for the group, but ended with a breakthrough when there was a breakdown in the congenial agreements that was brought to light through the articulation of the teachers’ assumption of shared understandings. An important result of the breach was that teachers were pushed to begin the process of sharing and negotiating their different beliefs about instruction. In this way, the disagreement among the teachers served to promote Intersubjectivity between them when their differing beliefs became public. Teachers meeting together in a congenial manner will not necessarily develop intersubjectivity. The teachers had engaged in conversations almost twice a month over the course of the school year and still did not understand the kind of Instmction the others gave in their classrooms. Congenial talk can mask beliefs that drive instruction, especially between general and special education 1 80 teachers. In this meeting, beliefs began to be shared, points of conflict arose, conversation was pushed to the point of breakdown, so that teachers could begin to see the differences that kept them from finding ways to coordinate their instruction for students with Ieaming disabilities or to engage in collaborative instructional efforts. CHAPTER 6 INFORMING OUR WORK WITH BEGINNING STUDY GROUPS General and special education teachers, and university researchers are striving to work more closely together as suggested in the educational reform literature. Many teachers and researchers are working in study groups to learn more about instructional practices and to support the changes teachers are making in their classrooms. At the beginning of this dissertation I proposed that this study group setting could be an altematlve approach to the inclusion efforts that Involve efforts to return students to the general education classroom. However, the beginning efforts of a study group involves a process of developing Intersubjectivity, especially for general and special education teachers who have different backgrounds and beliefs and work in the spirit of congeniality rather than collegiality. The results of this study inform our understandings of the process of Ieaming that occurred in this particular study group and allows us to pose questions for future research. This intervention was a collaborative teacher study group and the research investigated the development of the group during the first year of meetings, specifically In terms of the development of intersubjectivity between the panicipants. In this chapter I will discuss some of the conclusions drawn from the study, the implications for using this kind of intervention for developing collaboration between general and special education teachers, and the limitations of the study. Finally, I will project some of the potential for future research that is supported by this study. 181 1 82 Conclusions The beginning year of this teacher study group was focused on the participants’ efforts to become a community of learners. As discussed In chapter two, Rogcff (1994) describes a community of learners as a group that Is developed through the following processes: (1) leadership though facilitation, (2) emphasis on the process of Ieaming, (3) motivation inherent In the activities, (4) evaluation during the process of participation, and (5) collaboration. These processes were key to this group in the following ways. undershirt The process of leadership in the building of a community of Ieamers requires that the leadership be clear about the goals for the group. In the Wells (1994a) action research effort, teachers came to the group with the expectation that they would engage in a type of action research in their classrooms. In the Richardson (1994) study, the teachers volunteered to participate In a study that explored reading instruction and teaching practices. Similarly, in the Early Literacy Project (Englert et al, 1995), teachers who joined the project did so in order to explore innovative literacy instmction for students in special education. In contrast, the leadership and goals for this teacher study group was part of the negotiation process. Throughout the background and transition stages, the teachers repeatedly asked for clarification of the goals of the project (see Table 4) and described their confusion as the university researcher attempted to take a less authoritarian leadership role in the group. This was similar to Wells’ (1994b) experience with teachers who did not begin his class with the prior 183 inquiry Ieaming experiences. It is also consistent with Fullan’s (1991) findings that reform efforts do not need to be clarified to initiate the interventions, but clarity is required for the implementation of the intervention if educational reform is to take place. Once the teachers' personal perspectives and interests became acknowledged in the development stage of the meetings and the unique Interests of the teachers were incorporated Into the questions being considered in the meetings, changes in the group began taking place. The leadership role became one that facilitated and supported the teachers In the literacy activities they were doing in their classrooms. From this, the teachers were able to bring different interests and Instmctional experiences to the study group meetings which, in turn, supported the teachers’ sharing of their differing beliefs about instmction. For example, as Suzanne shared her experience at a workshop in the breakthrough meeting, the teachers began collegial conversations with her that brought to light some of their differing beliefs about Ieaming and Instruction. These effects may be tied to the design of this study. As described in chapter two, some staff development efforts that are brought to schools from external sources such as a university, are initiated to accomplish a given agenda, and then the control of the agenda Is transferred to the participants in the group (Hamilton 8 Richardson, 1995; Richardson, 1994). This did not happen In the first year of the study group in this project. One reason may lie in the membership of the group. In the Richardson study, the educators in the schools were approached by the university researchers and were asked to 184 volunteer to be part of the study. In the study described here, the teachers were appointed by the principal and were given the option to participate or not, yet they were not volunteers in the strictest sense. The teachers may have felt an obligation to participate given their selection by the principal. Thus, they may have come to the group with interests that were not closely matched to the goals of the intervention. In response, the goals of the project had to be shifted to accommodate the more diverse needs and interests of the group. Similarly, the meetings seldom followed the agendas preplanned for them. There were several reasons for this. first, the participants needed to develop collaborative relationships and lead the discussion in ways that were responsive to their backgrounds and interests. That meant the agendas were flexible and were loosely followed. This did cause some of the confusion and created a sense that the group was unfocused. To address that limitation, leaders in study groups may need to play stronger leadership roles In the beginning to clarify and negotiate goals for the group with the participants. The teachers in this study group may have benefited from a more structured setting at the beginning of the meetings than what was provided. The second reason the meetings strayed from the agendas was that the teachers often brought concerns about their students to the meetings and many times the discussions in the group focused on problems of students rather than broader instructional Issues. One aspect of this was the leadership role taken on by Jacqui who often led the discussions by sharing her frustrations about some difficult students in her class. 1 85 W A second process identified by Rogcff (1994) for the development of a community of Ieamers is a recognition of the process that Is required for the community to become established as a collegial group of Ieamers. The process of becoming a community of Ieamers takes time. Administrators and teachers need to realize that starting a study group will not necessarily result in immediate changes in teachers’ practices or in increases in student outcomes. Instead there is a period of time needed to build trust, negotiate roles and expectations, and surface beliefs and assumptions of shared understandings. Teachers need to change patterns of congenial relationships they have built In the past and negotiate the entrance of new participants, such as teachers from general or special education and outside staff developers. To bridge general and special education we need to consider allowing teachers to engage In talk over time in a manner that encourages collegial discussions about instmction and pushes for increasing intersubjectivity. The intersubjectivity that develops between teachers, as they agree or disagree about Issues and beliefs, forms the basis for continued Ieaming and supports their efforts for change. Participants who were willing to state their beliefs about issues pushed the development of Intersubjectivity in the groupbecause others then could question, expand upon, and negotiate their beliefs. As shown In chapter 5, there was an assumption of shared understandings between the participants In the study group that only came to light when the conversation in the meeting broke down. Prior to that point the conversation focused on sharing 186 and agreeing which masked the undenying differences between thegeneral and special education teachers. In this way, intersubjectivity without agreement was a vital sign that the study group was progressing and teachers were beginning the change process. MW Third, becoming a community of Ieamers Involves internal motivation for Ieaming. As Richardson (1994) found in the Reading Instruction Study, teachers were resistant to externally mandated change. Similarly, as described in chapter 4, the motivation for change in this study group was closely tied to the goals for the group that the participants brought Into the meetings. Sara was interested In making changes In her writing Instmction and worked closely with me to build on some of the literacy ideas introduced to the group. She asked for and did additional readings about writing instruction and pushed her Ieaming by inviting me to participate in her classroom instruction through modeling, observing, and giving feedback We developed a collegial relationship that allowed her to question me about the kind of feedback I was providing to her and allowed me to suggest changes in her writing lessons. Within the group, the teachers' deveIOping intersubjectivity built a sense of need among them that sparked their Interest In the possibility of collaboration. When the teachers’ different beliefs were brought to light in the April 17 conversation, intersubjectivity began to take shape which created a sense of need for the teachers to begin working together. Intersubjectivity without agreement brought to light the differences between the participants and 187 challenged their assumptions of shared understandings. In this way, the teachers began to develop a sense of need for collaboration, just as Jacqul commented to Suzanne In the April 17 meeting: 'T his supports the idea that what you and I do have to be consistent.“ Prior to this meeting, the Isolated, pull-out system seemed satisfactory to the teachers. Each teacher taught literacy to their students and assumed ownership for the literacy instmction of the students with special needs. Each teacher also assumed the other's instmctional efforts were useful as a support for their primary literacy Instruction. New meanings, understandings, and expectations needed to be negotiated in the process of becoming a community of Ieamers. As Barth (1990) explains, “Individuals enter into collaborative relationships only after they come to realize that they cannot achieve what they want to achieve acting alone” (p. 192). Exalmtlnn Evaluation in this study group played a central role In creating the collegial tensions that prompted discussions and therefore the development of the community of Ieamers. Similar to the teachers’ understandings of change being externally motivated, evaluation was externally imposed. The discussions of the January 9 transition meeting prompted teachers to share their concerns about not meeting the expectations of the administrators In the school. In addition, the project was seen as another external evaluation of the teachers' work Some of the teachers considered classroom observations to be evaluations of their teaching rather than a means to support their Ieaming about classroom Instmction. Leaders of study groups who work closely with teachers 188 In schools need to be aware of the prior experiences of teachers, particularly as they have been evaluated In their work. New types of internal evaluations, such as action research or collegial observations in each others’ classrooms, can become a means for teachers to learn about teaching and support each others’ efforts. QQIIabQLaIinn Collaboration is the final process identified by Rogcff (1994) for the development of a community of Ieamers. In this study group, the teachers did not develop they kinds of collaborative relationships advocated by researchers such as Little (1990) and Barth (1990) during the first year of the study group. Johnson and Pugach identify three barriers to collaboration that also seemed to be in place for this group: 1) the incongruence of ideas between special and general education teachers, 2) the avoidance of new ideas that do not match the belief structure of the teachers involve In the collaboration, and 3) the credibility of the teachers to each other in the collaborative relationship. In addition, Bauwens et al. (1989) cite time, beliefs and workload as factors that inhibit collaborative teaching efforts. These factors all influenced the development of collaboration between the teachers. The general and special education teachers came to the group with very different beliefs about literacy instruction and their roles in the literacy Ieaming of their students with Ieaming disabilities. The lncongruent ideas were further masked as the teachers participated In congenial rather than collegial talk. Teachers did not challenge each other's Ideas or question each other’s beliefs. 189 The process of Intersubjectivity needed to involve disagreement in order to surface the incongmencies and begin the negotiation of the teachers’ differences. This only began to happen In the breakthrough meeting at the end of the year. The teachers in this study group worked to cooperate with me as I came Into their school with my own agenda, yet also worked hard to conserve their literacy practices in a system that they believed was successful with their students. This barrier of resistance to change was more pronounced with some of the teachers, who believed that the pull-out system of education was very effective for promoting the literacy Ieaming of their students with Ieaming disabilities and thus, resisted efforts to collaborate. However, time and the systemic stmcture In the school also contributed to the difficulties teachers faced when considering working together. Finally, Johnson and Pugach cite the credibility of the teachers to each other as a third barrier to collaboration. As shown In chapter 4, the teachers’ perceptions of each other were very supportive and they believed thatthey were working toward the same goal of helping stmggling readers and writers in their classrooms. The only point at which issues of credibility surfaced was In the breakthrough meeting where Suzanne stated her belief that no matter what teachers did with their instmction, the majority of the students would learn to read. While this might be seen as a barrier to collaboration, it should also be seen as an impetus toward developing collaborative relations. Once the 190 teachers’ beliefs were shared, they could be challenged and teachers could begin the process of developing the intersubjectivity that supports collaboration. Limitations In addition to the limitations described in the previous sections, there were two distinct limitations in this study group that may need to be considered by others working in similar arrangements with teachers. The first limitation of this study was that the teachers in the study group were all from the same school with an established history of roles and relationships that carried over into the study group meetings. The general education teachers were all second-grade teachers who met on a regular basis for instructional planning meetings. Suzanne was not part of those meetings. In the Instructional planning meetings the focus was on the kinds of activities teachers were doing In their classrooms rather than theoretical discussions about the beliefs about Ieaming that were driving their instructional decisions. This may have Impacted on the kinds of discourse and interactions the teachers had in the study group meetings and also cast Suzanne in more of an outsider role In the group. The second—grade teachers, by virtue of working together in other settings, had an established way of Interacting that neither Suzanne nor I were privy to. Having teachers from other schools, breaks down the norms and expectations for each other that are involved In school-based collaborative efforts. On the other hand, long-term staff development efforts that promote collaboration between general and special educators should be school based. Initial efforts need to be made that bridge the separate cultures within schools. 191 The second limitation was the short duration of study. One year was not enough time to see changes in teachers’ practices, establish a focus for the study group, or even to see a lot of Intersubjectivity develop between teachers. In the tenth meeting of the year teachers were just beginning to share beliefs, challenge some of the beliefs and opinions of other teachers, and develop some mutual understandings. Sara, in her postinterview, said she was ready to focus on more instmctional issues In the meetings If they were to continue another year. What Can Be Learned From This Study Group There are several things that can learn from this study that might support future study group interventions with general and special education teachers. First, this study supports Hamilton and Richardson’s (1995) findings that the development of a beginning study group progresses through stages and the movement varies due to contextual influences. The study group featured in this research also progressed through stages, but the analysis of the stages focused on the socialization factors that Influenced the development of the group as a Ieaming community. Knowing some of the influences on study group development can help future innovators plan ways to support the group's participants and facilitate the group discussions. While the progression through the stages of development might still occur for the study group community to form, careful planning of the group activities to promote discussion about participants’ beliefs and surface assumptions of shared understandings has the 192 potential for accelerating the process toward intersubjectivity and pushing teachers’ Ieaming. Relatedly, there are implications for the leadership of the study group. Leaders need to develop a sense of the teachers’ beliefs and practices to support the leader's role as facilitator. As a leader of a study group, It is important to set clear goals for the group that are consistent or compatible with the participants’ goals for the group. This may mean structuring the group in alternative ways or clarifying changes made In the project objectives. It may be necessary for the group’s leadership to set a clear agenda at the beginning and work to transfer control of that agenda to the other participants over time. In addition, meetings might be structured to reduce (not eliminate) the time spent on congenial discussions and simply sharing student problems. Instead. teachers could be encouraged to surface their beliefs about Ieaming and instmction through questions or problems posed In the meetings for discussion. This also would push the process of developing a community of Ieamers because teachers would be supported to create more collegial discussions and negotiate their belief toward Intersubjectivity. However, there needs to be a balance between an external impetus that creates the agenda and asks teachers in a study group to negotiate their differences, and the same process of working for consensus, setting goals for the group and community building emerging from the people in the group. This has clear Implications for the leadership of the group to find the balance needed to facilitate the Ieaming in the study group. 193 Considerations for Using Study Groups to Support Inclusion There are several factors that need to be addressed by researchers or educators when considering the use of Iong-terrn staff development efforts to support teachers’ implementation of Inclusion in their classrooms. First, there is a history of systemic differences between general and special education that impact the focus of teachers’ beliefs and Instructional efforts. These systemic differences need to be addressed In teacher preparation programs and In Inservice staff development efforts. Teachers need to be encouraged and supported to share their beliefs with other participants In the study group and learn collaborative discourse patterns in an effort to develop more collegial relationships. This effort again would involve time and extended effort on the part of staff developers and teachers themselves as our teachers have been enculturated into a system where they teach In relative Isolation (Allen et al., 1991). Second, teacher study groups with general and special educators need to be structured to address the philosophical differences between the teachers in order to develop a common foundation on which discussions about Instructional questions can be based. Unlike teacher study groups that have developed from graduate classes (Wells, 1994a) where a foundation for discussions have been established, or with teachers who volunteer to study a particular subject matter such as mathematics or literacy (Featherstone, Pfeiffer & Smith, 1993; Short et al., 1992), study groups created to support bridge general and special education and promote teachers’ efforts at inclusion may 194 need to spend Initial time negotiating a common set of beliefs and understandings. This study extends research in teacher development and educational change by examining questions about the process of beginning a collaborative effort between general and special educators and a university researcher. It examines a case of a teacher study group to illustrate the Initial development of collaborative relationships between one group of general and special educators. This study raises questions about what is needed to support general and special education teachers' efforts to examine their practice in order to meet the needs of diverse students In their classrooms. From this case, issues associated with bringing together teachers from the historically separate general and special education systems are identified as things that need to be addressed in order to facilitate Instructional collaboration. APPENDICES APPENDIX A APPENDIX A PRE— AND POST- TEACHER INTERVIEWS W BI'IIIIII ill" 1. Would you describe your philosophy of educating the children in your classroom? What makes you believe that? a. b. What are your beliefs about teaching and your teaching role? How would you describe your beliefs about the students you teach? How would you characterize the Ieaming process of your students - specifically reading and writing? 2. How does your philosOphy about teaching and Ieaming play a role in your day to day teaching practice? Q l' IIS'IIIISIII' 3. What characterizes an L0 student? an at-risk student? Recognizing that students with Ieaming disabilities spend some time In the Resource Room, What kind of Instruction do you think students with Ieaming disabilities need that they do not get In general education? What do you see as your roles, responsibilities for working with special needs students? What do you see as the roles, responsibilities of the Resource Room teacher for working with special needs students? 4. How do you feel about discontinuing students from the Resource Room? a. What are the barriers to successfully discontinuing students from the Resource Room to return them full-time to general education classes? I What is your role In working around those barriers? 195 196 III | i II I | I. . 5. What are the literacy activities you do in your classroom? 6. What are the most important goals of reading instruction In your classroom? writing goals? Why do you think they are important? a. Are there specific skills or strategies in reading that you think your students should learn before they leave your room at the end of the year? in writing? b. Do your goals vary for certain students In your classroom? If so, how? If not, why not? c. Does your literacy instruction vary across the year? (Is it different at the end of the year than the beginning of the year?) If so, how does It vary? 7. What opportunities do your students have to Interact with each other (a) in whole class settings? (b) in small groups? (c) in pairs? 8. How much time Is spent on literacy Instruction? 9. How do you assess your students’ literacy performance? E I. I I I . II . . l' 10. Have you ever been involved in a collaborative relationship with another 11. teacher or group of teachers? Describe the nature of the collaboration. a. Did the collaboration enhance your Instruction? your perceptions of yourself as a teacher? b. Did the collaboration benefit your students in any way? Have you ever been involved with a research project? If so, explain. a. If you were able to decide what this project examined, what would you study? Why? b. How do you see your role in this research project? 0. How do you see my role In this research project? d. How can this research project help you? What do you hope to gain from this project? 197 Q I. l I I I . maullnntinnal-ifllmal' 12. 13. 14. 15. Describe/characterize your dream (ideal) school. How would you characterize the working environment at this school? How interactive are teachers, administrators in your school? - Do other teachers or the principal know what you are doing in your classroom? How do they know?/ Why don’t they know? What support, if any, do you get In your school from parents, teachers. administrators? 198 W I am interested In your perspectives on this project so that I may learn what I could do to improve the way I Interact with teachers and help groups to begin meeting together to discuss Instructional issues. 1. What did you like about participating on this project? How did this research project help you? What did you gain from this project? a. Did your participation on this project change your Instruction? your perceptions of yourself as a teacher? . What specifically was helpful? . Did the study group benefit your students in any way? b. Did this research project hinder you In any ways? What didn't you like about this project? 2. In what ways could the teacher study group be improved? 3. How do you think the roles of the participants in the project developed? a. How do you understand what your role was in this research project? b. How do you understand what my role was in this research project? 0. How do you understand the roles of the other teachers In the research project? d. Do you think there are any things that could be changed to help you take on a different role? 4. What could I do as a researcher to be more helpful to teachers? a. What types of things were helpful? b. What things were not helpful? 5. We have had a year of meeting together. I think the group has gone through many different phases and would continue to grow and develop if we continued meeting. If this group was to continue next year how would you like to see the group develop? a. What would you like to see stay the same about the group? 6. b. 199 What would you like to see changed? Describe your feelings about the Ieaming of your special needs students in your class this year? a. What expectations did you have for their Ieaming? Did they differ from the other students in your class? How and Why? Did the students meet your expectations for Ieaming? o How and Why? - What contributed to the students meeting your expectations If students did not meet your expectations what was the reason? There seemed to be a lot of things to cover this year In your literacy instmction. Who determines what themes are covered in 2nd grade and when they should be covered? How do you feel about the number of different themes and the amount of time you had for them? Are you thinking about making any changes in your literacy curriculum? If so, why and what are they? If not, why not? Prompt - Several themes seemed to be overlapping and there seemed to be a feeling of "oh I have so much to do and no time left to do It' whenever I came to observe or talk with you In the meetings. Would you describe your philosophy of educating the children in your classroom? What makes you believe that? b. What are your beliefs about teaching and your teaching role? How would you describe your beliefs about the students you teach? How would you characterize the Ieaming process of your students - specifically reading and writing? How does your philosophy about teaching and Ieaming play a role In your day to day teaching practice? 10. 11. 12. 13. 200 What are the; literacy activities you do in your classroom? What are the most Important goals of reading Instruction in your classroom? writing goals? Why do you think they are Important? a. Are there specific skills or strategies in reading that you think your students should Ieam before they leave your room at the end of the year? in writing? b. Do your goals vary for certain students in your classroom? If so, how? If not, why not? 0. Does your literacy Instruction vary across the year? (Is it different at the end of the year than the beginning of the year?) If so, how does it vary? Did your students meet the goals you set for them this year? How do you know the goals were/were not met? How did you develop a sense of community in your classroom this year? . What opportunities do your students have to interact with each other (a) in whole class settings? (b) in small groups? (c) in pairs? 14. 15. 16. 17. Describe/characterize your dream (Ideal) school. How would you characterize the working environment at this school? How Interactive are teachers, administrators In your school? - Do other teachers or the principal know what you are doing in your classroom? How do they know?/ Why don't they know? What support, if any. do you get in your school from parents, teachers. administrators? 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