Melanie Sperling | University of California, Riverside (original) (raw)
Uploads
Papers by Melanie Sperling
Research in The Teaching of English, 2014
We guess there would be little debate among educators that a key goal in the schooling process is... more We guess there would be little debate among educators that a key goal in the schooling process is to help students to thrive academically as they grow into the life around them (to take a phrase from Vygotsky [1978]), and, as individuals with their own sets of experiences, to find in their classes supportive places to do so. Debate occurs when we ask what students need to learn, and how they need to be learning, in order to achieve these goals. The debate isn't new, and it drives such language and literacy concerns as what counts as "academic" as students develop as language users in school-what topics are worth discussing for students and what ways of discussing are worth spending time on (Sperling & DiPardo, 2008). While such debate may sometimes seem a relative luxury for students already conversant with the social and academic practices of the society in which they live and learn, it is hardly so for second-language (L2) students who are new to the society in which...
Teachers College Record: The Voice of Scholarship in Education, 1998
The English Journal
The JSTOR Archive is a trusted digital repository providing for long-term preservation and access... more The JSTOR Archive is a trusted digital repository providing for long-term preservation and access to leading academic journals and scholarly literature from around the world. The Archive is supported by libraries, scholarly societies, publishers, and foundations. It is an initiative of JSTOR, a not-for-profit organization with a mission to help the scholarly community take advantage of advances in technology. For more information regarding JSTOR, please contact
This paper explores the ways in which inner-city students' social, cultural, and political relati... more This paper explores the ways in which inner-city students' social, cultural, and political relationships and their thinking and behavior patterns that stem from the range of different situations outside the classroom can shape the classroom roles that they develop with their peers as thinkers and learners of English and writing. It presents a case study taken from 6 weeks of observing writing instruction in an inner-city classroom and explores students' classroom roles during a class discussion and writing exercise conducted the day after the events surrounding the jury verdict in the original Rodney King trial. Results show that all focal students played roles in relationship to three social realities: the classroom community, the world outside the classroom, and their impending texts. Furthermore, these three realities are sometimes critically interconnected. How these realities manifest themselves in the classroom discussions and exercises are discussed as well as the implications for research. (Contains 34 references.) (GLR)
Reading Research Quarterly, 2011
The difficulties and obstacles encountered in research in the analysis and interpretation of writ... more The difficulties and obstacles encountered in research in the analysis and interpretation of writing conference talk are theoretically importmlt. These dilemmas may serve as markers to help researchers see how the routines of research and the interpretations of findings are integrally related. The ways in which talk "rearranges" problems should be of interest to those who concern themselves with the relationship of oral discourse to learning to write. Discourse analysis of classroom interaction is comprised of two phases of research: data collection, and data analysis. The use of recording equipment, and the kind of equipment used, will affect the kind of information obtained from classroom settings, as student comments demonstrate. Related to this is the need to gather contextualizing information, since student-teacher talk can be misunderstood outside of context. Often, teacher and student motives can only be attained through personal interviews, as examples show. The timing of interviaws, furthermore, affects what is discovered in the data. The dilemmas of when and how to collect data affect all aspects of a study and affect what the data can teach. Other phenomena of importance when considering conferences are "adjacency pairs" and the question of who is "steering," (invaribly the teacher, as illustrated in one scenario). In sum, all of these obstacles make the responsibility of Interpretation a challenging process replete with methodological paradoxes. (HS)
Teachers College Press, Jan 5, 2010
Intended for teachers, this paper considers response to student writing, looking at the different... more Intended for teachers, this paper considers response to student writing, looking at the different angles from which it is commonly perceived and acknowledging the complications that e valuation and the demands of curriculum add to that response. Three major areas are examined. There is an historical look at response, so that some of the roots of traditional approaches and assuaptions can be seen. The highlights of the past decade are cited, including the angles from which traditional approaches have been attacked and through which current research is evolving. Finally, current ideas from research and teaching are discussed in order to assess what the state of the art is now and what needs to be considered for teaching and learning writing in the future. (DF)
A study examined autobiographical narratives written by preservice English teachers who described... more A study examined autobiographical narratives written by preservice English teachers who described their new experiences in student teaching. Subjects, 18 young men and women enrolled in a one-year combination teaching credential and masters degree program at Stanford University, described in writing a major classroom experience. Fourteen of the le students completed the assignment. Results indicated that: (1) 10 of the 14 narratives conveyed in metaphor that the classroom is a closed system in which the teacher's purpose is to win students over to the teacher's way of sesing the world and doing the world of school; and (2) 4 of the 14 narratives evoked a "convergence" metaphor in which teachers and students are common participants in a learning event. Findings suggest that such narratives can be potent instructional vehicles for working with neophyte teachers, for the very elements that identify these texts as narratives carry cultural and political assumptions that in part constitute teaching. (RS)
This paper reviews and summarizes research studies in writing and related language areas that hel... more This paper reviews and summarizes research studies in writing and related language areas that help educators to understand how writing is socially based. The purpose of the paper is to cast classroom practice in the variously dim and gleaming lights of research and theory, linking practice, research, and theory by looking with a close-up lens at the ways in which writing and other language experiences inside and outside of school have been studied and explained. Using this lens, the paper first presents some theoretical perspectives on written language acquisition and development. Next, the paper reviews studies that investigate social contexts for writing development both in school and out. The paper then loons at studies of instructional practices in writing that are, from lesser to greater degrees, socially based. The paper concludes with a presentation of some "core concepts" which capture the ways in which some of the most promising instructional practices in writing are linked to social theories. Ten notes are included; 213 references are attached. (Author/RS
A study examined an eleventh grade literature teacher's written responses to her students' writin... more A study examined an eleventh grade literature teacher's written responses to her students' writing. Copies of the students' graded papers were collected, and the instructor and eight students were interviewed. These sources became central to building a framework detailing five key ways that this teacher oriented herself to student writing: (1) interpretive; (2) social; (3) cognitive/emotive; (4) evaluative; and (5) pedagogical. In the interpretative orientation, the instructor was relating the student texts to her own personal experience and to her knowledge of the student and his or her work. In the evaluative orientation, the instructor invoked disparate roles she has with the students, i.e., "peer," "literary scholar," "teacher," and "aesthetic reader." In the cognitive/emotive orientation, the teacher reflected on her analytical reasoning and her feelings as well. In her evaluative orientation, she assessed whether the student's writing was working for her. And in the pedagogical orientation, she viewed the student writing as vehicles for her own teaching and learning. (Contains one figure showing the five ways of orientation for the teacher-as-reader. (TB)
Review of Research in Education, 2008
In exploring the role of research in the secondary school subject traditionally known as English... more In exploring the role of research in the secondary school subject traditionally known as English, we address a host of issues crowded with problems and potentials. Surely the perennially debated contours of the field have never been more in question, as new technologies and ...
[
Reading Research Quarterly, 2011
ABSTRACT
Research in The Teaching of English, 2014
We guess there would be little debate among educators that a key goal in the schooling process is... more We guess there would be little debate among educators that a key goal in the schooling process is to help students to thrive academically as they grow into the life around them (to take a phrase from Vygotsky [1978]), and, as individuals with their own sets of experiences, to find in their classes supportive places to do so. Debate occurs when we ask what students need to learn, and how they need to be learning, in order to achieve these goals. The debate isn't new, and it drives such language and literacy concerns as what counts as "academic" as students develop as language users in school-what topics are worth discussing for students and what ways of discussing are worth spending time on (Sperling & DiPardo, 2008). While such debate may sometimes seem a relative luxury for students already conversant with the social and academic practices of the society in which they live and learn, it is hardly so for second-language (L2) students who are new to the society in which...
Teachers College Record: The Voice of Scholarship in Education, 1998
The English Journal
The JSTOR Archive is a trusted digital repository providing for long-term preservation and access... more The JSTOR Archive is a trusted digital repository providing for long-term preservation and access to leading academic journals and scholarly literature from around the world. The Archive is supported by libraries, scholarly societies, publishers, and foundations. It is an initiative of JSTOR, a not-for-profit organization with a mission to help the scholarly community take advantage of advances in technology. For more information regarding JSTOR, please contact
This paper explores the ways in which inner-city students' social, cultural, and political relati... more This paper explores the ways in which inner-city students' social, cultural, and political relationships and their thinking and behavior patterns that stem from the range of different situations outside the classroom can shape the classroom roles that they develop with their peers as thinkers and learners of English and writing. It presents a case study taken from 6 weeks of observing writing instruction in an inner-city classroom and explores students' classroom roles during a class discussion and writing exercise conducted the day after the events surrounding the jury verdict in the original Rodney King trial. Results show that all focal students played roles in relationship to three social realities: the classroom community, the world outside the classroom, and their impending texts. Furthermore, these three realities are sometimes critically interconnected. How these realities manifest themselves in the classroom discussions and exercises are discussed as well as the implications for research. (Contains 34 references.) (GLR)
Reading Research Quarterly, 2011
The difficulties and obstacles encountered in research in the analysis and interpretation of writ... more The difficulties and obstacles encountered in research in the analysis and interpretation of writing conference talk are theoretically importmlt. These dilemmas may serve as markers to help researchers see how the routines of research and the interpretations of findings are integrally related. The ways in which talk "rearranges" problems should be of interest to those who concern themselves with the relationship of oral discourse to learning to write. Discourse analysis of classroom interaction is comprised of two phases of research: data collection, and data analysis. The use of recording equipment, and the kind of equipment used, will affect the kind of information obtained from classroom settings, as student comments demonstrate. Related to this is the need to gather contextualizing information, since student-teacher talk can be misunderstood outside of context. Often, teacher and student motives can only be attained through personal interviews, as examples show. The timing of interviaws, furthermore, affects what is discovered in the data. The dilemmas of when and how to collect data affect all aspects of a study and affect what the data can teach. Other phenomena of importance when considering conferences are "adjacency pairs" and the question of who is "steering," (invaribly the teacher, as illustrated in one scenario). In sum, all of these obstacles make the responsibility of Interpretation a challenging process replete with methodological paradoxes. (HS)
Teachers College Press, Jan 5, 2010
Intended for teachers, this paper considers response to student writing, looking at the different... more Intended for teachers, this paper considers response to student writing, looking at the different angles from which it is commonly perceived and acknowledging the complications that e valuation and the demands of curriculum add to that response. Three major areas are examined. There is an historical look at response, so that some of the roots of traditional approaches and assuaptions can be seen. The highlights of the past decade are cited, including the angles from which traditional approaches have been attacked and through which current research is evolving. Finally, current ideas from research and teaching are discussed in order to assess what the state of the art is now and what needs to be considered for teaching and learning writing in the future. (DF)
A study examined autobiographical narratives written by preservice English teachers who described... more A study examined autobiographical narratives written by preservice English teachers who described their new experiences in student teaching. Subjects, 18 young men and women enrolled in a one-year combination teaching credential and masters degree program at Stanford University, described in writing a major classroom experience. Fourteen of the le students completed the assignment. Results indicated that: (1) 10 of the 14 narratives conveyed in metaphor that the classroom is a closed system in which the teacher's purpose is to win students over to the teacher's way of sesing the world and doing the world of school; and (2) 4 of the 14 narratives evoked a "convergence" metaphor in which teachers and students are common participants in a learning event. Findings suggest that such narratives can be potent instructional vehicles for working with neophyte teachers, for the very elements that identify these texts as narratives carry cultural and political assumptions that in part constitute teaching. (RS)
This paper reviews and summarizes research studies in writing and related language areas that hel... more This paper reviews and summarizes research studies in writing and related language areas that help educators to understand how writing is socially based. The purpose of the paper is to cast classroom practice in the variously dim and gleaming lights of research and theory, linking practice, research, and theory by looking with a close-up lens at the ways in which writing and other language experiences inside and outside of school have been studied and explained. Using this lens, the paper first presents some theoretical perspectives on written language acquisition and development. Next, the paper reviews studies that investigate social contexts for writing development both in school and out. The paper then loons at studies of instructional practices in writing that are, from lesser to greater degrees, socially based. The paper concludes with a presentation of some "core concepts" which capture the ways in which some of the most promising instructional practices in writing are linked to social theories. Ten notes are included; 213 references are attached. (Author/RS
A study examined an eleventh grade literature teacher's written responses to her students' writin... more A study examined an eleventh grade literature teacher's written responses to her students' writing. Copies of the students' graded papers were collected, and the instructor and eight students were interviewed. These sources became central to building a framework detailing five key ways that this teacher oriented herself to student writing: (1) interpretive; (2) social; (3) cognitive/emotive; (4) evaluative; and (5) pedagogical. In the interpretative orientation, the instructor was relating the student texts to her own personal experience and to her knowledge of the student and his or her work. In the evaluative orientation, the instructor invoked disparate roles she has with the students, i.e., "peer," "literary scholar," "teacher," and "aesthetic reader." In the cognitive/emotive orientation, the teacher reflected on her analytical reasoning and her feelings as well. In her evaluative orientation, she assessed whether the student's writing was working for her. And in the pedagogical orientation, she viewed the student writing as vehicles for her own teaching and learning. (Contains one figure showing the five ways of orientation for the teacher-as-reader. (TB)
Review of Research in Education, 2008
In exploring the role of research in the secondary school subject traditionally known as English... more In exploring the role of research in the secondary school subject traditionally known as English, we address a host of issues crowded with problems and potentials. Surely the perennially debated contours of the field have never been more in question, as new technologies and ...
[
Reading Research Quarterly, 2011
ABSTRACT