IT STARTED with just a vague sense of dissatisfaction.

Finding Meaning and Purpose Together Teachers immersion in a literacy study group produces authentic reading for the teachers as well as their students. The social processes of reading, talking, modeling, and further discussion push teachers learning to higher levels than does just reading about new ideas. By Theresa Tribbe Socol IT STARTED with just a vague sense of dissatisfaction. After several years as an intermediate school principal, I was frustrated with my inability to move my staff from literacy instruction that could be described as a technical-basics approach to more meaningful instruction. Technical-basics literacy wasn t working for our fourthand fifth-graders. Most classrooms were using a basal reader and the related workbook, and all the teachers but one were using a spelling workbook. The teachers were generally teaching reading, writing, and spelling separately, and the students weren t seeing the connections. Some whole-class novels were being read, but teachers micromanaged each chapter with lots of vocabulary and questions. Round robin reading was still prevalent, and there was very little real talk about reading. Much of the instruction in all these language arts classes was teacher directed, and so students didn t own their learning. Moreover, students were spending a lot of time on readingrelated activities but not much time actually reading. It was the disjointedness of the instruction that struck me, though. Students weren t putting ideas, strategies, and concepts together to help themselves become better readers. Instead, they were going through the motions and just doing what they were told to do fill in a worksheet, read chapter 10 tonight, answer end-ofchapter questions. But the activities weren t authentic and purposeful, and consequently reading had a smaller impact on the students. THERESA TRIBBE SOCOL is an assistant professor in the Department of Teacher Education at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. My teachers, on the other hand, were working harder and harder. Some had found ways, mostly through coaxing, to make reading meaningful. Others kept trying ideas in the hopes that they d hit on something that would work. Still others had given up and simply relied on what they d done for years. In short, teachers were managing their literacy programs. And while the programs were organized and included all of the pieces we thought were necessary to make literacy meaning- 616 PHI DELTA KAPPAN

ful, somehow a huge piece was missing. As the instructional leader, I wasn t completely sure what that piece looked like. This sense of dissatisfaction led me back to school, where I studied literacy intensely. And I became fascinated. I returned ready to help my teachers move forward. What I didn t realize was that I was still at the technical-basics level in my own understanding. HOW WE GOT STARTED In an effort to create meaningful literacy instruction, I designed a staff development initiative in which my teachers and I studied literacy together. In short, we became immersed in meaningful literacy. 1 We read a text, came together as a book group to talk about the reading, watched a model of the literacy concept we had read about, and then encouraged one another to try the new concept. 2 such practices as whole-class instruction with a basal or round robin reading as ones that failed to promote meaningful literacy, replacing these approaches with others that were more meaningful was more difficult. I couldn t simply ask teachers to abandon their old practices without having something ready to replace them. But at this point, I was still on the outside thinking about managing the reading and figuring out how to get teachers to abandon unsuccessful practices. I wasn t thinking from the inside, helping teachers move toward reading for authentic purposes. FIRST STEPS As we moved into the first months of the study group, several teachers took their first steps. They made the connection between what we were doing in our study group and how they could bring that same excitement about learning into their classrooms. Not surprisingly, I found that my own beliefs about literacy and instruction were changing from valuing the technical basics to attaching more value to meaning. The study group met weekly. Teachers were given the text and were required to attend, since the meetings occurred during the workday. Of course, I couldn t require anyone to do the reading, and I could only urge teachers to try implementing what we were learning. While I went into this experience to help teachers consider new ways of teaching literacy, I found that my own beliefs about literacy and instruction were changing from valuing the technical basics to attaching more value to meaning. At first, as the literacy teachers and I began to read about, talk about, and implement new literacy practices, it was easy for me to identify technical-basics literacy practices that I hoped we could replace. It was clear that round robin reading needed to disappear, for I had seen that it created anxious students (those whose turns were coming up) and unengaged students (those who had already read or were far down the line). For most students, this wasn t real reading, and it was far from meaningful. I also began to understand that the basal reader wasn t engaging because students didn t have any choice in what they read. The students seemed bored, and they did not spontaneously talk about their reading like people I knew who had read a good book. Students needed both choice and access to good books. While it might have been easy initially to identify literature circles were one of the first new concepts several teachers tried. 3 We read about literature circles and discussed their potential. The teachers tried the idea and talked some more. Several teachers were very successful right away. What the successful teachers discovered was that students were engaged reading novels, recording big ideas during their discussions, and really talking about their reading. Classrooms were noisy and productive on literature circle days. Students asked when they would get to meet again and were reading thoughtfully to be prepared. Yet the teachers were still worried that the students weren t getting the books, so they tried to manage each aspect of the literature circles. They hadn t yet come to the understanding that students were finding a purpose for the reading and so didn t need so much outside management imposed on them. However, the teachers did acknowledge that the students were engaged. Literature circles were providing students the opportunity to read and talk about that reading in meaningful ways. Because the teachers who were using literature circles wanted to make sure that students were prepared for their circle meetings, we began reading and talking about the need for sustained reading time. Teachers be- APRIL 2007 617

gan giving students time to read. They realized that their students were more engaged in their reading because they were doing more of it, and they reported this observation to our group. I began to see the same kind of engagement among the teachers in our study group. Teachers started replacing the technical basics with more meaningful practices, but at first we didn t look much deeper than that. Teachers This new understanding dawned on me about three months into the initiative. We had replaced a lot of basic literacy practices, and both teachers and students were much more engaged. I realized that the immersion was the one critical component that was helping us succeed. It was the structure or process that was making the learning so accessible and meaningful. We were being immersed in literacy learning, and this immersion was helping us learn more quickly and easily. We were reading about literacy concepts, gleaning the big ideas from our reading, talking about the big ideas, seeing a concept modeled at each meeting, trying the concept, and talking about what worked and what didn t. I realized that this process of immersion was pushing the teachers learning to higher levels. Our weekly meetings took on a new dimension: they Both teachers and students learned that, in social settings where ideas can be examined from a variety of perspectives, literacy experiences become authentic. seemed to be learning more quickly and easily, though, because they were immersed in literacy. Beyond that, my thinking (and theirs) was mostly practical, not theoretical. I was encouraged because teachers were feeling a sense of accomplishment as students seemed more engaged. But I soon realized that the hard part was just beginning. Being immersed in the topic was helping teachers move away from the technical basics and let go of the outside (management) issues a little at a time. But I began to understand that for our reading to have significant impact, it had to fill an authentic need. IMMERSION became the sanctioned format for our learning. They became the platform to continually communicate with my teachers, not about problems or schedules the totality of a principal s dialogue on many days but about relevant instructional practices. I looked forward to the meetings because the teachers were excited about what they were trying. It was energizing to hear them talk about reading a literacy textbook and to learn what had worked in their classrooms. I began to see that teachers realized the benefits of immersion, too. One teacher explained that the time with others was the way she was able to learn the most. The assigned reading provided the foundation for the learning and gave us a starting point. As we read and brought our big ideas to the meetings, I began to understand how each of us engaged with the reading and came away with our own understandings. Often, what I thought was a big idea didn t make the teachers lists, but this helped me understand where they were coming from. Our understandings were then solidified or refined as we spent time talking about them. Modeling at the beginning of each meeting became our anchor lesson. 4 I came to realize that teachers could easily read and glean important understandings, but modeling really solidified their thinking. One teacher expressed it well: I m a visual learner, so for me to see it happening helped me a lot to see how it was supposed to work. Another expressed that I d better model, model, model, that s part of my job. At first I didn t realize the power of the modeling I knew only that it helped teachers attach an example to the reading so that it was easier for them to try something new. Over time, though, I began to refine my thinking, as I realized that the modeling was so important and so successful because it was making explicit the reading process that was happening in the 618 PHI DELTA KAPPAN

reader s head. Because it made such an impact on the teachers, they came to understand that they needed to offer explicit models for students. I really began to grasp that, even though comprehension can t be seen, we nonetheless have to make it explicit, and modeling can do that. These anchor lessons were making the reading/ thinking process itself explicit, and teachers could do the same thing for their students. Talking was the most critical feature of our immersion. I craved the professional dialogue and engaged in it whenever I had the chance. Many teachers did likewise, and the conversations spurred us forward. To implement meaningful practices, we had to be able to read about an idea, see it modeled, talk about it, try it out, and then talk about it some more. One teacher explained that reading wasn t enough; she still felt she needed the meeting. Another said, I wish I had more time to talk each week. If for some reason the teachers didn t get the time they needed to talk, their implementation of what they were learning suffered, and I heard about it. I also realized how much I relied on our dialogue to refine my own beliefs about literacy. Each conversation whether in meetings, in hallways, in classrooms, or in the lunchroom pushed my thinking and changed my understanding of how adults transform their own literacy practices. I came to see that we can move away from a focus on the technical basics and toward meaningful literacy by putting ourselves inside the reading, by reading and talking for authentic purposes. Often, the dialogue forced us to reexamine our thinking and led us to spend more time discussing a particular concept than we had originally thought necessary. And the teachers refined their implementation based on our discussions. They didn t need to read more or see another model; they needed to talk with their colleagues. This realization solidified my belief in the social nature of literacy and of learning to implement new strategies. I knew that I loved to talk about a good book, but our literacy discussions were more than that. It wasn t until our discussions about literacy instructional texts that I fully understood the potential impact of these interchanges. We needed that social interaction to get the most out of our reading, to solidify and push our thinking, to question what we had read, and to implement new practices. We had started on the outside thinking about how to manage different aspects of reading. Gradually, with the benefit of one another s thinking, we moved deeply inside our learning about literacy. As we neared the end of the first year, it was clear that both teachers and students had learned that, in social settings where ideas can be examined from a variety of perspectives, literacy experiences become authentic. My participation alongside my teachers deepened my own understanding as well. What I learned from being in a study group with my teachers changed my own literacy beliefs. Indeed, the process we used has become the key to my efforts to provide meaningful instruction as a professor who teaches reading to preservice and inservice teachers. I strive to provide literacy instruction that immerses these learners in a social process of reading, talking, trying, and talking some more. Together we create an atmosphere in which the reader sees the authentic meaning inside the reading. 1. Theresa Tribbe, We Are All Learners: Study Group Facilitation of a Middle-Level Literacy Program (Doctoral dissertation, University of Cincinnati, 2001). 2. Brian Cambourne, The Whole Story: Natural Learning and the Acquisition of Literacy in the Classroom (New York: Ashton Scholastic, 1988); Carlene W. Murphy and Dale W. Lick, Whole-Faculty Study Groups (Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Corwin Press, 1998); and Laura Robb, Redefining Staff Development: A Collaborative Model for Teachers and Administrators (Portsmouth, N.H.: Heinemann, 2000). 3. Harvey Daniels, Literature Circles: Voice and Choice in Book Clubs and Reading Groups, 2nd ed. (Portland, Me.: Stenhouse, 2002); and Reggie Routman, Conversations (Portsmouth, N.H.: Heinemann, 2000). 4. Stephanie Harvey and Anne Goudvis, Strategies That Work: Teaching Comprehension to Enhance Understanding (York, Me.: Stenhouse, 2000). K APRIL 2007 619

File Name and Bibliographic Information k0704soc.pdf Theresa Tribbe Socol, Finding Meaning and Purpose Together, Phi Delta Kappan, Vol. 88, No. 08, April 2007, pp. 616-619. Copyright Notice Phi Delta Kappa International, Inc., holds copyright to this article, which may be reproduced or otherwise used only in accordance with U.S. law governing fair use. MULTIPLE copies, in print and electronic formats, may not be made or distributed without express permission from Phi Delta Kappa International, Inc. All rights reserved. Note that photographs, artwork, advertising, and other elements to which Phi Delta Kappa does not hold copyright may have been removed from these pages. Please fax permission requests to the attention of KAPPAN Permissions Editor at 812/339-0018 or e-mail permission requests to kappan@pdkintl.org. For further information, contact: Phi Delta Kappa International, Inc. 408 N. Union St. P.O. Box 789 Bloomington, Indiana 47402-0789 812/339-1156 Phone 800/766-1156 Tollfree 812/339-0018 Fax http://www.pdkintl.org