wmwp fall newsletter 2014

Connections W e s t e r n M a s s a c h u s e t t s W r i t i n g P r o j e c t V o l u m e 2 2 , n u m b e r 1 , S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 4

English Department College of Humanities and Fine Arts University of Massachusetts Amherst

Newsletter of the Western Massachusetts Writing Project

2014 Teacher of the Year to speak at Best Practices

Westfield Public Schools impacted by WMWP professional development

by Karen Mieleby Chris Tolpa

Literacy Leadership Institute shares wealth of knowledgeby Karen Diaz

Very few initiatives have impacted educational practice more than the Common Core State Standards. To address the 42 ELA standards and 20 Con-tent Literacy Standards, school districts across the nation scram-ble to find complex texts, create rigorous lessons, and implement content literacy strategies. Al-though the change is urgent, it is obvious that profound, lasting change explicit instruction, high expectations, differentiated in-struction will take time. When Westfield Public Schools and the Western Massachusetts Writing

Project forged their relationship in 2011, it was a known factor that our pace would be that of a waltz, not a jitterbug. Now, in 2014, we continue to pick up the tempo as we perfect our dance. We began with those teachers who knew the CCSS best, 20 secondary ELA teachers and two administrators determined to make meaning of the new Com-mon Core State Standards. Bruce Penniman led the graduate course entitled, Principles and Practices of Effective Curriculum Design for English Teachers, where we shared best practices in English

- Continued on page 12

Fourteen literacy lead-ers from across Western Massa-chusetts are participating in the Western Massachusetts Writing Projects Literacy Leadership Institute. Teachers, principals, curriculum directors, and teach-er-consultants from across the Pioneer Valley and beyond will meet for a total of eight sessions from April, 2014 to January, 2015.

Classes have been held at UMass Amherst and Easthampton High School. In the future, classes will be held at the WMWP Best Practices conference and Smith Vocational and Agricultural High School. Through the institute, participants will study the many DESE initiatives with a focus on the relationships among them.


Anne Marie Osheyack, the 2014 Massachusetts Teacher of the Year, will be this years keynote speaker at the annual WMWP Best Practices confer-ence on October 18. Anne Marie was nomi-nated for Teacher of the Year while teaching 9th grade English at Central High School. There, she served as 9th grade team-faciliator, which required her to work closely with her students, their parents, and their commu-nity. She now teaches English at Northampton High School. Anne Marie says, This year as a Teacher of the Year has really opened my eyes in terms of advocacy. As a teacher of the year, I am responsible, for the rest of my life, for advocating on behalf of teachers and students. Our voices are much more pow-erful than we imagine them to be. Before this, I really thought, but Im just a teacher. Now I know I am a teacher, and a professional, and I have a voice worth listening to. All teachers do. For more information on the Best Practices conference, see pages 4 and 5.

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Taking pictures, learning about composi-tion and lighting, discussing identity, community, and media representation, and investigating health in Holyoke were all part of this summers Pho-tovoice workshop. As part of the Holyoke High School ELL Summer of Power, teacher-consultants Dani OBrien and Katie Richardson facilitated a Photovoice project with nine ELLs for five weeks that sought to position students as researchers who learn about their community through photography and act as agents of change. Students became acclimated into the group through viewing, writing, and discussing individu-al and group identities, different elements of health, roles of the media, who is a researcher, and ways of analyzing images. As students began taking pic-tures of themselves and their world, they identified strengths and weaknesses of Holyoke and consid-ered how these impact their health and the health of their community. Students had an opportunity to work with professional photographer, Rob Deza, who is the official photographer to mayor Alex Morse, to learn photographic techniques that would enhance their pictures. In the end, students identified ways they could share their images and ideas, and they did

so by creating posters urging people to keep Holy-oke clean. They also created a video called We Are Holyoke that combined their images with text they wrote using the I am From format. The link to their video is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkkC7jbHZho

Holyoke youth use Photovoice to tell about their communityby Katie Richardson

WMWP modifies leadership structure WMWPs leadership team has a new con-figuration this year as well as several new members. To better match the leadership positions with the current needs of the site, the WMWP Executive Board voted in June to modify the responsibilities of the three existing co-director positions and to convert three coordinator roles to co-director posi-tions. Bruce M. Penniman, a WMWP teacher-consultant since 1994, has returned as site director, a position he held from 2003 to 2007. He previ-ously served as a co-director and Summer Institute facilitator for several years. Bruce taught English for 36 years at Amherst Regional High School and

remains involved there as an advisor to the Afri-can Scholars Program. He is the author of Build-ing the English Classroom: Foundations, Support, Success (NCTE, 2009); in 1999, he was Massachu-setts Teacher of the Year and a finalist for National Teacher of the Year. Past president and current con-ference co-chair of the New England Association of Teachers of English, he has also edited NEATEs journal, The Leaflet, and the NCTE Assembly on American Literature newsletter. Bruce says, Im excited to be a part of the WMWP leadership team again, to have the oppor-tunity to work with such talented and dedicated



WMWP Fall PlannerRethinking and Reclaiming Assessment: Best Practices in the Teaching of WritingSaturday, October 18, 8:30 a.m.- 3 p.m. UMass Bartlett Hall. See pages 4-5 for details. WMWPs annual conference features three rounds of concurrent sessions on such topics as Internet memes, writing with voice, writ-ing in science, and improving student re-search, plus a keynote speech by Anne Marie Osheyack, the 2014 Massachusetts Teacher of the Year, co-author of Teaching in the Real World: Strategies to Survive and Thrive. 6 PDPs, or 10 PDPs with extension option. Registration fee: $50.

WMWP on FacebookIf you havent already, check out our WMWP Facebook page www.facebook.com/West-MassWP and become a member of the group. It is a great way to stay connected with your WMWP friends, share ideas, stories and resources, post and discuss articles and texts with rich relevance to our work, and stay informed (and/or reminded) about upcoming events. We will soon announce this years book club title. You can earn some valuable PDPs by participating in the reading and discussions.

WMWP Teachers as Writers ContestDeadline: Monday, December 1 WMWP invites all Massachusetts educators to submit manuscripts of up to 750 words for its annual Teachers as Writers Contest. Prizes include credit for WMWP programs and publi-cation. Submission guidelines are available atwww.umass.edu/wmwp/events/teachersaswriterscontest.html.

National Day on Writing Monday, October 20 Participate in the Sixth Annual National Day on Writing. Submit some of your own writing, encourage your students to participate, organize a writing event at your school. For ideas and information, visit www.ncte.org/dayonwriting/.

Passion and Practice Building a Balanced Culture of Literacy in Our Schools: NEATE Fall Conference October 24-25. Mansfield, MA. Keynote addresses by Erik Palmer, author of Well Spoken: Teaching Speaking to All Stu-dents, and Barry Lane, author of But How Do You Teach Writing? A Simple Guide for All Teachers, plus almost 30 concurrent sessions, book exhibits, a grant program, and network-ing opportunities. For details and registration forms, visit www.neate.org.

WMWP Leadership Team MeetingsMondays and Tuesdays, 4:15 to 6 p.m.: Sep-tember 15, Five Colleges, Amherst; October 28, Wistariahurst Museum, Holyoke; December 8, January 20, and March 2, Five Colleges; May 5, Wistariahurst; and June 8, Five Colleges.WMWP leadership meetingsopen to all WMWP teacher-consultantsare held for the purpose of reviewing ongoing programs, plan-ning future programs, and discussing issues of importance to teachers, including the WMWP inquiry theme for the year: Rethinking and Reclaiming Assessment. Teacher-consultants who attend five of the years seven meetings are eligible for 10 PDPs.

Questions? E-mail WMWP office manager Jess Ouellette at [email protected] or call 545-5466.


A Sessions (8:45 10:15)

Rethinking and Reclaiming Assessment

Saturday, October 18, 2014Bartlett Hall Lobby, UMass AmherstRegister Online at www.umass.edu/wmwp/registration.html (please indicate session preferences)

WMWPs Best Practices in the Teaching of Writing Fall ConferenceKeynote address by Anne Marie Osheyack, 2014 Massachusetts Teacher of the Year

8:30 Coffee & Registration8:45 Workshop sessions A & B12:00 Lunch: Keynote by Anne Marie Osheyack1:45 Workshop session C3:00 Closing&6PDPcertificatepickup

$50 registration fee (Includes lunch)

Schedule

The Western Massachusetts Writing Project has a proud tradition of featuring selected workshops by its newest Summer Institute class and veteran teacher consultants at its annual Best Practices conference. This years pro-gram includes 8 morning workshops, followed by a luncheon featuring keynote speaker Anne Marie Osheyack, 2014 Massachusetts Teacher of the Year. Four additional workshops will be held in the afternoon. Participants will earn six PDPs with an option of earning four additional PDPs by completing a follow-up activity.

A1. How Can Internet Memes Be Used in the Class-room?Using internet memes, a static basis for a form of viral digital media, is a low-stakes way for students to use a format to further elicit analysis about literature, especially poetry. Teachers and students can use worksheets with popular memes, such as Doge Meme and Aint Nobody Got Time For That, to connect to Emily Dickinsons poem Im Nobody which speaks to the idea of fame and viral media. Students can use a meme format sheet to create their own memes based on their analysis of the poem and then write and share why they chose the memes they chose to speak about fame. This activity could be used for almost any type of literature for any subject in any grade. Memes have static formats, but the language of memes is always changing, which allows for new ways of using and appropriating memes for different grade levels. Jacqueline Desmarais teaches 7th grade ELA at Powder Mill Middle School in Southwick, MA.

A2. Courageous Conversations at the Intersection of Culture, Equity, Language, and Identity: English Language Learners and Social JusticeThis interactive and reflective workshop provides partici-

pants with the opportunity to explore vocabulary as a place for cultural, language, and identity issues. Educators will experience the importance of identifying and addressing these issues in the classroom to better support English language development and content comprehension. Participants will create an action plan to select a familiar classroom text that can be analyzed and taught through a social justice lens. Designing instruction or any type of work to teach or talk about social justice issues should be intentional, relevant, and accessible. It is a framework to engage not only teachers and students, but everyone, in courageous conversations.Maria Cahillane is a Teacher-in-Residence at Westfield State University. Andrew Habana-Hafner is an assistant professor at Westfield State University. Floris Wilma Ortiz is an assistant professor at Westfield State University.

A3. Step Up to the Mic: Inspiring Students to Write with VoiceWith a focus on grades 8-12, this workshop aims to: 1) define the elusive quality of voice in concrete terms, 2) demonstrate methods to analyze voice in writing, and 3) explore the benefits of low stakes writing assignments to help students find their voices and enjoy the process. Through close reading of work by student writers and famous authors, we will analyze the techniques used to create voice, then apply those methods in writing of our own. We will take a work of low stakes writing and work on refining it by applying these same methods. Nicole Crosby teaches 9th and 11th grade English at SABIS International Charter School in Springfield, MA. Christopher Rea teaches ELA at Ludlow High School in Ludlow, MA.

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A4. District Determined Measures: What? How? and Why?This presentation examines the Massachusetts initiative of District Determined Measures (DDM) from three different perspectives. The following questions will be addressed: What might the creation of an English DDM look like? How can teachers use DDM data to inform classroom instruction? How do DDMs affect an educa-tors evaluation?Kate Morneau is an assistant principal at Fausey Elemen-tary School in West Springfield. Tom Fanning has retired from teaching middle school technology in the Amherst Public Schools. Chris Tolpa is the ELA supervisor for the Westfield Public Schools.

B Sessions (10:30 12:00)B1. Literacy Leadership Institute ReunionFor 2014 LLI participants only.

B2. Teaching for Social Justice: What Does it Mean and How Do You Do it?This session will provide participants with an understand-ing of what it means to teach for social justice and real world examples of how it is being done in schools in the area. Participants will have the opportunity to reflect on their own teaching practice and consider what it means to teach for social justice in their own classrooms, schools, and communities. Dani OBrien is a Doctoral Student at UMass Amhersts College of Education. Kelly Norris teaches English at Minnechaug Regional High School.

B3. Writing in Science (And Tech Tools to Make it Easier and More Fun)Clear writing takes clear thinking, and by helping students develop their writing skills, they will become better com-municators and critical thinkers. In this interactive work-shop we will share a variety of strategies for writing in science and discuss how to adapt these strategies to your classroom, using both low-tech and high-tech tools. You will leave with writing strategies you can use right away.Hollington Lee is a science teacher at Ludlow High School. B4. Tips and Tricks for Improving Student Research Often teachers hit road blocks with students when it comes to research projects. Students may lack the skills needed to create research questions, find search terms, or even know where to begin their research. In this workshop, teachers will review sample lesson plans, decipher what they expect students to find when researching, and re-write individual lesson plans to guide students to deeper understanding and more precise research. M. Allegra DAmbruoso is a library teacher at the High School of Commerce in Springfield, MA.

C Sessions (1:45 3:00)C1. 2014 Summer Institute ReunionFor 2014 SI alums only.

C2. Assessing Student Knowledge, Skills, and Motiva-tion: A Universal Design ModelIn this workshop, we will explore why and how the Uni-versal Design for Learning model defines assessment as a process of gathering information about what students know and can do. We will explore why it is important when we write lesson plans to distinguish the goal(s) from the means in order to accurately assess student knowledge and skills. You will practice how to write a lesson plan that broadens the means to a goal in order to accommo-date learner variability, and therefore, remove barriers to accurately measure what students know and can do.Momodou Sarr is a Special Education teacher at Amherst Regional High School and a Teacher Consultant with the Western Massachusetts Writing Project.

C3. Outcome-based Curriculum PlanningFor students to be truly college and career ready, they should possess the intellectual curiosity and problem-solving ability that comes from an outcome-based curricu-lum. This workshop will demonstrate how Understanding by Design (UbD), the curriculum plan designed by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe, uses essential questions and performance assessments to drive the skills work of a unit, to increase student engagement, and to achieve deeper comprehension.Diana Roy is the Director of Curriculum for the Ludlow Public Schools. She is also a Teacher Consultant with the Western Massachusetts Writing Project.

C4. Hacking Your Notebook/Paper CircuitryWhat if that bright idea inside your writing notebook could literally be illuminated? Thats the concept behind paper circuitry, which turns your notebook pages into circuits. Paper circuitry is part of an effort by the National Writ-ing Project and its partners to reclaim notebooks as a space for innovative thoughts and tinkering for writing, science, math, and more. With copper conductive tape, watch batteries, and sticker LED lights, participants in this session will create a simple paper circuitry project that will surely light up their Best Practices day. Sign up early: only twelve spots available!Kevin Hodgson is a sixth grade teacher at the William E. Norris Elementary School in Southampton, Massachusetts, and the technology liaison with the Western Massachusetts Writing Project.

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2014 Summer Institute encourages teachers to growWe researched...

We wrote...I have never thought of myself as a writer. I teach writing. I edit it. I respond to it. But I dont often focus on my own. Well, over the past three weeks, this definitely has changed. Writing in and out of the day has become a wel-come ritual, one that has offered a valuable space for reflection, creativity, and wordplay. Through these exercises, the cloud of my thoughts has taken tangible shape in words, and Ive surprised myself. Its been fascinating to see ideas I didnt know I had come to life on the page thanks to thought-provoking prompts. My writers notebook has become a place of experi-mentation and discovery, and I am grateful.

Ive often considered creative writing to be something that would be nice to do when I get the time. Thanks to this institute, that time has finally ar-rived. Ive found myself exploring new territory and revising works Ive written in the past, and its been both rewarding and fun. If a writer is sim-ply someone who writes, I suppose I do see myself as a writer now. One of the greatest gifts this institute has offered me has been the opportunity to write daily, which has shown me firsthand how powerful and transforma-tive this habit can be. Its definitely one that I plan to continue.

--Chris Rea, English teacher at Ludlow High School

Teachers should be constantly researching. Our students are always learn-ing new information. They are always researching, even if they dont know that they are. We need to be as curious as they are.

As part of the Summer Institute, I had a different view of research than my classmates. As a library teacher, I see mostly research; it is a part of every day. Research is everything from school projects to fun fact-finding. Un-like classroom teachers, I never assign projects. I decided to do my Teacher Inquiry Workshop on how teachers can help students do better research by phrasing the assignment well and doing preliminary research before send-ing students out to find sources. I did what many librarians love to do: re-search about research! Students (and teachers) rarely make the long journey of research, and simply Google information. With that in mind, I taught my classmates how to use Google and subscription databases to their full potential as well as how to evaluate websites. Most importantly, I showed them what their school librarians can do to assist them in creating meaning-ful research assignments for students.

--Allegra DAmbruoso, Librarian at High School of Commerce

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2014 Summer Institute encourages teachers to growWe researched...

We presented...It has been a true gift to learn from the dedicated individuals of the 2014 Summer Institute. Throughout our three weeks together, each of us pre-sented a Teacher Inquiry Workshop (TIW) based on a compelling question. My TIW focused on argumentative writing and how to engage students to write an effective thesis statement. As the first presenter in our group, I was a bit nervous. Thoughts tumbled through my mind as I was planning my presentation. Would my information be useful to my cohort group? Would they think I was knowledgeable about my topic? Would I be able to engage them in a memorable way? Based on the positive support I had already experienced with my group, I finally shut off my critical mind and took the plunge. The experience of preparing my TIW and then presenting it was both exciting and empowering.

Frankly, Im glad that I got my TIW out of the way at the beginning of the Summer Institute since it freed me up to focus more intently on the follow-ing workshops. Every week, I received TIW gifts ranging from Poetry and Social Media to Helping Teachers and Students Research. I am amazed at how many different topics I was exposed to that I will be able to use in my classroom and share with my colleagues.

--Reina Rago, ELA teacher at Advanced Math and Science Academy Charter School

Teachers should be constantly researching. Our students are always learn-ing new information. They are always researching, even if they dont know that they are. We need to be as curious as they are.

As part of the Summer Institute, I had a different view of research than my classmates. As a library teacher, I see mostly research; it is a part of every day. Research is everything from school projects to fun fact-finding. Un-like classroom teachers, I never assign projects. I decided to do my Teacher Inquiry Workshop on how teachers can help students do better research by phrasing the assignment well and doing preliminary research before send-ing students out to find sources. I did what many librarians love to do: re-search about research! Students (and teachers) rarely make the long journey of research, and simply Google information. With that in mind, I taught my classmates how to use Google and subscription databases to their full potential as well as how to evaluate websites. Most importantly, I showed them what their school librarians can do to assist them in creating meaning-ful research assignments for students.

--Allegra DAmbruoso, Librarian at High School of Commerce


TC discovers past connection with WMWP 2014 SI participant Nikki Crosby discov-ered that WMWP was responsible for publishing her work when she was a 6th grade student. She reflects on the impact it had on her life. There I stood: a bottomless reservoir of shuf-fling, self-conscious adolescent energy. Tweens, teens, and teachers stood around the UMass Am-herst campus auditorium, talking and laughing as confidently as stockbrokers at a cocktail party. Why dont you grab yourself a cookie? asked my elementary school librarian. Where did she come from, and what was she playing at? Be-cause theyre for you! I blurted out. She chuck-led, shaking her head. Why would they put out cookies for us? Of course theyre for you kids! Her cajol-ing fell on deaf ears, for I ac-cepted neither cookies nor law-ful admittance into that ceremony hall. Those were privileges in-tended for the college-bound, I reasonednot hill town kids like me. The chatter subsided. Middle and high schoolers began to line up beside a stage. One by one, and after a brief introduction, they were called up to the podium to share their work, and while I do not remember what those students wrote, these young authors made quite an impression on methey were passionate about writing, and they were up there belting it out like pros. Poetry, memoir, short story, essay, and nearly every genre my then 6th grade self could conceive of was represented. After I got over these students stage presence and strength of delivery, there were just words. And

words I knew I could write; they were the reason I was here. That day, when the Western Massachusetts Writing Project award ceremony commenced, I was a pretty good writerfor a country girl. Upon conclusion, I was a good writer period, and I re-turned home with a deep sense of empowerment. The world of academia was not that hostile, elitist, and impossibly difficult to penetrate place I imag-ined it to be. I had been there and, as you may have concluded, lived to tell about it. One year later I distinguished myself by

writing zealously in 7th grade Eng-lish class, tearing through a new journal booklet every week. It was almost as if, as a published author, I held my written work to higher standards. Being a writer had become part of my identity, and I owned it throughout my career as a stu-dent.

I am now a high school English teacher af-ter taking the path of greatest resistance, becom-ing the college educated person that I was never raised to be. I chose this path to change the minds of talented students who fashion themselves as ru-ral, or poor, or minority, or otherwise an other, and therefore, unfit to hold the keys to the educa-tional kingdom. I want for them what WMWP did for me. Without the WMWP student anthology and award ceremony, I would have been oblivious to avenues before me. And while I can do my best to open those doors for students, being recognized, published, and honored by the ambassadors of an academic realm that may as well neighbor Mor-dorthat is irreplaceable.

by Nikki Crosby


Your donation, of whatever size, will help us continue to offer the Summer Institute and other programs. If you would like to make a contribution, you can do so online at: http://www.umass.edu/wmwp/contribute.html or by mail at UMass Amherst Annual Fund, Development Office, Memorial Hall, 134 Hicks Way, Amherst, MA 01003-9270. Be sure to earmark your con-tribution to the Western Massachusetts Writing Project, CHFA.

Support WMWP Teachers and Programs

teacher-leaders. WMWP is already a strong and active National Writing Project site, and I hope to help grow our capacity to serve teachers and stu-dents in our region by developing relationships with a variety of educational partners and strengthening our long-range planning process. I know that there will be no shortage of great ideas to work on from teachers in the WMWP community. Karen Diaz is the new co-director of pro-gramming. Karen has done professional develop-ment on writing workshop, UbD, and written re-sponse to reading. Her main goal is to continue to offer an exemplary Best Practices conference that grows every year. Dani OBrien is taking on the role of co-di-rector of continuity after serving as the co-director of youth and community outreach. In her new posi-tion, she hopes to provide opportunities for TCs that meet their needs as teachers and writers in a way that is nourishing and rejuvenating. Karen Miele is the new co-director for out-reach. She has served as the editor of the WMWP newsletter and co-facilitator of the summer insti-tute. In her new role, she hopes to draw more atten-

tion to the wonderful work that the writing project is doing. Alicia Lopez takes over as co-director of the Summer Institute after being a co-facilitator for five years. She hopes to continue to attract new people to the WMWP through the Summer Institute. Wilma Ortiz is the new co-director of ELL. It is her hope to create a long-term sustainable net-work of teacher leaders who can better support edu-cators working with ELLs. In addition, she hopes to provide opportunities for leadership that could ex-tend and expand the work of our site in addressing the needs ELLs. Kevin Hodgson is taking on the role of co-director of technology. As technology liaison for WMWP for ten years, he facilitated discussions about the nature of digital composition and the writing lives of youths. The re-emergence of the WMWP Technology Team will be his focus in the year ahead, with plans to find ways to help teachers think about technology in a meaningful way. All six co-directors lead teams of teacher-consultants. If you would like to serve on a team, write [email protected].

-changes in leadership structure - Continued from page 2

Why do I donate to WMWP? Math has always been a challenge for me, but this math is too simple to ignore. When I make a donation, I want the money to do as much good as possible, so lets think about some numbers. This past summer, nine teachers participated in the Summer Institute. Three of those teachers teach in self-contained classrooms with approximately 25 students, so they will reach about 75 students this year alone. The other six teachers teach in high schools or middle schools, so conservatively, they teach at least 75 students each. My donation, designated for the WMWP, will reach over 500 students in eight differ-ent schools this year. These teachers are going back to school this fall with a new focus on reading, writ-

ing, and literacy. They came to our Summer Institute as good teachers with a desire to learn more about adding writing instruction to their curriculum, and they will face their classes this fall with many new ideas to add to their teacher toolboxes. In the past, WMWP had funding from the Na-tional Writing Project and some government sources that has since disappeared. Since we no longer receive this funding, we appreciate any donations we receive now more than ever. If you have fond memories of your SI experience or use techniques you learned through the WMWP, please consider donating to help us continue our teachers teaching teachers philosophy. You can make a difference for many teachers and many more students right here in Western Mass. Any amount will help support our work.

by Joanne Wisniewski


Hacking Our Notebooks with Paper Circuitryby Kevin Hodgson

A glance at the table revealed makers in ac-tion. Copper conductive tape. LED sticker lights. Markers and colored pencils. Watch batteries. Pa-per clips. The WMWP Summer Institute was in the midst of hacking their notebooks with paper cir-cuitry, using the theme of light both figuratively (in their writing) and literally (with circuits.) The activity in the Summer Institute was part of a national Hack Your Notebook Day in which a handful of writing project sites across the country took part in using the concept of paper circuitry to illuminate thinking. Paper circuitry involves creat-ing actual circuits and lights within the notebook itself to showcase connections between concepts or to highlight certain pieces of information or words with LED sticker lights. The National Writ-ing Projects involvement in Hack Your Notebook Day stems from a push to reclaim notebooks as a space for thinking, exploring, tinkering, and work-ing out problems in a safe space. Our project used the theme of light as a way to connect with the science of circuitry, and some Summer Institute fellows wrote and illumi-nated poems. Others worked on scientific ideas expressed with simple and parallel circuits. A few fellows wrote beautiful tributes to friends, family,

and pets. By the end of the session, all of the projects were lit up, and some re-flections allowed the group to consider how this might have possibilities in the classroom for engaging students as writ-ers, scientists, and makers. Some of the possibilities for paper circuitry included: Using with English Language Learner students to engage them in the playful act of writing as a means of self-discovery; In history class, during a unit on the Industrial Revolution, adding paper circuitry to traditional poster reports, perhaps even representing the shift from gas lights to electrical lights in a visual way;

In science, using the lights to show the flow of nerve pulses in the human body and connecting it to poetry that explains the process; Using for content-area vocabulary, where students are presented with specific words, and those words get lit up in the illustrated sentence that they write; For advanced student writers, reflecting af-terward on the aesthetics of the writing when using paper circuitry, such as how does the use of circuits impact the writing itself (brevity, placement, use of specific words, etc.); Creating a timeline project, where the lights represent important elements of the timeline itself (there were questions about how to connect mul-tiple timelines together); Creating a cultural heritage map, where students family origins are pinned with light to the world map itself, giving a visual representation of cultures. More information about Hack Your Note-book Day, including an archived webinar, can be found at the Educator Innovator website http://www.educatorinnovator.org/webinars/hack-your-notebook-day-live-webinars/


-Literacy Leadership InstituteThe institute is facilitated by Jane Baer-Leighton, WMWP Professional Development Coordinator, and Leslie Skantz-Hodgson, WMWP Co-Director for Teacher Programs. The institute began with participants form-ing six groups. Each group studied a particular DESE initiative in depth. The groups ex-plored Access for All, Content Area Lit-eracy, Outcomes-based Curriculum Plan-ning, Outcomes-based Teacher Evaluation, Shifts in Literacy Standards, and Teaching with Technology. During the first three meetings, there was also time to explore literacy instruction in the content areas through readings and discussion. Dur-ing the August sessions, groups presented their research. Participants stated that even though they thought they knew something about these topics, they learned even more from the presentations. From determining impact ratings for teacher evaluation using DESE guidelines to content-area writing

strategies, resources, and vocabulary instruction, the literacy leaders felt very positive about the knowledge they gained from the institute. Many feel they will be able to take the information and use it for professional development in their own districts.

Nurturing a culture of writing at STEM Middle

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by Jack Czajkowski To get true learning, kids must put ideas into their own words. So say Harvey Daniels, Ste-ven Zemelman, and Nancy Steinke, the authors of Content-Area Writing, one of the texts at the cen-ter of a new yearlong partnership between WMWP and STEM Middle Academy in Springfield intend-ed to help teachers use writing to foster learning. Promoting writing in all content areas is one of the major goals of the NWP Supporting Ef-fective Educator Development (SEED) Teacher Leadership Development Grant that links WMWP and the faculty and staff at STEM Middle Acade-my. WMWP is one of just 20 sites awarded a SEED grant this year. Alicia Lopez, Jack Czajkowski, and Kev-in Hodgson are the lead instructors. In addition, teachers from STEM Middle Academy are helping to plan the professional development curriculum as they know the needs of their students the best

and that is a unique quality of SEED grants: faculty from inside the school collaborate with teachers from the WMWP to construct the content and help STEM Middle Academy put ideas into their own words. The first meeting of this PD series focused on Writing to Learn in the Content Area and was held on August 20 when Site Director Bruce Pen-niman welcomed the STEM teachers into the WMWP family. STEM teachers uncovered the many ways that they are already using writing to help students learn. Upcoming sessions will focus on public writing and performance assessment, writing workshop, and conducting authentic re-search as a basis for conducting an inquiry project. STEM teachers have already begun to share ideas via Edmodo, the online platform used to host this community. As part of the grant, the whole faculty of STEM has been invited to participate in the up-coming WMWP Best Practices Conference.

and designed units of rigorous instruction using Wiggins and McTighes backward design process, Understanding by Design (UbD). Entire ELA cur-riculums have been built since this time using UbD, ensuring that standards, assessment, and instruction run parallel in the classroom. Trish LeClair, Depart-ment Head at Westfield High School, and a majority of WHS ELA teachers have used their UbD training to create a foundational curriculum for grades nine and ten. Trish says, The UbD course allowed my teachers the collaboration time necessary to begin creating engaging lessons with more intentionality. Now, the essential questions drive each unit and en-gage more students because of their relevance and interdisciplinary nature. In 2013 and 2014, our efforts expanded to include content area teachers. Over forty teachers and three more administrators have learned about lesson planning and literacy through Principles and Practices of Effective Curriculum Design for Con-tent Area Teachers. Physical Education, foods, and English teachers all found a common theme through Shakespeare and health. Music and Art teachers

found rhythm in the study of jazz and the visual arts. By beginning with the end in mind and taking time to break down standards, educators began to better understand the concept of explicit instruction and found ways to make learning more rigorous and relevant. As South Middle School literacy coach Linda Crockett stated, This experience has shown me that literacy standards and strategies could, and absolutely should, be part of every discipline's cur-riculum. I am confident that with time and training (like this course), this will become the norm, and student success will soar. WMWP is a respected professional develop-ment provider because it is led by real educators with real experiences who share their talents and knowledge with colleagues. It relies on the com-bined efforts of facilitators and participants alike to make meaning of all the changes and new initia-tives bombarding todays educational front. West-field Public Schools will continue working with our partner, WMWP, in order to find our own rhythm in a time of change.

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WMWP embarks on science initiative WMWP has joined five other sites and a research institute to embark on a two-year project aimed at promoting argument writing in middle school science classes. With a Supporting Effective Educators De-velopment (SEED) grant it received from the U.S. Department of Education, NWP invited the six sites to participate in this endeavor with SRI, an inde-pendent, non-profit research institute. The other five sites are in California, Delaware, Maryland, New York, and Pennsylvania. Participating from WMWP are middle school science teachers Susan Fisher (Pioneer Val-ley), Tara Furkey (Chicopee), Eileen Lynch (West-field), Karl Meunch (Salem), and Amber OReilly (Springfield). High School science teachers Maria Borowski, (Worcester) and Hollington Lee (Lud-low) are also participating to help WMWP explore ways that this work can eventually benefit science instruction at the high school level. Jack Czajkows-

ki and Leslie Skantz-Hodgson are co-facilitators of the group, with Bruce Penniman as project manag-er. The project was kicked off in Austin, TX July 14-18. Project leader Tanya Baker, Director of National Programs for NWP, opened the weeks work with an analogy: just as scientists seek to learn all they can from, say, a pond, by scooping as much material as they can from the pond, the SEED Science Writing group will be scooping student work that results from the arguments students write from their science labs and lessons. We looked at sample student work and teachers lessons using some protocols, templates, the Next Generation Science Standards, and each other as resources. Our next steps back home in Massachusetts are to do more lesson studies, implement the les-sons under the observation of SRI, examine some scooped student work, and check in with the oth-er sites via conference call on our collective prog-ress.

by Leslie Skantz-Hodgson

wmwp fall newsletter 2014

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