Memo #2

As I started my research, I honestly had some small panic attacks. I really didn't think that I was going to find any research, to support or negate my thought that writing could help students learn science and math while helping develop their writing skills. However, I was (extremely) pleasantly surprised to find a lot of research in this field. There were teachers who had written about lesson plans that they have done to integrate writing, there was writing on ways that students have developed writing skills in the classroom, and there was actual scientific experiments to see whether students would learn from writing in their science and math classrooms. For example, in the article "Integrating Writing into Mathematics Classroom to Increase Students Problem Solving Skills" one group of students solved math problems the way they were taught in class, and other students wrote about their problem. Results found that if students wrote about their problem, their problem solving skills increased (they were more likely to get the problems right) and they had better writing skills. In the article "Writing to Learn by Learning to Write During the School Science Laboratory: Helping Middle and High School Students Develop Argumenative Writing Skills as They Learn Core Ideas" students were tested at the beginning of the school year, the middle of the school year, and the end of the school year on their writing skills and science knowledge. In the mean time, the students conducted science experiments and intensive writing projects. At the end of the experiment, it was found that the students developed a lot of writing skills and scientific knowledge due to their intense writing projects. This means that, through my research, I have found that writing is a two-way street; students can learn their subjects more intensely while also developing their writing skills. Through all of my research , I did not exactly find a scholarly leader in this field, but instead something a little bit differently; most of my sources all cited the same site: the National Research Council. I have gone onto their site, but have yet to find anything to aid in their research (yet). Their site is very large and very hard to navigate, and so I may be able to eventually find something that will support my current findings (or maybe argue against my findings!) but so far, I have not found much.

Memo #1

As I was looking for topics on which to conduct my research, one thing kept returning to my mind; democratic schools. Democratic schools revolve around the concept that if students are very interested in the subject that they are learning about, then they are much more likely to want to learn about the subject and are more likely to do better in this subject. To combine this thought with writing, my question is; can we use writing to help students learn better and become more interested in the subjects that they are learning about? Something that schools are always trying to do is get students to be more fluid in their reading and writing skills. Thus, it makes sense that we try to incorporate both reading and writing into subjects like history, science, art, and maybe even math. But can having to incorporate reading and writing be a two-way street? Can we get students to improve their reading and writing skills while also intimately learning about subjects like science and history? I personally have spent hours upon hours reading and writing, not just about subjects that I am personally interested about, but also subjects that pertain for school. Even though I have been out of school for three years, the things that I remember the most out of all of the hours and hours of class time that I have had, is the things that I was allowed to write about, mainly creatively. Creative writing projects have helped me remember about women on the battlefield in World War I, and exactly the science behind the Titanic sinking. Reading creative stories about chemistry has helped me remember how covalent bonds work. Doing lots of writing in school across different subjects has also helped me be able to explore different writing styles and be able to learn how to write about multiple subjects. Having our students being able to read and write well is something that we are constantly working on achieving. So is it true that incorporating, say, science and writing, lead to better reading and writing scores on standardized tests? Will reading and writing help students learn science better than if they just had a teacher lecture at them or do the activities that they were doing before? Hopefully, by the end of this research session, I will be able to say for definite whether reading and writing can be a two-way street with other subjects like science or history. I hope to work with students and teachers from Coventry High School. I would like to interview teachers on how much writing they assign to their classroom, why they assign that much writing or that little writing, and if they think that increasing writing in all areas of school helps students learn more. I hope to pass out a questionnaire to students asking them about their writing experiences in school, if they would like an increase in writing in their classrooms, and if they think writing helps them learn better. Other things that I may have to consider is that maybe teachers don’t like adding writing to their classrooms, or are reluctant to add it to their classrooms because they don’t know how to teach or grade writing. Or perhaps teachers are unable to add writing to their curriculum due to the fact that they have to spend their time teaching to the test or doing other things that schools require them to spend time on.

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Memo #1