I'm a little embarrassed admitting my greediness, but I have to say, I don't regret it. Every hand-me-down book with K.Malin scrawled on the inside cover has resulted in an "aha!" My current read, Study Driven by Katie Wood Ray, is one of these books I quickly smuggled to my classroom. The author's intention is to provide a framework for planning units of study in the writing workshop. The author is an advocate of authentic study. She doesn't want pre-made lessons and curriculum guides. She wants to present her students with real-world examples of writing in a particular genre, ask her students to study the writing and share what they notice, and then use the observations to guide students as they write their own piece in the genre.
I've struggled to wrap my mind around the premise that curriculum is the outcome of instruction rather than the starting point, but this framework represents an inquiry stance, and inquiry is something I've wanted to develop further in my classroom.
I've become determined to create more inquiry-based learning in my classroom because I think authentic inquiry is key to student engagement and motivation. Ray's framework is a perfect fit. Ray, herself, addresses the engagement of students involved in a study-driven workshop: "Because [Emily's] students knew they were expected to write something that was similar to what they had been reading... their inquiry had that wonderful sense of urgency that writers who are expecting to write something know so well" (6).
When developing units of study, Ray shares that she determines in advance approximately how much time she would devote to each phase of the inquiry, and she uses short assessments to help her students pace themselves. Ray defines the phases of the framework as the following:
Gathering Texts: The teacher, sometimes along with students, gathers examples of the kind of writing students will do (different kinds of genres)
Setting the Stage: Students are told they will be expected to finish a piece of writing that shows the influence of the study.
Immersion: During immersion (Cambourne 1988) the teacher and students spend time reading and getting to know the texts they'll study. They makes notes of things they notice about how the texts are written. They think about the process writers use to craft texts like the ones they are studying. Ray often guides her student's note-taking by asking leading questions that correspond to her essential questions for the unit.
Close Study: The class revisits the texts and frames their talk with the question. "What did we notice about how these texts are written?" the teacher and students work together to use specific language to say what they know about writing from this close study, developing curriculum as they go. Think anchor charts galore. The teacher, through modeling, takes a strong lead in helping students envision using what they are learning in their own writing.
Writing Under the Influence: Students (and often the teacher) finish pieces of writing that show (in specific ways) the influence of the study.
