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142 Pages·2017·1.67 MB·English
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OOlldd DDoommiinniioonn UUnniivveerrssiittyy OODDUU DDiiggiittaall CCoommmmoonnss English Theses & Dissertations English Spring 2016 LLeevveerraaggiinngg DDiiggiittaall CCoommmmuunniittiieess ooff PPrraaccttiiccee:: HHooww AAssyynncchhrroonnoouuss DDiiggiittaall CCoollllaabboorraattiioonn AAffffoorrddeedd aa CCoommpplleexx RReeaaddiinngg//WWrriittiinngg DDiiaalloogguuee ffoorr SSeeccoonnddaarryy SScchhooooll SSttuuddeennttss Susanne Lee Nobles Old Dominion University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/english_etds Part of the Online and Distance Education Commons, and the Rhetoric Commons RReeccoommmmeennddeedd CCiittaattiioonn Nobles, Susanne L.. "Leveraging Digital Communities of Practice: How Asynchronous Digital Collaboration Afforded a Complex Reading/Writing Dialogue for Secondary School Students" (2016). Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Dissertation, English, Old Dominion University, DOI: 10.25777/8cqe-0z72 https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/english_etds/11 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the English at ODU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in English Theses & Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ODU Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. LEVERAGING DIGITAL COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE: HOW ASYNCHRONOUS DIGITAL COLLABORATION AFFORDED A COMPLEX READING/WRITING DIALOGUE FOR SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS by Susanne Lee Nobles A.B. May 1993, Duke University M.Ed. May 1999, Virginia Commonwealth University A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of Old Dominion University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY ENGLISH OLD DOMINION UNIVERSITY May 2016 Approved by: Louise Wetherbee Phelps (Director) Kevin DePew (Member) Michelle Fowler-Amato (Member) Katie Dredger (Member) ABSTRACT LEVERAGING DIGITAL COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE: HOW ASYNCHRONOUS DIGITAL COLLABORATION AFFORDED A COMPLEX READING/WRITING DIALOGUE FOR SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS Susanne Lee Nobles Old Dominion University, 2016 Director: Dr. Louise Wetherbee Phelps This dissertation examines a case study of a research unit taught to secondary school students with the inclusion of an asynchronous digital collaboration with college students. Over consecutive school years, two classes of high school seniors and two classes of college students, despite being geographically separated by more than 90 miles, worked together in multiple reading and writing exchanges within an online community as they read a primary text and as the secondary school students wrote research papers. This study seeks to understand the effects of this unit on the secondary school students’ thinking, reading, and writing skills, focusing specifically on the inclusion of an authentic, responsive audience and the affordances of pedagogically-driven technology integration in the classroom. iii Copyright, 2016, Susanne Lee Nobles, All Rights Reserved. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First, I would like to express my admiration of and appreciation for my students for their hard work and openness to new ways of learning. Because of them, I was able to explore and grow as a teacher. Right behind my students was my administration, and I want to thank my Head of School and Head of Upper School for always believing in my work. They trusted me enough to let me experiment (and completed many IRB forms without complaint!). Next, I would like to thank my committee. Kevin DePew is the definition of flexibility and support, and these were critical to me as my committee make-up changed. Thank you, Kevin, for always saying things would be okay—and for taking one of the newly-opened spots on my committee. Michelle Fowler-Amato has been an invaluable resource on how my work fits into the field of secondary education, as well as a critical early reader. Thank you, Michelle—your support kept me believing in the value of my work. I want to give special thanks to Katie Dredger. Katie keeps me growing and learning, and in our work together, she has become a dear friend. Thank you, Katie, for our many years of digital collaboration and F2F friendship, and here’s to many more. Finally, I cannot capture the thanks I owe my chair, Louise Wetherbee Phelps. Louise has challenged and supported me as a thinker since I first met her at SDI in 2011—she is my boundary broker. Only through her patient, insightful reading of many drafts and her hours dedicated to helping me conceptualize my work is my dissertation what it is today. Thank you from the bottom of my heart, Louise, for giving me so much of your care and support. No matter what was happening in your life, you always had time to give to me. I also want to thank my fellow student and good friend, Laura Paganucci, for the many texts, lunches, emails, glasses of wine, and editing support we shared through our parallel dissertation journeys. I cannot wait to walk in graduation together. Finally, I want to thank my family. My parents funded my coursework—their unwavering belief in and support of education and of me is why I am receiving this degree. Thank you for 45 years of constant love and support. To my children, Sabina and Caleb—thank you for your constant enthusiasm for my work, even when it took me away from you. You both approach each day with such amazing energy and excitement—you are my role models. Finally, to my husband, Kevin—thank you for every day. You told me I could do it, and you made sure to smooth the way in our lives for that to be a reality. I promise, no more degrees. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Page LIST OF TABLES .......................................................................................................................................vii LIST OF FIGURES………………………………………………………………………………………………..………………………………… viii Chapter 1. INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................................. 1 SETTING AND BACKGROUND....................................................................................................... 1 THE INITIAL PROBLEM ................................................................................................................. 2 TEACHING COMPOSITION IN THE SECONDARY AND COLLEGE CLASSROOM................................. 3 THE STUDY .................................................................................................................................. 6 RESEARCH QUESTIONS AND ORGANIZATION............................................................................... 7 2. METHODOLOGY ............................................................................................................................... 10 INTIAL METHODOLOGY: ACTION RESEARCH .............................................................................. 10 SETTING OF STUDY.................................................................................................................... 11 OBJECT OF STUDY: THE REDESIGNED UNIT ................................................................................ 12 DESIGNING THE FORMAL STUDY AND THE RESEARCH QUESTIONS ............................................ 20 CASE STUDY METHODS ............................................................................................................. 22 PARTICIPANT SELECTION ........................................................................................................... 27 DATA COLLECTION AND INTERVIEW PROTOCOLS ...................................................................... 28 DATA ANALYSIS ......................................................................................................................... 31 STRUCTURE OF FINDINGS.......................................................................................................... 37 3. DEVELOPMENT OF STUDENTS' THINKING SKILLS AND REFLEXIVITY ................................................... 39 CHANGES IN STUDENT PERCEPTION .......................................................................................... 40 THE FOUNDATION OF STUDENTS' CHANGE: THINKING AND REFLEXIVITY .................................. 45 OVERVIEW OF FINDINGS ........................................................................................................... 53 DEFINING FEATURES OF THE REDESIGNED UNIT........................................................................ 54 4. AUDIENCE, COLLABORATION, AND LAYERS OF READING: COMPLEXITY THROUGH INTEGRATION ..... 56 CORE FEATURE #1: AUDIENCE ................................................................................................... 57 CORE FEATURE #2: COLLABORATION ........................................................................................ 60 CORE FEATURE #3: LAYERS OF READING ................................................................................... 69 OVERVIEW OF FINDINGS ........................................................................................................... 81 5. EXPANDED SPACE AND TIME AND READING/WRITING INTEGRATION: DIGITAL AFFORDANCES ALLOWING FOR DEEPER LEARNING .................................................................................................. 83 CORE FEATURE #4: EXPANDED SPACE AND TIME....................................................................... 84 CORE FEATURE #5: READING/WRITING INTEGRATION............................................................... 93 OVERVIEW OF FINDINGS ......................................................................................................... 105 vi Chapter Page 6. CONCLUSION: TOWARDS A NEW DIGITAL COMPOSITION PEDAGOGY............................................. 107 ESSENTIAL FEATURES OF A DIGITAL COMPOSITION PEDAGOGY .............................................. 108 AREAS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH ............................................................................................... 114 FINAL THOUGHTS.................................................................................................................... 117 REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................................ 118 APPENDICES A. STUDENT NOTIFICATION FORMS....................................................................................... 126 B. INTERVIEW QUESTIONS .................................................................................................... 128 VITA .................................................................................................................................................... 133 vii LIST OF TABLES Table Page 1. Chronology and participants of data sets......................................................................................... 29 2. Reading phases of the layered coding process ................................................................................. 32 3. Categories from the first reading of student pre-interviews ............................................................ 33 4. Coding of the student post-interviews and end-of-unit reflections .................................................. 34 5. Final codes ...................................................................................................................................... 37 6. Word clusters used to identify the final codes ................................................................................. 46 viii LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page 1. Character card template.................................................................................................................. 15 2. Digital character forum excerpt ....................................................................................................... 17 3. Moffett's discourse theory .............................................................................................................. 62 4. Moffett's discourse theory .............................................................................................................. 87 5. Time in digital discourse .................................................................................................................. 91 6. The writing process ....................................................................................................................... 108 7. Moffett's discourse theory ............................................................................................................ 109 8. A nascent digital composition pedagogy ........................................................................................ 110 1 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION This dissertation reports on a study of a research paper unit during which seniors at an independent high school engaged in an asynchronous digital dialogue with an audience of college students. Throughout this digital collaboration, the students worked with each other and the college students in multiple reading and writing exchanges within an online community, as the secondary school and college students read and analyzed the primary literary text of Othello and as the secondary school students wrote research papers. This study seeks to understand the effects of this unit on the secondary school students’ thinking, reading, and writing skills, focusing specifically on the inclusion of an authentic, responsive audience and the affordances of pedagogically-driven technology integration in the classroom. This study developed in several stages. First, I was the teacher of the original research paper unit for eight years, from 2001 to 2008. In 2009, I redesigned the unit to include an authentic audience through the affordances of a digital collaboration tool, as I sought to help the secondary school students understand that, while they had strong reading and writing skills, they still had and would always have more to learn about writing (Adler-Kassner & Wardle, 2015). After perceiving significant growth in the students who participated in this redesigned unit, I began an action research study. As a teacher- researcher, I observed these perceived changes in the students over the next four years that I refined and taught the redesigned unit. Finally I formalized this study in 2014 into a two-part case study in order to document and analyze the effects of the redesigned unit on the secondary school students as thinkers, readers, and writers. This dissertation reports on the findings from this two-part case study. SETTING AND BACKGROUND This study is set at Franklin Academy1, an independent school whose mission is to provide “a rigorous, college-preparatory education in a nurturing environment that challenges each student to achieve academic excellence, to think critically and independently, to communicate effectively, and to act honorably” (Institutional Website, 2015). As a subset of the school’s mission, the Franklin Academy English department’s mission (2011) defines the thinking and communication skills the department 1 All names of institutions and people are pseudonyms to protect the identity of the participants in adherence to the IRB protocols described in Chapter Two.

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The students would post quotes said by or about the character then reflect on and analyze others' quotes and posts. The mentors would ask questions to push the students to think more deeply and would provide outside context and different interpretations to broaden the students' thinking (see Figure
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