Educator Innovator

Equal access to quality writing education has been a longstanding challenge in the United States and not enough has been done to move the field forward in recent years. In this report, we at 826 National aim to bring writing education to the forefront of public, policy, and funding conversations by examining its current state and issuing a call to action to the field. In the summer and fall of 2020, we interviewed 19 writing education experts, including authors, researchers, and educators, about the current state of writing education in the United States. We distill their reflections on the benefits, challenges, and inequities of writing education, and then draw on those reflections to outline recommendations for the field. Learn more: https://826national.org/research/ 826 Digital: https://826digital.com Take the National Teacher Survey: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScX9i7u_FBqET9CVq4hwAJqBkpWpwySvGjORqaVP9f1bTF72g/viewform Next Steps and Take Home Google folder: https://drive.google.com/drive

Abdi Nor Iftin has been featured on various radio and TV stations sharing his life story of growing up in a country torn by civial war and immigrating to the United States in 2014. His new book Call Me American was released in 2018 and is a finalist for New England's Bookseller's Association book awards. Abdi is interviewed by author and educator Kate Kennedy. Kate taught writing at Portland High School, was the director of the Southern Maine Writing Project, and is the author of Skin, A Memoir and End Over End.

In this CoLab, co-author/editor Christopher R. Rogers will be joined by members of the Marginal Syllabus team for a conversation that starts with the editor’s introduction to the February 2021 edition of the journal Research in the Teaching of English. Written in the days prior to the 2020 presidential election, amidst dual public health and racial justice pandemics, the article’s brevity belies its provocative power. Reading the article now also offered the team a chance to reconnect with Christopher, himself a long-time Marginal Syllabus partner, for a conversation in which he reflected on social activism, art and poetry, his passion for literacy, and his formative experiences as a student and teacher. This article is the featured article for June 2021 in the LEARN: Marginal Syllabus and will be available throughout the month alongside a curated set of online annotations using Hypothes.is. Viewers are invited to watch the CoLab discussion, socially read the article alongside colleagues, and if interested,

Joseph Bruchac is a Nulhegan Abenaki citizen and a leader among his people. He is the author of more than 120 books for children and adults, including his best-selling series, Keepers of Earth: Native American Stories and Environment Activities for Children. Joseph is interviewed by Dr. Caitlin Johnson, an enrolled member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians. Dr. Johnson is an English teacher at Dakota High School in Fargo, North Dakota.

Do you love historical fiction? Teach American Literature? Are you a teacher-writer? Any of these would be a great reason to tune in to NWP Radio as we talk to Don Zancanella about the writing life, teaching and writing, and about his magnificent new novel Concord.

Chris Crutcher’s years as a teacher, then director, of a K-12 alternative school in Oakland, California through the nineteen-seventies, and his subsequent twenty-odd years as a therapist specializing in child abuse and neglect, inform his thirteen novels and two collections of short stories. Chris has received a number of coveted awards, from his high school designation as “Most Likely to Plagiarize” to the American Library Association’s Margaret A. Edwards Lifetime Achievement Award. His favorites are his two Intellectual Freedom awards, one from the National Council for Teachers of English and the other from the National Coalition Against Censorship. Five of Crutcher’s books appeared on an American Library Association list of the 100 Best Books for Teens of the Twentieth Century (1999 to 2000). Chris is interviewed by Stephenie Eriksson, a National Board Certified Teacher, a teacher-consultant with the Ohio Writing Project, and a past-president of the Ohio Council of Teachers of English/Language Arts. For

In this CoLab, author Ebony Elizabeth Thomas is joined by colleagues Christina Cantrill, Joe Dillon, and Remi Kalir to discuss her article “‘We Always Talk About Race’: Navigating Race Talk Dilemmas in the Teaching of Literature” which was published in Research in the Teaching of English in May 2015. This article is the featured article for May 2021 in the LEARN: Marginal Syllabus and will be available throughout the month alongside a curated set of online annotations using Hypothes.is. Viewers are invited to listen to or watch the CoLab discussion, socially read the article alongside colleagues, and if interested, join the discussion. LEARN is a collaborative project of the National Writing Project (NWP), the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), and the Marginal Syllabus team, with the support of Hypothesis.

For National Poetry Month, NWP Radio has launched a special limited series called “The Story of a Poem” where we interviewed poets from the NWP Writers Council about their poems, their composing processes, and writers’ craft. This episode features poet and educator George Ella Lyon.

English teachers took note when Penguin Young Readers invited #DisruptTexts to create a discussion guide for Amanda Gorman’s inauguration poem, “The Hill We Climb.” But it was not surprising. Teachers who want to expand the range and diversity of literature in their classrooms have looked to the #DisruptTexts movement for inspiration and guidance. Now a widespread movement with discussions, activities, and local affiliates, #DisruptTexts was founded by four educators: Tricia Ebarvia, Lorena Germán, Kimberly Parker, and Julia Torres. In this segment from the network, Julia Torres talks with Noah Waspe of the Ohio Writing Project podcast Write Answers about the first steps that teachers might take when introducing literature by BIPOC authors into their teaching.

For National Poetry Month, NWP Radio launched a special limited series called “The Story of a Poem” where we interviewed poets from the NWP Writers Council about their poems, their composing processes, and writers’ craft. This episode features Dan Zev Levinson.

For National Poetry Month, NWP Radio launched a special limited series called “The Story of a Poem” where we interviewed poets from the NWP Writers Council about their poems, their composing processes, and writers’ craft. This episode features Shirley McPhillips.

Matt de la Peña is the first author to make his second appearance on The Write Time! Matt is a #1 New York Times bestselling and Newbery Medal-winning author. He has penned six critically acclaimed YA novels, including Mexican WhiteBoy and The Living, which was a Pura Belpré Author Honor Book. Matt’s picture book Love was a #1 New York Times bestseller, and Last Stop on Market Street was awarded a Newbery Medal. Matt lives in Brooklyn, New York. Aeriale Johnson is a Reggio-inspired, abolitionist teacher of third graders at Washington Elementary School, a school bursting with the energy of multiculturalism and multilingualism in downtown San Jose, CA. Aeriale is dedicated to antiracism and works every day of her life to disrupt oppressive systems and promote a more just and equitable world wherein all folx can thrive.

For National Poetry Month, NWP Radio launched a special limited series called “The Story of a Poem” where we interviewed poets from the NWP Writers Council about their poems, their composing processes, and writers’ craft. This episode features H.K. Hummel.

Ann E. Burg worked as an English teacher for many years before becoming a full-time writer. Flooded, Requiem for Johnstown is her fourth verse novel published by Scholastic Press. Her books have received numerous awards and commendations, including most recently, the Bank Street College Claudia Lewis Award. Ann is interviewed by Amy Bouch, a reading-obsessed 8th grade English teacher at Chartiers Valley Middle School near Pittsburgh. Amy is a Western Pennsylvania Writing Project (WPWP) teacher-leader and the Vice President of the Western Pennsylvania Council of Teachers of English (WPCTE).

For National Poetry Month, NWP Radio has launched a special limited series called “The Story of a Poem” where we interviewed poets from the NWP Writers Council about their poems, their composing processes, and writers’ craft. This episode features performance professional and poet, t.l. sanders.

In this CoLab, author Latrise P. Johnson is joined by colleagues Joe Dillon, Remi Kalir, and Hillary Walker to discuss her award-winning article "Revealing the Human and the Writer: The Promise of a Humanizing Writing Pedagogy for Black Students" co-written with Hannah Sullivan and published in Research in the Teaching of English in May 2020. This article is the featured article for April 2021 in the LEARN: Marginal Syllabus and will be available throughout the month alongside a curated set of online annotations using Hypothes.is. Viewers are invited to watch the CoLab discussion, socially read the article alongside colleagues, and if interested, join the discussion. LEARN is a collaborative project of the National Writing Project (NWP), the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), and the Marginal Syllabus team, with the support of Hypothesis.

For National Poetry Month, NWP Radio has launched a special limited series called “The Story of a Poem” where we interviewed poets from the NWP Writers Council about their poems, their composing processes, and writers’ craft. This episode features author, poet, artist, and teacher, Patrice Vecchione.

Have you scoured the web for writing contests for your students? Have you worried over which publishing opportunities have students’ best interests at heart? Tune in to this show to hear about the resource you’ve been looking for.

This NWP Radio CoLab features the authors of our March reading for LEARN: Marginal Syllabus. Jennifer Turner and Autumn Griffin, two Black woman literacy scholars, discuss their article and their work learning alongside two adolescents, Tamika and Malia, over a six-year period. This is the first month’s reading from the LEARN Marginal Syllabus, Spring 2021 co-developed with the National Writing Project (NWP) and the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) with support from Hypothesis. Each month, March through June, we will invite educators to collaboratively read and discuss an article published by NCTE that investigates the intersection of literacy and equity. Each reading with related author discussion will go “live” on the first Monday of the month.

An excerpt from the original NWP Radio episode, "Why School? A Conversation with Mike Rose."