Teacher Exchange Minigrant Helps Head Off Phonics-In-Isolation Effort

By: Donna Vincent
Publication: The Voice, Vol. 5, No. 4
Date: September-October 2000

Summary: Donna Vincent discusses the collaborative opportunities of the nationwide NWP Teacher Exchange Program.

The overhead projector cast shadows of emergent writing onto the screen as Alisa Daniel, codirector of the Southwest Georgia Writing Project, described her research. I sat on the edge of my seat. Alisa didn't know it yet, but she had struck a chord (and a nerve) with me. My quest is to help teachers find and utilize strategies that promote literacy. That's why I applied for the NWP Teacher Exchange program and how I ended up in Georgia in the first place. Before me stood a comrade, a cohort, a crony. I introduced myself and we've been talking ever since.

When Pat Fox, director of the program, and Joye Alberts, NWP field director, asked if I wanted to apply for a Teacher Exchange minigrant so that Alisa and I could continue our conversations, I didn't hesitate. Alisa and I had joined forces, sharing experiences and insights, frustrations and woes. We were on a mission to write the wrongs in educational mandates. She has a district policy that prohibits the use of predictable texts and strictly monitors the implementation of a lockstep phonics-in-isolation reading program. My mandate is statewide. The irony is that it's soundly grounded in theory. The tragedy is that it's watered down with each legislative session. And the opposing troops are rallying again—against whole language, against the application of skills, against writing and reading for real purposes in a developmentally appropriate mode.

I see my mission as being that of community educator. Parents, administrators, legislators, and the media are well intended but not always well informed. Anecdotally, I can tell them that using language on a daily basis fosters the acquisition of literacy. But I know that the opposition is not interested in anecdotes. They salute cold, hard, replicable, reliable facts, which are difficult for classroom teachers to come by. Alisa had some. We emailed, we faxed, we fretted together.

The grant gave us the opportunity to read and discuss the same books. I bought titles and mailed copies to her. I sent her our state-generated materials for primary teachers, including the Kentucky Early Learning Profile. I also mailed her the module I'd developed on purposeful, primary writing with choice, along with the videos I'd designed and narrated for Kentucky's Educational Television. She is now sharing them with her colleagues.

Alisa measured and documented student growth over time. Test scores indicated that explicit phonics instruction in isolation was not working. We met at the NCTE conference in Nashville. She gave me her data just in time to help me in my efforts to head off a local movement in the same direction.

Of course, you can't help but have other benefits spring from this kind of communication. From peer revision and editing of drafts to procedural changes in our respective writing projects, Alisa and I agree that we certainly have grown professionally and personally from knowing each other. She recently emailed me saying how much our conversations have validated her thinking and bolstered her enthusiasm for the cause. I'm seriously considering beginning a doctoral program, thanks to her lead.

The minigrant not only made this kind of communication possible, but forced it. Just knowing that I had made a commitment to keep in touch with Alisa helped turn a task into a habit. Thanks to the National Writing Project, I now have a new sounding board, a shot in the arm, and a longer Christmas card list.

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