Current educational policy tends towards teacher-proof curriculum that is focused on No Child Left Behind mandates and emphasizes reading almost at the exclusion of writing (Lesnick, 2006). Various empirical studies have provided insight concerning how writing is taught within certain elementary contexts. However, most empirical studies either reflect a particular pedagogical perspective or a dichotomization of what might appear opposite views of teaching writing (Graham, Harris, MacArthur, & Fink, 2002).
This dissertation study examined how writing is being taught in public elementary schools, which serve kindergarten through fifth-grade students. A cross-disciplinary theoretical framework (Thames & York, 2003) juxtaposed empirical research on teaching elementary writing with composition theories informed by post-secondary scholars of composition studies and applied linguistics. A sequential mixed model study (Onwuegbuzie & Teddlie, 2003) included survey and case study methodology. Survey respondents included 274 public school teachers, representing 34 schools and 33 districts in the New England states. Content analysis (Sandelowski, 2001) of case studies focused on interviews and observations of 12 theoretically sampled survey respondents.
Exploratory principal component analysis identified four components of writing pedagogy: Individual Discourse, Constructivist Discourse, Sociocultural Discourse, and Text Form. Three components of beliefs were identified: Pragmatic, Ecological and Situated Pedagogical Beliefs. These components were more robustly understood, based upon disaggregated and correlational survey data as well as case study data.
Although the survey findings suggested statistically distinct sets of teacher practices and beliefs, teachers reflected varying combinations of the identified pedagogical practices and beliefs. Teachers' pedagogical choices appeared related to polycontextual factors (Gutierriez, Baquedano-Lopez, & Tejeda, 1999). This resulted in a more nuanced representation of teachers' polycontextual, pedagogical choices that involved navigating among teaching practices. Major findings included: (a) the opaqueness of culture and language, (b) the emergent status of writing pedagogy that focused on Sociocultural Discourse, and (c) the disjunctures teachers expressed between practices and beliefs. A pedagogical model is presented, which represents the observed phenomenon. Implications for professional development and research are presented.
