| The purpose of this dissertation was to examine ways in which middle level teachers who implement writer's notebook at a full, partial, or limited level identify the impact of the way they use writer's notebook, provide formative feedback to students about their writing, and associate these practices with more effective teaching of writing. Three main research questions drove this study: How do teachers perceive writer's notebook as impacting the culture of how writing is instructed? Do practices related to providing feedback change over the course of implementing writer's notebook? Do district writing assessment results in January 2015 demonstrate a significant change from student scores in September 2014? Within this last question, the researcher also considered changes across each teacher's classes. The researcher used quantitative and qualitative methods to investigate these questions. A pre and post survey and an analysis of student results on a district writing assessment at two points in the school year comprised the two quantitative research methods. The qualitative methods included interviews at three points during the data collection, observations of teachers' classes, and the collection of samples of teacher feedback on student writing. Conclusive findings related to each of the research questions varied regarding the impact of writer's notebook and formative feedback. During interviews, participants often expressed ideas related to perceiving a shift in teaching writing, especially in terms of modeling, using mentor text, and having students revise their writing. While there were statistically significant differences in certain writing domains on the assessments, a relationship between those differences and the use of writer's notebook and formative feedback was not conclusive. Essentially, findings about changes in practices for providing feedback could not be established. Overall, using writer's notebook may most notably shift perceptions about how writing should be instructed, while additional studies should be conducted to further investigate its impact on student achievement. More studies are also needed to make determinations about changes in teachers' feedback on student writing. Studies conducted throughout a full year or two could yield more conclusive results. |
