Preservice Teachers’ Knowledge of Instructional Scaffolding for Writing Instruction

This study reports on an analysis of preservice teachers’ dialogue journal entries for evidence of ways in which teachers develop conceptual understanding for writing instruction. Teachers’ propositional statements were identified and coded at a specific level for three themes: (1) level of instructional scaffolding, (2) focus of proposed instruction, and (3) hierarchical levels of language. The study identified a set of dilemmas faced by teachers as they developed pedagogical content knowledge for writing instruction, centered on participants’ assumptions regarding a direct, causal relationship between the provision of models for effective writing and the improvement of students’ expertise for writing

Coaching Conversations: Enacting Instructional Scaffolding

This study analyzed coaching conversations and interviews of four coach/teacher partnerships for specific ways in which kindergarten and first-grade teachers, and coaches, conceptualized instructional scaffolding for guided reading. Interview transcripts were coded for coaches’ and teachers’ specific hypotheses/ ideas regarding instructional scaffolding. Coaching session transcripts were analyzed for coaches’ and teachers’ actual use, or enactment, of instructional scaffolding. Significant tensions were evident between hypotheses describing the need for high levels of instructional support versus opportunities for students to read independently. Teachers’ expertise for effective instructional scaffolding appeared to be assisted by coaching conversations that enacted instructional scaffolding, demonstrating an analytic, evidence-based approach to instructional problem solving