1 the Process of Change in the Teaching and Learning of Writing

The Process of Change in the Teaching and Learning of Writing about Literature in an 11th grade Honors English Language Arts Classroom

Dissertation

Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy

in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University

Brenton Goff M. Ed, B.A.

Graduate Program in Education: Teaching and Learning

The Ohio State University

2018

Dissertation Committee

George Newell, Advisor

David Bloome

Alan Hirvela

Copyrighted by

Brenton Goff

2018

Abstract

Although most of the writing in high school English Language Arts (ELA) classrooms is about literature and although there have been incessant calls for changing the practices of teaching and learning literature, only meager amounts of research have been conducted in these interrelated domains of the field. Accordingly, this dissertation seeks to address these issues by examining the process of a teacher transitioning her teaching practice to literary argumentation. The ethnographic and discourse analytic case study reported here was part of an eight-year, Institute of Education Sciences (IES) funded research project on teaching and learning argumentative writing in high school

ELA classrooms. As part of the larger project, this dissertation study was embedded in a yearlong study of teaching and learning of literary argumentation in an Honor American

Literature course at “Davis High School”. The teacher was a white female in her seventh- year teaching ELA while the students were in both tenth and eleventh grade and were comprised of 18 students, ten females and eight males. Of the 18 students, 16 students identified as white while two identified as Asian-American. Using microethnographic methods, I examined the contextual factors shaping a teacher’s changing approach to literary argumentation, how she and her 10th and 11th grade students’ instructional conversations fostered a shared understanding for literary argumentation; and finally to consider how the context and argumentative writing practices shaped student learning, I

iii traced a case study student’s essay for sources and processes related to the curricular context. This study of changing approaches to the teaching of writing about literature is framed by theories of teacher change and a microethnographic approach to discourse analysis. Findings demonstrated that the teacher attempted to change her literature instruction by introducing literary argumentative practices into her teaching through writing assignments as she worked to cultivate a shared reading to frame her curriculum and to inform and shape her students’ writing about The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald, 1925).

Findings also indicated that instructional conversations were inconsistent with how and when they contributed to the literacy practices the teacher attempted to bring about as they were influenced by both the teacher’s and students’ previous experiences interpreting literature. The contextualized analysis of student writing revealed that the student negotiated the literary argumentation practices the teacher attempted to bring about through her use of the curricular context. Change for the teacher was a complex process, including relatively easy efforts to develop writing prompts and assignments to foster learning while struggling to modify her uses of instructional conversations to shift to more dialogic practices requiring student ideas. This study contributes to the knowledge base for the teaching and learning of literary argumentation as an understanding of the complexity of teacher change within the legacy of a teacher’s own experiences and within the institutional demands of teaching canonical interpretations of literature.

Acknowledgments

When I first decided to go back to graduate school to study I had no idea what impact that choice would have on myself and my family. While I may have my name on this dissertation I must state unequivocally that this would not have been possible without the support of so many. To start I would like to thank the class that hosted me for this study; by allowing me into your classroom and sharing with me I was able to learn so much. Ms. Smith, your courage to try something new and collaborate with me made this work possible, and for that I am truly grateful.

My advisor, George Newell, allowed me the flexibility and space to grow as a student and scholar. His insight, collegial spirit, and fatherly advice has helped keep me grounded and focused throughout my time as a doctoral student and candidate. I would like to also thank the rest of my committee, Dr. David Bloome and Dr. Alan Hirvela; I cannot tell you how much you have taught me about what it means to be a scholar by listening to your discussions during Argumentative Writing Project meetings. How I judge myself as a researcher is rooted in these conversations over the past five years.

The doctoral students and members of the Argumentative Writing Project have given me outlets to be both a scholar and a friend, and I look forward to seeing you at conferences as we continue onward into our careers.

My first teaching job at the Dayton Early College Academy planted the seeds of what I have become today. What I learned as a teacher there shaped what I think great education can be. Dr. Judy Hennessey, I can earnestly say that, without your support, I would not be where I am today. Thank you for seeing in me what I might not have seen in myself at the time. The friendships I made at DECA helped me envision the future that

I am currently benefiting from, and for that I am grateful.

Last and most importantly, my family, I would not be where I am today without your support. My in-laws, Jim and Lisa, and my parents, Karen and Mark, thank you for continuing to be supportive of our growing family and believing in me. Karen and Lisa, this would not have been possible if you two had not watched the girls. Norah, Lucy, and

Beckett, being your father is one of the best gifts I could have been given. Melanie, we started this journey without any kids and we now have three. Thank you for giving me time to write and going on this journey with me. I wouldn’t want to take it with anyone else.

Vita

2007…………………………. B. A. English Education, The Ohio State University

2009…………………………. M. Ed. English Education, Wright State University

2009-2012……………………Dayton Early College Academy, Dayton, OH: English Teacher

Publications

Weyand, L., Goff, B. & Newell, G. E. (2018). The social construction of warranting evidence in two classrooms. Journal of literacy research, 50(1), 97-122.

Wynhoff Olsen, A., VanDerHeide, J., Goff, B. & Dunn, M. (2018). Examining intertextual connections in written arguments: A study of student writing as social participation and response. Written communication, 35(1), 58-88.

Newell, G. E., Goff, B., Buescher, E., Weyand, L., Thanos, T. & Kwak, S. (2017). Adaptive expertise in the teaching and learning of literary argumentation in high school language arts classrooms. In R. Durst, G. Newell, & J. Marshall (eds.) English language arts research and teaching: Revisiting and extending Arthur Appleebee’s contributions. New York: Routledge.

Fields of Study

Major Field: Education, Teaching and Learning

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Table of Contents

Abstract ...... iii Acknowledgments...... v Vita ...... vii Table of Contents ...... viii List of Tables ...... x List of Figures ...... xi List of Examples ...... xii List of Transcripts ...... xiii Chapter 1. The Challenges of Teaching and Learning Literary Argumentation ...... 1 The Problem, Context, Events, and Teacher Change ...... 3 Research Questions ...... 9 Definitions of Key Terms ...... 11 Outline of Chapters ...... 13 Chapter 2: Theoretical Framing of Teaching and Learning Writing Literary Arguments 15 Research and Theory on Teacher Change in the Teaching of Reading and Writing .... 15 Theorizing Speaking and Writing Connections in the ELA Classroom ...... 19 Scholarship on Writing about Literature...... 20 Framing the Study of the Teaching and Learning of Literary Argumentation in ELA Classrooms ...... 24 Chapter 3: Research Method ...... 43 Context of the Study ...... 44 Entrance into the Research Site ...... 45 Working Collaboratively with the Teacher...... 47 Data Collection and Analysis...... 55 Data Analysis ...... 60

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Chapter 4: Literary Argumentation as Social Practice in an Honors American Literature Class ...... 73 Sociocultural Context of the Classroom ...... 74 Literary Argumentation Practices in The Great Gatsby Unit ...... 93 Teacher-led Events: Creating a Context for Reading the Great Gatsby ...... 102 Chapter 5: Analyzing Tacit Warrants in Literature Discussions ...... 112 Description of Events ...... 116 Chapter 6: Contextual Analysis of Students’ Final Argumentative Essay ...... 138 Contextual Analysis of Tiffany’s Final Literary Argument Essay ...... 140 Chapter 7: Conclusion and Implications ...... 164 Theoretical Implications ...... 171 Pedagogical Implications ...... 178 Methodological Implications ...... 180 Concluding Thoughts ...... 181 References ...... 183 Appendix A. Unit of Study ...... 200 Appendix B. Teacher Interview ...... 203 Appendix C. Student Interview...... 205 Appendix D. Analytic Tables for Transcripts ...... 207 Appendix E. Tiffany’s Writing ...... 229

List of Tables

Table 2. 1 Frames of Literary Argumentation (from Newell & Bloome, 2017) ...... 32 Table 3. 1 Honors American Literature Curriculum Plan...... 49 Table 3. 2 Description of Data Collection from The Great Gatsby Unit ...... 55 Table 3. 3 Instructional Chain ...... 61 Table 3. 4 Discourse analysis categories ...... 64 Table 4. 1 Frames of Major Writing Assignments ...... 96 Table 6. 1 Rubric for literary analysis essay ...... 142 Table 6. 2 Analysis of introduction...... 147 Table 6. 3 Analysis of body paragraph one ...... 151 Table 6. 4 Analysis of body paragraph two ...... 153 Table 6. 5 Analysis of body paragraph three ...... 155 Table 6. 6 Analysis of conclusion ...... 157

List of Figures

Figure 4. 1 Annotated bibliography directions ...... 83 Figure 4. 2 In-Class Essay Assignment ...... 84 Figure 4. 3 Sample of students’ reading notes ...... 85 Figure 4. 4 Buber (1958) Writing Assignment Directions ...... 86 Figure 4. 5 Literary Argument Essay Directions and Rubric ...... 88 Figure 4. 6 Moving toward a social practice perspective in teaching literary argument .. 92 Figure 4. 7 Writing Assignment Trajectory for The Great Gatsby Unit ...... 99

List of Examples

Example 3. 1 Sample field notes...... 57

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List of Transcripts

Transcript 4. 1 January 4th whole class instruction, explaining the unit ...... 103 Transcript 4. 2 January 4 whole class instruction, foreshadowing the reading ...... 104 Transcript 4. 3 Warranting toward a shared reading ...... 110 Transcript 5. 1 Warranting evidence through multiple perspectives ...... 120 Transcript 5. 2 Warranting evidence based on a character’s actions ...... 123 Transcript 5. 3 Warranting Evidence Regarding Social Class and Power ...... 126 Transcript 5. 4 Warranting Evidence Regarding Social Class and Power ...... 128 Transcript 5. 5 Symbolism Discussion ...... 132 Transcript 5. 6 Symbolism Discussion ...... 134 Transcript 5. 7 Ubiquity of the color white...... 135

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Chapter 1. The Challenges of Teaching and Learning Literary Argumentation

This dissertation is about the teaching and learning of literary argumentation and how one teacher and her students understood and enacted socially constructed practices during an instructional unit which required discussion, writing and reading as interwoven social practices. This study is also about understanding a teacher undergoing change and how she attempted to enact new (to her and her students) literacy practices. Another aspect this study seeks to understand is how a high school student wrote a response to literature drawing on the classroom events and curricular unit to compose their essay.

Such a project is necessary given that most of the writing in high school English

Language Arts (ELA) classes is about literature (Applebee, 1993), a significant dimension of learning to write on which only meager amounts of research has been conducted. We also know that students have also performed poorly on national assessments of writing (e.g. Applebee & Langer, 2006; NAEP, 2011). Perhaps more importantly, learning to write argumentatively about texts and ideas provide students with new ways of knowing, thinking and reasoning that may be transferred to a range of intellectual and academic contexts. While there is a tradition of empirical instructional studies of learning to write (Smagorinsky, 1991; 1997) and learning to read literature

(Marshall, 2000), there are few studies that consider the interrelationship between reading literature and writing about literature.

While this study is about the teaching and learning of writing, literature, and argumentation, it is also about how a teacher and her students experienced and adapted to significant curricular change. The change from a structural epistemology of argumentative writing (Newell, VanDerHeide & Wynhoff Olsen, 2014) to literary argumentation (Newell & Bloome, 2017) is also under investigation. Meaning, the teacher sought to move beyond a structural approach, which focuses on learning argumentative terms and emphasizes the location of particular elements in the argumentative essay to an approach that seeks to consider the contextual and rhetorical features of a given argument. In the context of this study, however, the teacher also simultaneously shifted her views regarding what the argument was about, that is, changes in her approach to the teaching and learning of literature.

The few studies of writing regarding teacher change offer specific and important insights into the challenges that arise as English Language Arts teachers attempt to change how they teach writing in their classrooms (Langer & Applebee, 1987; Swanson-

Owen, 1986; See also Freedman, Hull, Higgs & Booten, 2016 for a review of recent research focused on teacher change as participants in the National Writing Project.) As implementation studies conducted over the past decade have shown (cf. Richardson

1994), “outside change agents cannot afford to overlook insider perspectives since improving schools turns on the incentives, attitudes, abilities and responses of those ultimately responsible for translating reforms into improved educational services for students” (Swanson-Owen, 1986, p. 70).

This dissertation attempts to understand three things, (1) how with the support of myself as a collaborator, a teacher adapts to change as she implements literary argumentation principles and practices into her curriculum, (2) how instructional conversations highlight the tensions of the curricular change, and (3) how a case study student’s writing illustrates these tensions by analyzing how she drew on shared classroom events to compose her individual written response to literature.

The Problem, Context, Events, and Teacher Change

Tensions in Teaching Literature

How teachers have taught students literature has been in tension for as long as teachers have taught literature (Marshall, Smagorinsky and Smith, 1995). Marshall et al. illustrates the location of the deeply rooted tension to its origins in 1938 with the publication of two books Understanding Poetry (Brooks & Warren, 1938) and Literature as Exploration (Rosenblatt, 1938). From these texts, the modern divide of English language arts literature pedagogy can be demonstrated.

The roots of Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren’s articulation that the poem is the object of study and students and teachers should align to their definition is the basis for Marshall et al.’s (1995) argument,

Brooks and Warren provided a vocabulary for discussion literature and the

teaching of literature that emphasized literature’s formal, objective characteristics

and deemphasized the importance of both the author and the reader. They were

attempting, in other words, to construct an intellectually coherent and

systematically objective method for teaching texts. (p. 3)

Their aim, to establish a view of text as a puzzle to be solved with close examination and warranted with systematized analysis, immediately influenced ELA pedagogy and how students warranted their analysis about what literature meant in classrooms. The other book published in 1938 by Louise Rosenblatt offered a student- centered approach to the teaching of literature. For Marshall et al. (1995), Rosenblatt goes into great depth to articulate that students, or readers, and not the text should be the focus of discussion,

For Rosenblatt, reading literature is not objective analysis, but an exploration, a

process, an experience in which readers draw upon their own histories, their own

emotions, in order to, quite literally, make sense of the text. Meaning for

Rosenblatt is not found in the text; it is made by the reader in transaction with the

text. (p. 4)

These two approaches to how literature should be taught have had profound pedagogical implications. Arthur Applebee (1993) found these approaches to be “incompatible visions of what matters in the teaching and learning of literature” (p. 137). He also concluded that ELA teachers often mix and mash up these approaches in their day-to-day teaching of literature and may not fully understand how these approaches have differed with regard to what counts as knowledge. These tensions suggest a deep divide in the field and represent significant challenges in the study of literature-related argumentative writing.

Varying Conceptualizations of Learning to Write Responses to Literature

A key problem is that writing scholars and teachers do not agree on what writing is and how to teach it, let alone how to research it (cf. Smagorinsky,2006). The field of

ELA’s rather under-developed practical theories for teaching literature also complicate notions about how teachers should teach written response to literature and how researchers might untangle varying theoretical and methodological approaches. One way to parse these complications is to consider the relatively recent history of the field.

Over the last 50 years, there have been parallel studies of writing and literary have been conducted for understanding grounded in constructivist theories (e.g., Purves &

Beach, 1972; Flower & Hayes, 1981) and social constructivist theories (Langer, 1990;

Langer & Applebee, 1987) of teaching and learning. For example, studies of writing have moved from a focus on the written text (e.g., Braddock, Lloyd-Jones & Schoerer, 1963) to a focus on the cognitive processes of writers (e.g., Flower & Hayes, 1981) to a focus on the social context of writing (e.g., Beck, 2009; Newell, Bloome & Hirvela, 2015). In parallel fashion, Galda and Beach (2001) organize their review of response to literature research using similar categories of “research on text”, “research on readers’ processing”, and “research on context.” Simply put, both writing research and response to literature research have had comparable and parallel histories in how they have theoretically and methodologically positioned writing and response to literature. The reason for parallel shifts over time resides in a changing unit of analysis for the study of writing and the study of literary understanding.

These shifts suggest that historically there has not been a great deal of agreement about what written response to literature looks like because the three different units of analyses—text, cognitive processes, social context-- suggest different ideas about what counts as worth studying. In the next chapter I will discuss in more depth how those above approaches might buttress or limit how researchers theorize and study written response to literature but highlight here how contextual issues have become theoretical and methodological sticking points for researchers. An example which highlights how context shapes written response to literature was Sperling and Woodlief’s (1997) study of two different classrooms. One classroom was located in an urban school and the other in a suburban school. A key finding was that the teachers had vastly different classroom conversations about literature and what it meant to write in their classrooms. What their study suggests is that when studying writing the context needs to be taken into consideration as it shapes students’ conceptions about what it means to write.

National standardized assessments of writing such as National Assessment of

Educational Progress (NAEP) consider writing as decontextualized products which are often scored using rubrics which may or may not account for what students are actually learning in an assessment context in which time is controlled. In the three approaches, text, cognition, and social context, context was increasingly addressed as researchers sought to move students closer to the products students created but there is still a need for scholarship which addresses the relationship between context and student writing. For example, Sperling and Woodlief’s (1997) study took into account how differently the conversations, social practices and related events prepared the two classrooms they

6 studied. But questions remain about what sorts of activities, conversations, and social practices proliferated across the unit to prepare the students to compose successful written products in each classroom.

The Instructional Context and What Students Write

Another problem addressed in this dissertation is the problem of understanding the relationship between what happens in the instructional contexts and what students actually compose. Scholars have attempted to advise and direct teachers’ writing instruction by focusing on different units of analysis. For example, early studies of writing (Braddock, Lloyd-Jones and Shoer, 1963; Hillocks, 1986) generally focused on the textual products by analyzing its features using pre-test post-test measures. Those early experimental studies often made claims about instruction and learning by comparing students’ written products that emerged from a range of interventions. By not taking into account the instructional context and the students who produced the writing, assumptions about “good” or “best practice” instruction were made. Similarly, studies of writing which focused on individual writer’s cognitive processes (e.g., Hayes & Flower) did not foreground the social context of the classroom. Even with the more recent studies of the social contexts of writing, questions remain about how students engage with the instructional contexts across events (Prior, 2018; Wynhoff Olsen, VanDerHeide, Goff &

Dunn, 2018).

Focusing on both the instructional context and the conversations the students and teachers have and the writing students are actually doing may provide a more thorough understanding of how students actually negotiate the instructional context to compose

7 their responses. By accounting for the events across time and how literacy practices are socially constructed, the connections among speaking, reading and writing would not be as dubious. Meaning, through scholarship which seeks to understand how practices are made concrete within and across events, researchers will understand with more specificity how literacy practices are being drawn upon amongst the participants. How such a research agenda might be developed is the topic of the next section.

This study aims to address several complications in the study of written response to literature: (1) historically, studies of classroom writing have generally been limited to three major approaches when considering written response to literature: focus on text/written products, focus on cognitive processes of individual writers, or a focus on the social context without much consideration of how teacher change shapes how texts, processes and context are part of that change ; (2) we do not know a lot about how classroom interactions (discussions, small group, etc.) support students as they compose their response and there are few studies which focus on teachers attempting to change their practices with regard to response to literature; (3) we also do not know how students draw on the classroom context, social interactions and classroom resources when they compose their written responses.

These three issues will be addressed by examining the events that occurred in an

11th grade Honors American Literature course over a curricular unit. I will first describe how a teacher established with my collaborative efforts the practices she believed significant in the teaching and learning of literary argumentation. Next, I discuss the key events the case study students and teacher pinpointed as salient as in the composing of

8 their final essays. Those events will then be analyzed for how they were socially constructed. Finally, a case study student's will be analyzed for traces of the practices

(e.g., how to take from a source text) identified. In conducting this study, I hope to discover how students draw on the context across the instructional unit and understand how a teacher attempted to bring about change in their teaching practice.

Research Questions

To begin this dissertation study, I started by addressing the need for scholarship which addresses the teaching and learning of literary argumentative writing in secondary

ELA classrooms as well as teachers in transition. I studied a 10th grade Honors American

Literature course for an entire school year, but for the purposes of this study will report on one literary unit of study which occurred at the start of the second semester in January

2016 until early February. The Honors American Literature course included high achieving 10th grade students and 11th grade students who were in transition between the

English department’s offerings. Because the teacher, Ms. Smith, had been a participant in the Argumentative Writing Project’s (AWP) research study and was willing to “try out” ideas she had learned about teaching, learning, argumentation, and literature, she was the ideal candidate to study. The overarching question that addressed the nature of teacher change in the teaching of literature-related argumentative writing guided this study and frames the methodology employed for this study: How, when and what kinds of teacher change occur with collaborative support, and how do these changes in teaching and

9 learning practices manifest themselves in instructional events? My three research questions are as follows:

1. What does the teaching and learning of writing about literature look like in this

classroom during an instructional unit? What are the interactional and institutional

factors that shaped the teacher’s changing approach to literary argumentation?

2. How do the teacher’s and students’ instructional conversations about literature

and about writing about literature create shared understanding for and

construction of literary argumentation?

3. How does a case study student's essay reflect and refract the curricular context in

terms of literary argumentation practices?

In order to answer my research questions, I conducted a multilayered analysis of one instructional unit that included teacher-led literature discussions and students’ writing analytically about literature. To understand the influence of the instructional context on students’ approach, I also conducted an analysis of a case study student’s final literary argument essay. Before I focused on a single, significant instructional unit, I observed the classroom for the entire school year (when possible) and almost every day during the unit of study. During my observations I used ethnographic methods, including audio and video recordings, field notes, artifacts (e.g. handouts and students’ writing) collected during the unit and interviews about the unit with the teacher and case study students. I analyzed the data using discourse analysis of instructional conversations about literature and then conducted a contextualized analysis of a student’s literary argumentative essay.

Definitions of Key Terms

Argumentation

In my work on the Argumentative Writing Project I have come to understand writing as more than a structure of parts (e.g. claim, evidence, warrant). Instead, I see argumentation a means of constructing new knowledge and gaining perspective where there previously had been none (Weyand, Goff, & Newell, 2018). In this study argumentation is based on Toulmin (1958) argumentation and the efforts of the AWP.

Teacher Change

Teacher change, within the context of this study, means a change in the purposes and goals for teaching literature: from a transmissive approach grounded in long-standing canonical teacher-sponsored interpretations to a more dialogic approach grounded in argumentation shaped by students’ ideas and experiences. Deep change is possible only when a teacher is offered a new framework or approach to be enacted inside her own classroom with the opportunity to collaborate with others in discussions about instructional processes and problems as well as the principles underlying the new framework (Richardson, 1994). This view of teacher change sees a need for teachers to maintain both a top view of the larger goals and theories motivating the change as well as an understanding of the processes within the day-today interactions and activities of the change. These two facets of teacher change, the knowing and the doing are integral for change to occur.

Intertextuality

Intertextuality is traditionally defined as the insertion of one text into another, but here is defined as “how texts – which is broadly defined as practices, ideas, and others’ voices) are taken up and integrated into other texts” (Wynhoff Olsen, VanDerHeide,

Goff, & Dunn, 2018).

Literary Argument

Literary argument refers to the processes of historical reflection and refraction of participants responding to each other where the text is central to the process (Newell &

Bloome, 2017). The use of literary argument in this study is central in understanding how a teacher changes her practice to frame the teaching and learning of written literary response.

Literacy Practices

Literacy practices are culturally driven and are constituted by how particular people in particular events construct literacy. The practices are also constituted by social institutions, cultural practices, and social relationships. (Street, 1984)

Literacy Events

Literacy events are concrete events whereas literacy practices are enacted and visible. I follow Heath’s (1983) description which argues for the non-trivial use of writing. Meaning, events in this study are observable and are shaped by the practices.

Barton and Hamilton (1998) argue that events are always in a social context and highlight the situated nature of literary.

Outline of Chapters

In Chapter Two, I will outline this study’s theoretical framework, I will discuss the scholarship on teacher change, I will discuss the speaking and writing connection, I then will highlight the scholarship on writing about literature. Finally, I will offer a framing for the study of teaching and learning of literary argumentation in English Language Arts classrooms.

In Chapter Three I describe the research methods used for this study and clarify how my theoretical assumptions shaped my methodological choices as I discuss the data collection procedures and analytical procedures. In Chapters Four, Five, and Six I present my findings of the study. Each chapter of the findings will be a response to each of the research questions mentioned above. Put plainly, Chapter Four discusses an analysis of the social practices of literary argumentation by highlighting how the teacher used writing assignments to cultivate particular literacy practices. Specifically, I analyze the trajectory of writing assignments and how they are rooted in particular theoretical assumptions about writing and argumentation. I also analyze a telling event (Mitchell,

1987) which reveals how the teacher wanted the students to adopt a shared criterion for

“reading” the novel in a particular way, and finally a discussion of the final literary argument essay.

Chapter Five focuses on the how several key events were interactively constructed to illustrate how a particular set of social practices of literary argumentation were negotiated between the teacher and students. Here I am especially interested in the tacit literary warranting and the contextual or situated warranting the teacher was

13 attempting to bring about. Chapter Six is a contextual analysis to trace the sources and issues of concern to the case study student's summative literary argument essay. Chapter

Seven discusses conclusions and the implications for research and teaching and points toward future research needed.

Chapter 2: Theoretical Framing of Teaching and Learning Writing Literary Arguments

In this chapter to build a framework for my study of literary argumentation in secondary ELA classrooms, I consider studies of teacher change, written response to literature as well as argumentation. In framing a study of the teaching and learning writing about literature, I first offer a theoretical discussion of the social aspects of language as a backdrop and to serve as a foundation for building my argument for the centrality of the social. I then outline approaches of past studies by considering their theoretical and methodological assumptions for connecting speaking and writing. Finally,

I revisit the speaking-writing connection by offering an approach to the study of literary argumentation which accounts for a teacher undergoing change, the instructional context, and students’ writing as they compose their argumentative responses to literature.

Research and Theory on Teacher Change in the Teaching of Reading and Writing

A theory of teacher change was necessary and instrumental in helping understand what I was observing in the classroom I was studying as well as my participation as a collaborator with the teacher I was studying. Because this dissertation study was a part of a larger study of literary argumentation where teachers were asked to adopt principles and practices for teaching literary argumentation, theories of change need to be addressed.

Langer and Applebee’s (1987) findings about teachers in transition from their study of the teaching of writing are important when considering theories of teacher change in relation to the teaching of writing. For Langer and Applebee, examining the role of teachers as professionals undergoing change helped them understand the role writing and the processes surrounding the teaching of writing had in the classrooms they were observing. One of the central findings was the role of activities in the classrooms they were studying. Activities became key in seeing the change in teachers’ underlying epistemologies as well as their understanding of writing to learn, and either reinforced patterns teachers were already using or subverted previously held patterns which caused realignment of the teacher’s goals. They also found that the role of assessment was an important marker for understanding the changes teachers made in their study.

Swanson-Owens’ (1986) study of curricular change in writing highlights a move from what Langer and Applebee (1987) and Marshall (1987) studied as the processes of writing to one that approaches teaching as a process. As with Langer and Applebee,

Swanson-Owens sees the role of activities as integral in understanding the natural sources of resistance she found when meaning systems collided. Swanson-Owens' accounts of two teachers offers an insider account which positions the adoption and change which teachers are making through the emic lens which positions the teachers as qualified, knowledgeable and rational in their decision-making processes. This is an important shift in moving beyond seeing teachers as passive receivers of knowledge and external curricular expectations.

Richardson and Anders’ (1994) study of staff development offers a strong example of how a theory of teacher change can disrupt normative views of teaching and teachers as well as offering a thoughtful examination of the role of “The Other” in the change process. For Richardson and Anders, they see the movement toward an inquiry stance as integral in establishing a foundation for change. They highlight several key areas which foster an inquiry stance but argue that a constructivist approach was central to their ability as researchers to understand how teachers developed new knowledge.

Richardson and Anders’ (1994) found three key pieces of information in their staff development study regarding theorizing teacher change.

First, they found that the goals of their project needed to be turned over to their participants in terms of agenda, content, and processes. What they found was that a collaborative environment between the researchers and teachers fostered the agenda setting by their participants. More successful change occurred when teachers set their own contextual agendas and developed local content and processes for their schools and districts.

Second, the role of “The Other” of staff researcher was paramount in understanding the collaborative process. They found that the staff developer should not be seen as imparting knowledge to their teacher as the penultimate expert, rather, the staff developer should be seen as having expertise in the theories of learning and research and in the content area. But the interactions surrounding the “imparting” of knowledge should be non-threatening. They also found that successful change occurred when staff

17 developers pushed the teachers to move beyond why a particular activity worked toward an inquiry orientation.

Finally, Richardson and Anders (1994) found that the role of research became a point of divergence for their study. They realized that they as researchers had their own culture and language for what they were observing while their teacher participants had another. They quickly realized that studies were important for starting their conversations about implementing new practices but that those practices needed to be contextualized for change to occur.

The scholarship surrounding theories of teacher change are clear that for successful change to occur, attention to goals, collaboration, activities, and research need to be addressed. A theory of teacher change was also an important facet of this dissertation because the Argumentative Writing Project (AWP) at Ohio State also sought to understand teacher learning in their intervention study (Newell, Bloome & Hirvela,

2015). The AWP wanted to understand the reasoning processes of English Language Arts teachers’ analysis of scenarios and student writing.

The theory of change from which I am drawing in this study is rooted in

Richardson and Ander’s (1994) work, but extends to include a belief that teacher change occurs when teachers are assuming control of the goals being implemented as well as the active tailoring of those goals with their contexts (classrooms, schools, communities, and students). This view of teacher change sees a need for teachers to maintain both a top view of the larger goals and theories motivating the change as well as an understanding

18 of the processes within the day-today interactions and activities of the change. These two facets of teacher change, the knowing and the doing are integral for change to occur.

Theorizing Speaking and Writing Connections in the ELA Classroom

Scholars in the last quarter century have pushed the study of written composition away from the trope of writing as an individual endeavor to one which accounts for the social contexts the writer is directly or indirectly responding to. This push has taken many approaches but has generally sought to understand speaking and writing within larger sociocognitive and more general language theories. I build on more recent scholarship which has sought to understand the relationship between writing and speaking by including the added challenge of writing and speaking about literature.

To begin, the theoretical roots of this study are found in assumptions about language and literacy and the social practices actors use when engaging in speaking and writing. Scholarship which views language (e.g., Bakhtin, 1981; Volosinov, 1986) as dialogic and a “two-sided act”, or in other words, a simultaneous reflection and refraction of what has been said while pointing to a present or future context guide this study. There are two major areas of research which arose from this theoretical backdrop which I will now discuss.

Sociocognitive approaches to the study of writing see writing, like language and literacy, as an activity which is socially and culturally shaped (Dyson, 1995; Flower,

1994; Langer 1987). A sociocognitive view sees learning to write in classrooms as

“learning to anticipate that (and how) one’s words will be read” (Sperling, 1996). Within

19 this framework the interrelationships among the writer, the text, and the audience or readers are key. Central to the argument that writing is a social act is the belief that the act of writing also involves in the process of anticipating how one’s writing will be read.

Flowers (1994), working within this approach, frames the act of composing within the concept of anticipation but also suggests that writing is a process of negotiating the social context. This last point, that writing is an act of negotiating the social context, is one which this dissertation builds upon. However, Flower’s approach does not address the relationship of reading and writing processes as they are foregrounded and backgrounded within given literacy events in the social context and how time factors into the writer’s negotiation of the social context.

Scholarship on Writing about Literature

Writing and Literary Response Research as Change in Text

The roots of a change in text research perspective held beliefs that writing involved not making mistakes and that the text was edited and improved for what was wrong (Nystrand, Greene & Wielmet, 1993). Early studies, as described in Braddock,

Lyoyd-Jones and Schoer’s (1963) review of early empirical work, generally measured how differing instruction impacted written products with pre-test and post-test measures.

The text was foregrounded as an outcome measure leading to experimental studies to improve the written product and by extension improve instruction based on claims about what teachers ought to do. Underlying this approach was a rather simplistic assumption grounded in behaviorist theory and process-product research (Dunkin & Biddle, 1974)

20 that by studying what was missing from an ideal text and by ignoring classroom contexts teachers could be give prescriptions for fixing students’ writing regardless of social, cultural and institutional forces.

While researchers interested in writing about literature sought to understand the impact of instruction on written products (See Applebee, 1977 for a review.), they came to their studies with different questions about isolating factors as well as studying textual changes focusing on sentence level issues, consideration of the text as a whole, use of the elements of literary response and recently to inclusion of literary topoi with explicit instruction. Scholars have also studied teachers’ written and oral feedback. For example,

Purves (1972) and later Beach (1979) found that students who received feedback from the teacher between written drafts had more changes in text than the control group which received no feedback or another group which had a checklist. (Marshall (1987) argues that the textual change approach to writing research sought to isolate variables when studying response like the impact of factors like age (Applebee, 1978), text (Cooper,

1969), method of instruction (Kirpatrick, 1972; Beach, 1972; Hickman, 1983; Maichalak,

1976; Purves, 1981, 1983), characteristics on the reader (Holland, 1975; Mauro, 1984;

Petrosky, 1975) but altogether failed to study what students “took away from literary texts” (as cited in Marshall, 1987, p. 31).

Writing and Literary Response Research as Cognitive Processes

Research on writing research and written response to texts understood as cognitive processes generally tried to answer the question of why and how writers write and respond the way that they do. Emig’s (1971) study of 12th graders composing

21 processes was seminal in asking questions about how students composed. In one component of her study, she asked students to describe retrospectively how to compose a range of tasks to understand their processes during writing. This study, which has been cited by numerous writing scholars (Nystrand, Greene & Wielmet, 1993; Hillocks, 2005) as a landmark study opened up new avenues in the study of writing. In a similar approach, Hayes and Simon’s (1975) work explored writing as cognitive problem solving. This direction, followed by Flower and Hayes (1980), sought to build models of the writing process as it related to figuring out the problem of the task, whereas Emig

(1971) sought to understand the composing process. Studies of readers and their position in the reading of literature followed an arc similar to writing studies. Scholarship examined a range of factors shaping what readers brought to the task of reading a particular text. For instance, Newell (1994) argued that “dialogic” rather than “directive” feedback given between-drafts (of essays about literature) shaped students’ own exploration and fostered understanding of a short story. There have been many studies of readers and their role in the response process, for example; readers’ developmental levels

(Applebee, 1978), the reader’s personality (e.g. Bleich, 1975; Holland, 1975), the readers’ orientation to the text (e.g. Dillon, 1982; Hunt & Vipond, 1985), and the reader’s reading skill (e.g. Beach & Wendler, 1987; Lehr, 1988) (as cited in Marshall, 2000).

These early studies can be best characterized as seeking to understand the various parts and pieces of reading in relation to readers’ cognitive processes.

Writing and Literary Response Research in Situated Contexts

As the larger focus of literacy research and scholarship shifted toward situated aspects of language and discourse communities so did composition studies and studies of response to text. Scribner and Cole’s (1981) study of the Vai was instrumental in shifting the field’s understanding of literacy as a social construction and was taken up by Heath

(1983) and Street (1984) as more and more scholars pushed back against the literacy divide and deficit notions of literacy (Olson, 1977). As scholars framed literary understanding as being situated, the concept of practice became linked within the situation or the event (Bloome et al. 2015). Researchers studying writing and response followed this framing by studying writing and reading as literacy practices which writers engaged in within varying contexts and situations.

Marshall (2000), argues that studies focusing on context have two assumptions,

(1) the school context has a large influence on the kinds of responses of students, and (2)

“individual responses to literature will always be influenced by the norms, values, and preoccupations of a reader’s cultural context, that these are internalized by the readers and become the intellectual tools with which responses are built” (p. 393). These assumptions are a part of many lines of research exploring context and response to literature. These lines of inquiry include teachers’ beliefs about what makes a “good” response (e.g. Grossman, 1991), the literature curriculum (e.g. Applebee, 1993), classroom practices (e.g. Marshall, 1987), and classroom discussion (e.g. Nystrand &

Gamoran, 1997). Using a performance frame, Lewis (1997) argued that the meaning of literature, specifically its function and interpretation, is a social act. Lewis’ study is

23 especially important to the purpose and design of my dissertation project because it is also grounded in social practice theory and was ethnographically warranted.

Recently, VanDerHeide (2014, 2017) has asked comparable questions to those I am raising within this study. Drawing on an apprenticeship framework (Rogoff, 1995), she analyzed how a teacher taught literary argumentation and analyzed students’ participation within the sociocultural community. She found that students were apprenticed into ways of reading and writing which were comprised of “moves”. I see this dissertation study a continuation of a sociocultural and contextualizing analysis of writing and classroom talk.

Framing the Study of the Teaching and Learning of Literary Argumentation in ELA Classrooms

In framing an approach to the study of writing about literature in high school ELA classrooms, I build on the a microethnographic perspective which sees the teaching and learning of written response to literature as a reflection and refraction of the social historical context, which varies depending on the local context, is a reflection and refraction of the classroom curriculum, is shaped by social interactions, is tied to social identities, and is an asynchronous process. Also, key in framing this study is a theory of teacher change that sees teacher learning as goal driven, collaborative, and research based

(Richardson, 1994).

The theoretical framework for the procedures used in data collection and data analysis derive from Bloome et al. (2005) and are labelled microethnographic discourse analysis.

This framework is grounded in ethnography within cultural and social anthropology (e.g., 24

Blommaert & Jie, 2010; Atkinson & Hammersley, 1994) and interactional sociolinguistics (e.g., Gumperz, 1982; Green & Castanheira, 2012). In brief, an ethnographic case study is conducted in each classroom involving long-term participant observation, video recording, collection of artifacts (e.g., student written work), and ethnographic interviewing of the teacher and students. In all data collection activities, an emphasis is placed on obtaining an emic perspective of who is doing what, with whom, when, where, and how, and what meaning it has for participants.

By drawing on the principles of microethnographic discourse analysis for the study of written response to literature where the teacher and students are learning to write arguments about the literature they are reading together, I am moving to reconceptualize the above principles into three interrelated categories, 1) contextualized literacy practices,

2) enacted in literacy events, and 3) taken-up by students as composing practices. What follows is how these broad categories provide support in understanding the research questions outlined in Chapter One:

1. What does the teaching and learning of writing about literature look like in this

classroom during an instructional unit? What are the interactional and institutional

factors that shaped the teacher’s changing approach to literary argumentation?

2. How do the teacher’s and students’ instructional conversations about literature

and about writing about literature create shared understanding for and

construction of literary argumentation?

3. How does a case study students’ essay reflect and refract the curricular context in

terms of literary argumentation practices?

Contextualized Literacy Practices

The study of written response to literature over time includes the larger social historical context, varying local context, and the curricular and pedagogical context. The three layers of context factor into how issues of power, access and ideology are at play within the proposed study of classroom writing practices (Erickson, 2004). An example of ideological influence of the larger social historic context would be the influence of the

Common Core State Standards (CCSS, 2011) which include an added focus on argumentation in the English Language Arts as well as other content areas. Zooming out from the proposed boundaries of the study to include national pedagogical issues assists in understanding why a particular teacher is focusing on argumentation in the first place.

The local context includes the norms held by the group, in this case the classroom. Local contexts vary and help shape the writing practices within said context, meaning, an

Advanced Placement (AP) Literature course might be discussing literature but the writing practices would be vastly different than a non-AP class or an out-of-school context.

Another layer shaping the context is the curricular and pedagogical context which includes the classroom practices constructed by the teacher and students. Also, key in understanding the classroom context is that this is also a study of a teacher attempting to bring about new literacy practices which were central to her own teaching history and new understandings.

Writing literary response as social practices. The study of written response to literature which views writing in classrooms as interwoven social practices would offer another perspective that may push the field to unpack the complex relationship between reading and writing in classrooms. A social practice perspective takes into account the domain specific ways in which literacy events (like the study of teaching and learning writing about literature) are situated within specific places which have their own distinct practices and ways of doing (Barton, 1991; Shatzki, 1996). When foregrounding a social practice perspective and taking into account the domain specific practices of writing about literature, the historic and situational contexts become significant in understanding teaching and learning. Newell et al., (2015) suggest the following about social practices and their historical nature related to the study of argumentative writing in classroom contexts:

…any social practice is always located historically; that is, it reflects the nature and

uses of the social practice from before while its use in a particular social event is

oriented to that immediate event and to future events. In the context of that

immediate event and anticipation of future events, the social practice may be adapted

and refracted (p.15)

Writing practices are always historic in that they build upon and index previous events and uses of the practices while pointing toward the event in which it is embedded and toward future events. Understanding individual classrooms with this perspective means that studies of the written response to literature need to address the constellation of practices that impregnate specific situated local contexts (i.e. classrooms). But practices

27 are linked to actors within specific temporal/spatial sites who have historical social relationships which need to be taken into account when studying learning events. Rish

(2015) offers an example of how understanding the social relationship is key in uncovering how students bring to bear their historical writing practices when co-writing in a literacy event. His study showcases how writing practices clashed within a single literacy event bounded by a classroom lesson.

A social practice framework has not been employed in ways that might help us understand how students take up social practices across sequential literacy events surrounding writing about literature. Tapping into and understanding the social context of classrooms to understand the teaching and learning of writing over time is difficult and may be a reason why there are limited studies highlighting the interrelationship between writing and literature. From this perspective then, studying the relationship between talking, reading and writing as social practices takes time and lends itself to the study of culture in classroom settings (cf. Green, 1983). Drawing on Goodenough’s (1981) definition of culture, Dyson (2000) suggests that the participants, as a base for understanding that practices are shared through social activity or events, need to know how to participate in culturally suitable ways. According to Dyson, it is in events, or literacy events, where multiple participants engage with language and social relationships change over time.

Barton (1994, 2000) makes the argument for an ecological approach for the study of literacy and in doing so outlines an approach which aligns well with the argument I am making here. An ecological approach sees literacy not as “separate skills that underlie

28 reading and writing, it involves a shift to studying literacy, a set of social practices” that emerge “from people’s lives, from what people actually do and from the sense and meaning people give activities” (2000, p. 140). While Barton discusses the local and global notions of literacy in people’s everyday lives and the power of local everyday activities people engage in to resist land developers, an ecological approach offers an approach for thinking about the contextual layers highlighted above. I am also interested in the teacher’s role in aligning students’ voices to each other, delivering academic content, and providing opportunities for socializing them into ways of using language and drawing on events in relation to the learning to write responses to literature (O’Connor &

Michaels, 1993).

Drawing on an ecological approach to the study of students’ written arguments

Wynhoff Olsen, VanDerHeide, Goff, and Dunn (2018) argue that students writing can be intertextually traced to events, speakers, and classroom resources. Their study suggests that students also participate within the social life of the classroom because their writing is a reflection and refraction of the classroom context. Their methodology and data analysis is multilayered and seeks to establish a connection between the ecology of the classroom and student writing.

The study of literary topoi by Wilder (2002) offers another layer toward understanding the ways literary warrants operate in the literary discipline tacitly. They draw on Fahenstock and Secor’s (1991) literary topoi in their analysis of post-secondary students’ writing about literature. Their study used experimental and control groups to understand the effect of explicit literary topoi discussion and its influence on students’

29 final essays. What they found was that explicit instruction resulted in increased score gains. Their study is important given the earlier discussion that high school English teachers often use a range of approaches to teaching literature and typically a close reading approach has been widely used (Applebee, 1993).

Principles and practices of literary argumentation. To maintain a sense of continuity and provide a foothold for the teachers participating in the study to discuss how the deep theoretical concerns played out into the day-to-day lives of teachers, the

AWP worked to identify a series of principles and practices for the teaching and learning of literary argumentation. Key to the principles and practices of literary argumentation are the following two questions: (1) how might this text be read here, now, among us (the people present)? and (2) how might it be read in the future, in other spaces, among other people?1

These questions lay the foundation for considering how an ELA class socially constructs literary meaning, evidence, and warrants within the classroom space as they engage in the social practices of literary argumentation. The distinction between principles and practices represents the deeply rooted theoretical layer in the principles and the dynamic practices used to bridge the principles with the ever-changing contextual demands of the classroom. Ms. Smith noted over the summer that she could not reconcile her previous ELA curriculum now that she knew how to frame the teaching of literature across the school year by drawing on the principles and practices outlined to her over the summer workshop.

1 This comes from the AWP’s ongoing work on literary argumentation, see Newell et. al., 2017) 30

Argumentation and literary theory. There has been an ongoing debate about the teaching and learning of literature and literary criticism for the last 80 years (Faust,

2000). Table 2.1, on the next page, illustrates the major frames of literary argumentation as well as the locusts???? of meaning (Newell & Bloome, 2017). In short, the major camps in the debate are generally huddled around structural approaches (e.g. Brooks &

Warren, 1938), the individual’s transaction with the text (e.g. Rosenblatt, 1978), and more recent critical approaches which see the use of literature to act upon the world (e.g.

Appleman, 2009, Freire, 1970). It is my experience as a teacher, observing student teachers, and working with in service teachers that secondary ELA teachers tend to draw widely upon the varying approaches as they teach throughout the school year but they often do not consider what Applebee (1993) noted as a “incompatible visions of what matters in the teaching and learning of literature” (p. 137). The incompatibility has consequences when considering the events and practices of literacy instruction. What

Applebee is cautioning teachers against is to not be trivial when adopting an approach to how and why they are teaching literature. This last point in many ways was the crux of

Ms. Smith’s epistemological disruption for teaching literature. She was tasked with teaching the students to develop arguments about the literature they were reading but was not completely clear about how these deep theoretical differences between approaches could be reconciled and in many regards, amplified through instruction.

Table 2. 1 Frames of Literary Argumentation (from Newell & Bloome, 2017) FRAMING Unit of Meaning Focus of Argumentation Educational for Warrants Theorists

FORMALIST Text itself--how Interpretations based on Johannessen, the text works close textual reading Kahn, & Walter, 2009; Lewis & Ferretti, 2009

DISCIPLINARY Application of Interpretations through Foster, 2003; disciplinary tools invocations of a set of Lee, 2007; for interpretation special topoi (e.g., ubiquity) Wilder, 2002 and literary reasoning

READER- Reader in Interpretations as beginning Beach & RESPONSE transaction with in an evocation which Marshall, 1990; text becomes the bases for Probst, 2004 response

SOCIAL Social interaction Interpretations shared and Faust, 2000; PRACTICE within particular negotiated within a social Lewis, 2001; contexts process Newell & Bloome, 2017

Studying Literature Discussions as Literacy Events

The two major views when considering how events are constructed in relation to the contextualizing factors mentioned above are that, 1) the study of written response to literature should include the position that social interaction is a paramount factor in how the writing was composed and 2) that the students’ and teacher’s social identity influences the teaching and learning of written response to literature. Before highlighting the conceptual frame for understanding the events in the classroom context I want to define my approach to the term “event”.

There has been much scholarship on understanding events. Following the above foundation of a social practice approach toward the study of written response to literature means a diving down into understanding “events”. I follow Bloome et al.’s (2005) lead in considering events as a theoretical construct, one that is situated to a particular place in a particular time with agentive people acting and reacting to one another. Also, key in understanding events, and in the case of a study on writing about literature, is what people are doing together within the boundary of the event.

Events then are saturated with people, tasks, texts, and practices. Building a conceptual and theoretical foundation for understanding events is important, because as

Bloome et al. (2005) note, the use of, and definition of, events has not withstood controversy, especially in relation to notions of social practice. In my use of social practice, recall that I draw on Barton (1991) and Street (2003) to define social practices in relation to classroom writing practices and Newell et al. (2015) to define argumentative writing. I take up the point Bloome et al. (2005) make that by theorizing events and practices we need to be careful how much of an abstraction we are making when we write about practices within particular events. We are inscribing practices on people and not people, and in this case students and teachers, as agents drawing on, negotiating, and resisting the practices we’ve identified within a given event.

Understanding writing communities. To study the written response to literature across time as a set of socially constructed practices at the classroom level is in many ways the study of a community. Scholars have approached the study of community in many ways (here are a few); discourse communities (Bizzell, 1982), speech communities

(Hymes, 1971), interpretative communities (Fish, 1980), discourses (Foucault, 1972) or disciplinary arguments (Toulmin, 1972). What is problematic, as others have already argued (e.g. Prior, 2003), is that discourse communities view the community as a perfect world where cohesion and homogeneity exist. This point is in stark contrast to what I have personally experienced as a teacher, observed as a field researcher, and witnessed as a university supervisor working with student teachers. Communities, much like language, should be studied as they are and not as an idealized version. Cooper (1989) and Harris

(1989) have pushed against idealized communities when they become abstractions like

“academic discourse communities”.

Theories of communities, like the ones mentioned above, are generally based on the idea that there exist stable discourses and practices which are homogenous and occur in homogenous spaces (Prior, 2003). Prior’s approach to theorizing literate activity and social formations of groups is grounded in the following two ways; first, practice(s) are historical and concrete though language-in-use; and second, the language-in-use is made manifest in chains of situated utterances. What this means then is that communities of practice should be viewed as dialogic and heterogeneous activity which is activity produced and reproduced through human activity. This activity, as Prior argues, should be understood through the framing of layers or lamentations and co-genesis. A layered understanding of a community sees the multiple layers of social histories (e.g. histories of people, practices, and institutions) where people cannot be inscribed with a given identity, as if I stepped into a classroom and snapped a picture and labeled people in that given moment. Finally, co-genesis, for Prior, means that everything is continually

34 evolving, which, put another way, means that when attempting to understand practices of a community (e.g. a classroom) over time you need to see people, institutions, and practices as co-evolving as they act and react to each other.

Even Prior’s (2003) approach does not provide a complete picture of how practices become constructed across time. To understand what that means, events need to be analyzed for how those practices are offered and constructed through social interaction as people draw on the various texts they have at their disposal. It should be noted that I define text here not just as written texts or as Bakhtin (1981) states coherent complex signs (p. 103) but also as the students’ and teacher’s knowledge and lived experiences

(Bloome & Egan-Robertson, 1993). What Prior does not take into account in his sociohistoric approach is how the events become constructed.

Textual communities. Textual communities as outlined by Stock (1990) and reconceptualized by Wertsch (2002) provide a way of describing how communities are formed around the knowledge of a text. Wertsch using Stock’s argument that communities were places where people engaged with a text but also “the social and interpretive processes surround the text” and possibly more important in my use of textual communities:

a textual community is a collective whose thought and action are grounded in

written texts, but for some members this grounding may be indirect. Some

members of a textual community may not have even read the text, but by

participating in the activities of a textual community they can have access to the

textual material around which a group is organized (2000, p. 28).

Using the argument made above by Wertsch through Stock, I see classrooms as textual communities. From my experience as both a classroom teacher, university supervisor, and field researcher, English language arts classrooms often plan curriculum around texts. For example, the classroom for this dissertation read The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald,

1995) under the overarching yearlong question of “What is the American dream?” This I would argue is akin to Stock and Wertsch’s point that texts play an important role in organizing how communities, or in this case classrooms, organize themselves. While

Stock (1990) uses textual communities to discuss small reform groups in medieval

Europe, the point remains that classrooms also often organize themselves around texts.

As Werstch articulates, “it is essential in understanding who has a vested interest in creating and promulgating these texts – that is, their production” and equally important

“is an understanding of how textual resources are used, or consumed by individuals as members of a collective” (2000, p. 28-29).

Extending this notion of how texts are produced during events, remembered in events, and promulgated with respect to the understanding of a text to classrooms, texts, and teacher and students across time is complicated and messy. All of this to say, I am rooting this proposed study of the teaching and learning of written response to literature in a social practices perspective of writing as a process. That process reveals itself through a textual communities’ events, but the meaning of those events should be understood as socially constructed, both within the event and in the act of remembering the event.

Socially constructed events. Social interaction reveals that events are not just static structures in and of themselves but they are constructed by participants interacting with one another. As such, inscribing a prior notion of social practices as broad sweeping generalizations onto people in an event is problematic given that people are agentive and actively make meaning. DeCerteau (1984) provides a way of thinking about agency in his description of walking in the city. He outlines a powerful approach in thinking about the relationship of events and practices as they relate to theorizing and studying writing across time. He explains, while a city seems intransigent and a structuring structure ??? from the gaze of the top of the World Trade Center, that view is not the lived experience of the people within the city. He describes that as people walk they have agency with how they move through the city. Even though the city was planned and appears rigid, people can window shop or cut across and make their own path. The same can be said about students within events in the classroom, but the challenge is in making their routes visible.

Microethnographic discourse analysis (cf. Bloome et al., 2005) affords a theoretical and methodological approach toward studying interaction within events. As highlighted above, how events are constructed and then remembered matters. As people in a given event act and react to each other they are using language to make meaning.

Bloome et al., argue that “meaning and significance are located in actions and reactions people take to each other” (2005, p. 7). I refer back to the argument proffered above that mentions writing is not a static decontextualized thing but a process and that the study of language (both spoken and written) should be approached and conceptualized as

37 language-in-use and not an idealized universal. Meaning is produced in interactions, or participants’ actions, and that meaning is made manifest by participants’ use of language or in written texts (Bloome & Egan-Robertson, 1993).

Examining telling events (Mitchell, 1984) provides a means of making visible the repairs and reconstructions of how events are constructed locally within the event and then remembered outside the event. Examining how an event is constructed is an important first endeavor if I am making inferences as to how participants remember events collectively. Intertextuality, both interactional (eg. Bloome & Egan-Robertson,

1993) and textuality (Prior, 1998) constructed, provides a useful theoretical construct for bringing into focus how texts are used during the event, but also how texts become

“proposed, acknowledged, recognized, and have social consequence” (Bloome et. al,

2005, p. 41). The tool of intertextuality and intercontextuality also brings to bear how an event is socially constructed by the speakers acting and reacting to each other. For example, the teacher might project a text and frame the event with a question. The teacher is working toward consensus (cf. McDermott, Gospodinoff, & Aron, 1978) and building an interpretive frame for the instructional conversation. How the interpretation becomes socially constructed involves speakers who bring to bear their social identities.

Social positioning within an event is constructed in interactions and has consequence when considering how events are constructed and then remembered.

Composing Practices

The final principle of a social contextual approach to the study of written response to literature is one which sees the composition as an asynchronous process. Viewing 38 students’ composing as a non-linear or asynchronous process allows for the more complex understanding that students negotiate the curricular context, rely on social interaction and position, draw on events and use classroom resources is ways which might not be the norm (e.g. Dyson, 1987). Furthermore, the notions of community outlined above should not be the end point for studying students’ writing. Student’s final writing assignments are reflections and refractions of how that student engaged, negotiated and ultimately participated with the varying contexts, the content, and the social interactions from the curricular unit.

Contextualized analysis of writing. In attempting to understand the importance of the classroom context on the teaching of writing, Prior (1991) carried out a study of student writing in a higher education classroom. Key amongst his findings was that students’ responses were complex “historical moments” which indexed how the writers negotiated the historical and local contexts as they composed their assignments. Another example which illustrates how writing practices can be traced back to the classroom context was Dyson’s (2008) study of classroom writing practices. She found that while there were contextually driven, writing practices the students’ maintained agency in whether or not they used the sanctioned practices. Another example is Michaels’ (1987) notion of “writing systems” which accounted for students’ writing in relation to the social context of the classroom.

Text Production. Drawing on all of the above studies, Wynhoff Olsen et al.

(2018) push the field to consider how students’ texts are produced. Approaching the study of writing as participation and intertextual they focus on the social and interactional

39 connections which shape how texts are produced. Through a fine grain analysis of writing and a multilayered analysis of data they offer types of intertextual traces and intertextual moves students use when composing. The traces they identify are categorized as thematic, structural, or lexical and the moves students make are repeating, reordering, responding, and extending. Their findings suggest that students draw on their classroom ecologies when they write and that they, the students, are agentive as they use their intertextual moves to participate in the life of the classroom by widening or closing the intertexual gaps to “participate in their community through writing” (p. 84).

This chapter found that studies of writing and writing about literature have changed greatly from early studies as scholars moved the focus of their students from understanding writing as changes in text, to the cognitive processes of individual writers, and finally to more situated accounts of writing.

Studying Writing about Literature as a Social Practice To clarify my own concerns, my approach to the study of teacher change and students’ written response to literature is informed by several theoretical assumptions.

• That teacher change occurs when goals are shared and teachers take control of

external agendas by tailoring them to their contextual needs. Change also occurs

when non-threatening collaboration supports the teacher’s agenda. When the

collaborator2 is seen as a resource and provides opportunities for the teacher to

make clear their tacit assumptions about “what works.” Finally, the role of

2 The teacher in this study participated in a year-long federally-sponsored professional development project to develop a curricular intervention for teaching and learning literature-related argumentative writing 40

research should be apparent, but, should not be dogmatic, rather, research should

provide opportunities for contextualizing practices. (Based on Richardson and

Ander’s (1994) discussion of theorizing teacher change).

• That understanding how students learn to write in a classroom context over time

assumes that writing is a set of social practices that are made concrete in literacy

events by people acting and reacting to each other. I use social constructionism

(Gergen, 1999) as a way to situate how those practices are constructed and how

the participants make meaning across time through concrete language (Volosinov,

1929).

• That teaching and learning occur though social interaction. My approach to the

study of writing is grounded in the study of particular social practices which occur

in literacy events (Barton & Hamilton, 2000; Street, 1994). Research on writing

instruction that assumes a social practice framework complicates the study of

writing instruction by contextualizing writing events as occurring within the

situatedness of particular classrooms at a particular time as revealed through

participants’ interactions which may be face-to-face or through writing. Social

interaction is also central to the collaboration between the classroom teacher and

collaborator.

• That literary argumentation practices are socially constructed phenomenon that

happen in situ. Teacher and students are actively participating in constructing the

consequential effects of the literature and argumentation. Accordingly, the

participants negotiate within classroom literacy events the practices they are

jointly undertaking especially the assumptions about literature and classroom

writing about literature. The role of the teacher is key in determining how

particular practices become foregrounded within the unfolding curriculum.

In Chapter Three I move to discuss the research methods for this study which are grounded in the approach to literary argumentation I have outlined above.

Chapter 3: Research Method

As mentioned in Chapter 1 and 2, my research questions are as follows:

1. What does the teaching and learning of writing about literature look like in this

classroom during an instructional unit? What are the interactional and institutional

factors that shaped the teacher’s changing approach to literary argumentation?

2. How do the teacher’s and students’ instructional conversations about literature

and about writing about literature create shared understanding for and

construction of literary argumentation?

3. How does a case study student’s essay reflect and refract the curricular context in

terms of literary argumentation practices?

These questions are rooted in the theoretical and methodological understanding that composing written responses to literature is linked to its context of production, and that students’ written responses index particular resources which are socially constructed in discourse and writing events as well as in the collaborative nature of the study. The work in this study through microethnographic discourse analysis is an attempt to develop mid-level theory (Geertz, 1983) which explains the particularity of a teacher undergoing change and the influence of that change on a case study student’s writing. I take the stance that a methodology is in a dialectical relationship with events and theories (cf.

Bloome et al., 2005). As such, a microethnographic approach toward discourse analysis

43 demonstrates how specific literacy events in this classroom inform the theories of teacher change and how they modify the methodology to better capture the issue.

In the following sections I will describe how I will answer these questions by explaining the context of this study and why this teacher, class, and content are appropriate for this study, I then describe how I collected the data, and finally explain how I will analyze the data.

Context of the Study

The Argumentative Writing Project

The ethnographic and discourse analytic case study reported here was part of an eight-year, Institute of Education Sciences (IES) funded research project on teaching and learning argumentative writing in high school English Language Arts classrooms. Called the Argumentative Writing Project (AWP), the team of 4 professors and 5 doctoral students collaborated with 61 classroom teachers in urban and suburban schools in central

Ohio between 2014 and 2017. Teachers were recruited to the study based on recommendations of school district administrators and teachers associated with the local

National Writing Project affiliate. The AWP was designed as follows: each academic year, seven to thirteen teachers were recruited to participate in the AWP; the summer before each academic year the teachers participated in a three-week summer workshop on the teaching of argumentative writing.

The content of the summer workshop in which Ms. Smith participated was based on the concept of argumentative writing as inquiry and learning (cf., Newell, Bloome &

Hirvela, 2015). The workshop consisted of discussions of academic articles and sections 44 of Hillock’s (2011) book on writing arguments, and the writing of arguments by the teachers in response to essays and exercises (such as the “slip or trip” exercise in

Hillocks, 2011) in which readers must examine a picture for clues as to whether a murder suspect is lying and then write a “report” to the police chief warranting their claim.

During the last week of the workshop, teachers individually developed curricular and instructional plans for teaching argumentative writing. Although teachers shared ideas with each other, no attempt was made to standardize their instructional plans or how they conceptualized argumentative writing as inquiry and learning. At the end of the workshop, members of the AWP met with each teacher to discuss research procedures for the upcoming year.

As part of my work as a graduate research associate and member of the AWP, I was tasked with collecting data and providing clarity with the goals of the project as well as how those goals might be implemented into her practice. The AWP created a list of principles and practices which were used to give the teachers and researchers a common language to discuss argumentation and literary argumentation. My role was to help Ms.

Smith implement the principles, but there were also monthly meetings where the teachers were able to discuss their teaching practices with the other teachers in the project as well as the other members of the AWP.

Entrance into the Research Site

As part of the larger project, this dissertation study was embedded in a yearlong study of teaching and learning of literary argumentation in an Honors American

Literature course at “Davis High School”3. Davis High School is a newly built school and is on the outskirts of a large suburban school district which services around 60 square miles of central Ohio. The school district is large and pulls students from a neighboring county which accounts for more than 50% of its students. Of Davis High School’s 1500 students most were identified as; White, Non-Hispanic at 73%, Black, Non-Hispanic

9.4%, Asian or Pacific Islander 6.6%, Hispanic 6.4%, and Multiracial 3.7%. It has also been reported that almost a quarter of students were identified as economically disadvantaged (22.5%).

The primary reason the Honors American Literature course and its teacher, Kelly

Smith4, were selected was due to Ms. Smith involvement with the Argumentative Writing

Project (AWP). Working as a field researcher for the AWP, I studied her classroom for the 2015-2016 school year, but began working with her during the summer of 2015 as she participated in the AWP’s summer workshop. Because I already had access to the classroom and I had the opportunity to work with Ms. Smith for two weeks over the summer, I was able to learn about her approach to literature as well as argumentation and work with her to develop a curricular approach based on the principles of literary argumentation which drew on what she learned during the summer AWP workshop.

During the AWP’s three-week summer workshop, Ms. Smith and I worked together to develop an instructional unit that included ideas from the AWP’s Summer

Workshop on teaching literature-related argumentative writing. We also discussed how to

3 All locations are pseudonyms 4 All names are pseudonyms 46 incorporate principles of the AWP’s approach into her plans to teach literature she was required to teach throughout the school year. Ms. Smith was an ideal research partner because she displayed many of the social practices I wanted to study. Chief among them was how she organized the study of literature to the teaching of writing across time. For example, she designed her approach to the study of American literature around the question, What is the American dream? Because I was already researching the teaching and learning of literary argumentation in Ms. Smith’s class and she was a thoughtful teacher, I discussed with her the possibility of using her classroom for my dissertation study.

Although I was using a classroom that was part of the AWP for my dissertation study, I decided to collect additional data such as many more participant observations than the AWP required in order to gain an emic understanding of the literacy practices the teacher and students used. Methods of data collection and data analysis will be explained further in the next section.

Working Collaboratively with the Teacher

Ms. Smith was in her 7th year of teaching at the time of the study. Ms. Smith worked as a bank teller for several years before entering the teaching profession but became a teacher through the more traditional method of obtaining a license through an accredited university. Ms. Smith had a bachelor degree in English and a Masters degree in teaching English. Ms. Smith has only taught at Davis High School and her only other

47 experience teaching was student teaching within the West Franklin school district at another school.

At first, Ms. Smith was reticent to shift her approach to the Honors American

Literature course because she was worried about the unknowns of teaching literary argumentation with the texts she had grown accustom to teaching in particular ways. In fact, in our first interview over the summer at the end of the summer workshop she let me know that she joined the AWP’s study because she wanted “easy credits to add onto her

Masters for professional development.” And at lunch on the first day of the workshop she went to the restroom and contemplated how she could leave the study because she was worried it would turn her curriculum upside down. But she said once she knew more about argumentation there was no way she could go back to the way she had taught before. It was in the summer AWP workshop where I sat down with her and we worked together to map out her curriculum. In previous years she taught the Honors American

Literature course as literary history, but once she learned about literary argumentation she wanted to pivot away from a chronological approach to a thematic approach. However, she was not sure what that would look like with the texts she was required to teach by her department and district. We discussed the texts she needed to teach and how they might fit with the larger principles introduced through the AWP.

Researcher Positionality

Ms. Smith and I had a strong relationship early in our meetings and my initial operations. When I introduced myself during the summer workshop we were on the same page and shared many of the same beliefs about teaching and learning. My background as

48 a former high school teacher as well as my experience working with student teachers provided a sense of comfort to our discussions about teaching. When I asked Ms. Smith if she would be okay with using her teaching and classroom for my dissertation study, she respond “yes” with enthusiasm. Ms. Smith wanted me to “get” the data I needed and often asked my thoughts on projects, assignments and some activities. While I did not co- plan with Ms. Smith, we did discuss how assignments and activities related with each other, writing assignments, and the overarching question of the unit and school year (see

Table 3.1). Ms. Smith would take or leave my advice but always listened and the advice

I gave was offered in ways to support her existing practices or to strengthen the principles and practices from her work with the AWP which she was attempting to implement.

We also developed an overarching essential question to tie all the readings the students would engage with for the four quarters in her class: What is the American dream? The question served as a guide for Ms. Smith and her students as they read the required texts over the course of the year. Below is Table 3.1 which illustrates the overarching essential question and the unit level essential questions for each quarter.

Table 3. 1 Yearlong Honors American Literature Curriculum Plan Overarching Essential Question: What is the American dream?

Quarter 1 Quarter 2 Quarter 3* Quarter 4 (Aug to Oct) (Oct to Dec) (Jan to Feb) (Mar to May) Learning to Argue Justice Unit & Status & Class Isolation & Belonging Unit Freedom Unit Unit Unit Serial Scarlet Letter The Great Gatsby The Cather in the Rye House on Mango Street

EQ: How does EQ: How does EQ: How does EQ: How does feeling argument increase justice/injustice one’s class or as if one belongs to a 49 our understanding change the status affect how community or feeling of the American definition of the they view the isolated from a dream? American dream? American dream? community affect the EQ: How does American dream? one’s view of freedom change the American dream?

*Unit of Study

Ms. Smith Shifting Argumentative Epistemology

Before school year 2016-2017 when I observed Ms. Smith’s 11th grade classroom, she reported that she did not teach argumentative writing outside of a short unit which favored a formalist approach. For example, she tended to focus on close reading strategies and introduced the readings chronologically. Her transition to teach argumentation as an undergirding frame was a major transition for her, but one she saw the value in.

When we began collaborating in the autumn 2016 as part of the AWP, she agreed to teach Toulmin’s (1958) model of argumentation. As part of the AWP’s research plan,

Ms. Smith like other participating teachers, taught the Toulmin elements in a learning to argue unit and then pivoted to an arguing to learn model for the remainder of the school year. The tenants of the learning to argue unit focused on learning the Toulmin language of argument and was comprised of activities which foregrounded deeper understandings of those elements (Hillocks, 2011). Ms. Smith spent a large part of the first quarter teaching the students to make claims, understand appropriate evidence, and how warranting connected the evidence to the claim the students might make. Little instructional time was spent on counter-arguments or rebuttals in the first unit. In the 50 second quarter the class moved on to read the Scarlet Letter (1850) and Ms. Smith transitioned the students to literary argumentation using shorter readings to pivot the students to argue about literature using the same Toulmin language they worked on during the first quarter. She was most comfortable with teaching claims and evidence as they were elements she had used to teach thesis statements and evidence (Interview

7/22/15). She was wary of how literary argumentation was different than literary analysis which she was more comfortable teaching but attempted to introduce literary argumentation principles like understanding characters by including multiple perspectives.

Social practices of argumentation. The social practice approach to the teaching and learning of literary argumentation discussed in Chapter Two had been an ongoing conversation amongst the AWP’s members. As our research group developed a more nuanced understanding of argumentation and the teaching practices we observed over the multiyear study, we concluded that the effective teaching of argumentation and argumentative writing is more than teaching students a structure and the application of specific techniques within a genre, but rather teaching students to engage within the social practices of argumentation and literature within an ELA context (Newell &

Bloome, 2017).

As a part of the AWP’s study of literary argumentation, Ms. Smith was asked to think about the teaching of literature in two new ways: (1) she needed to consider how to build upon the role of Toulmin argumentation and its social practices as she planned her instructional units, and (2) she needed to consider the role literary argumentation would

51 play and how she taught the students to engage with the texts, assignments, and each other. Central to a social practice approach is learning as a social process. A social practice perspective assumes that there are cognitive and linguistic processes occurring during the teaching and learning but sees learning as an inherently social process.

New criticism/ close reading and writing about literature. In Ms. Smith’s

English department close reading was a major part of their curriculum (DHS English

Department Handbook). Ms. Smith also considered close reading a central skill for her students to learn to be successful in the upper grades at Davis High School. Her department was being asked to move to an independent reading model (Kittle, 2012) and

Ms. Smith alongside her colleagues in the English department fought to resist the curricular change because, among many reasons, they felt that they could more effectively teach their students if the class was using one text (Interview 7/22/15).

For Ms. Smith, close reading was a practice she believed helped students understand the novels they were reading. While she did not use New Criticism terminology in class or in interviews she often spoke of “figuring out the problem”

(7/22/15) with the texts they were reading as a class. In our first interview she relayed that, “Sometimes I’m not okay with not having an answer or even think there should be a right answer” (7/22/15). She recognized that she had notions about “right’ answers students should be relaying to her during whole class discussions. This notion of a correct response and that novels are problems to be figured out with close textual analysis is directly rooted in New Critical theory and was a tension Ms. Smith realized she needed to address in her curricular planning.

Ms. Smith’s students were even aware of the role close reading played in the study of literature and that close reading was considered crucial when writing about literature. The following is an excerpt from an interview with Tessa, a student in Ms.

Smith’s Honors American Literature course, regarding what she felt was different about her experience with writing and reading in the course versus her experience in other ELA courses at Davis High School:

I don’t like when she gives us a writing assignment. I feel like it’s just unformal. I

feel like I don’t know how to put it together. Like there really is no layout of how

to write it. She gives a prompt but usually in my other English classes they’ll say

like you need this many body paragraphs, introduction, conclusion, that stuff. I’ve

never had an assignment like that though (referencing Ms. Smith’s writing

assignment), one where you use other students’ ideas for your own. Usually you

just read and then annotate and then write the paper. (Interview 11/5/15)

What Tessa has observed in her experiences as a student at DHS is that to be a successful writer there should be a “layout” or structure which is a genre that travels from

ELA class to ELA class. To write successfully means to write a pre-set structure according to Tessa. The points that she identifies are echoed by other students who argued that Ms. Smith’s class was different. They understood that they still talked about the literature in similar ways to the ones they had before but when writing about the texts

Ms. Smith had different expectations. Reflecting a literary argument approach like the principles and practices espoused by the AWP, the practice of writing about literature was the anomaly Tessa identified in the assignment she had never had before. For

53 instance, the assignment, from The Scarlet Letter unit, tasked the students with using

“students’ ideas” versus the status quo approach of “annotate and then write the paper”.

The reliance on annotating as an instructional practice was important for Ms. Smith, her department, and the district, but the textual bias (Horner, 1999) favored by DHS but was at odds with how Ms. Smith as a participant in the AWP was now thinking about teaching literature and writing. She wanted to create a dynamic and local context of discussion which allowed students to contribute to, draw from, and negotiate as they decided how to develop their literary interpretations in literature discussions and in writing.

Students. The students in the course were juniors and sophomores due to the trajectory of DHS’ English course offerings. Students could enroll early as sophomores if they planned to take Advanced Placement courses in their junior and senior years, but the course was generally for Juniors. The sophomores moved up from Honors English 9 and the juniors from English 10. In the course observed there were 10 sophomores and eight juniors in the class; of the 10 sophomores two were male and eight were female and of the eight juniors, six were male and two were female. All were white except for two

Asian-Americans one male and female. The students were welcoming and would allow me to sit in during small group work to ask questions throughout my year-long observation of their class.

Tiffany. Tiffany was a 10th grade student and the one of the younger students in the class. She was considered by Ms. Smith and her peers to be a strong writer in class and was identified as someone who offered strong input during class literature

54 discussions. Tiffany was very social in class and despite being in a class with students as much as two years older than her, she was a frequent contributor to class discussions and was often a leader during small group activities. In order to understand and examine the processes and practices in Ms. Smith’s approach to literary argumentation, Chapter Six will detail Tiffany’s writing process and her use of the classroom resources.

Data Collection and Analysis

Taking an ethnographic perspective of a study in education (Green & Bloome,

1997), I drew on a combination of methods from the ethnography of communication

(Green and Bloome, 1983; Heath, 1983; Heath & Street, 2008) and discourse analysis

(Bloome et al., 2004; Wortham & Reyes, 2015) to gather appropriate data to answer my research questions. Ethnographic analysis is a qualitative approach to research rooted in

Anthropology and allows for the study of cultures. Taking an ethnographic approach means that this study seeks to understand insider knowledge and what is means to be a member of a group. I will now describe the data corpus and the data collection methods used. In Table 3.2, I describe the data source, the amount of data, and then a brief description of the data.

Table 3. 2 Description of Data Collection from The Great Gatsby Unit Data Source Amount of Data Description of Data Field notes (Number pages from) My notes utilized three categories as 24 class sessions suggested by Green and Bloome (1983): methodological, theoretical, and personal notes as well as categories for time and descriptions of the observation

Data Source Amount of Data Description of Data Audio and video 24 (fifty minute) class Video camera was always placed in the of class events sessions back left corner of the room unless the 18 class sessions with room shifted due to activity in the lesson. multiple audio In those cases the camera was positioned recorders to best capture the widest angle of participants.

Audio of class 24 class sessions; 5 Audio recorder was always placed on the events recording of case side of the room opposite the video study student in small camera. groups and during individual composing

Case study 4 These interviews focused on the student summative writing assignment for an interviews instructional unit. Students were asked about their composing of essays in relation to the events in the curricular unit. Teacher 4 One interview occurred before the unit, interviews two during the unit, and one at the end of the unit.

Print and digital I collected artifacts from all participating artifacts students for the entire school year. The • Handouts 43 artifacts included student writing, notes, any assessments, and activities throughout • Worksheets 9 the year. Special attention was paid to case study students to get any and all and work • Student 17 they were willing to provide as well as any writing work which was completed during the unit of study. Field Notes I attended as many class sessions as my schedule could afford during the course of the unit from January 4th to February 10th. Over the course of the instructional unit that lasted 30 days, I was able to observe 24 class sessions. During the class sessions I took electronic field notes. My field notes followed the AWP’s suggestions, which generally follow Green and Bloome’s (1983) category suggestions (e.g. description notes,

56 methodological notes, theoretical notes, and personal notes) with the addition of a time category. Below is an example of my field notes.

Example 3. 1 Sample field notes Date/ Class Session Method Theory Personal Time Description/Interpretation (focus on participant structure and 1/5 *Teacher discusses the peach The Video Teacher is Get copy colored handout about annotated was delayed framing the of peach 2:00 bibliographies but audio unit and handout *Students read the Biography of F. started at the being and Scott Fitzgerald time class explicit packets ______started about the groups *Teacher comes back as a whole setting up are class and gives directions with what Recorder intertextual annotating 2:11 they will be doing over the next few Placement connections days – 1 – T, H, ______T Teacher *The teacher models and then models explains what commentary means -2-D, S, N appropriate and how the piece would be useful -3- V, R, J, practices *Directions in small groups – talk A for about what sorts of things we annotating would mention -4- L, C, P, and *Teacher models how they should A thinking think about annotating the about how biography piece -5 – K, E, P, this *P (student) is writing into the H assignment googledoc/ example titled Honors fits into the American Literature – Annotated larger Bibliography – The American learning Dream *Teacher asks - Does Fitzgerald attain the AD?

Audio and Video Recordings For this study I attended 24 class sessions and audio and video recorded every lesson. The video camera was placed in the back of the room at an angle to capture as much of the classroom space as possible. The camera was rarely moved unless the class 57 space was rearranged (e.g., from whole class to small group work) depending on the activity or the lesson. Because I was also collecting data for the AWP’s larger study of the teaching and learning of argumentation, I needed to set the camera up to capture instruction yet not become a disruption. This meant I needed to have an angle on the front whiteboard and projector which the teacher relied on often during her teaching. Because of this focus on instruction and because the camera was placed in the back of the classroom, the video data captured the teacher more often than particular students.

Because I was most interested in studying the relationship between instructional conversations and students’ composing of literature-related argumentative writing, the audio and video data are key features of the study. The teacher wore a lavalier microphone connected to the camera in the corner of the room. This served to capture

Ms. Smith’s voice during instructional conversations. She often moved around the room or spoke quietly to small groups in some activities so the lavalier was used to collect audio in more than a single participant structure. Digital voice recorders were used to capture whole class sessions or when the class worked in small groups or when students worked in the computer lab. Up to five recorders were used at any given time and priority was given to placing the recorders near the case study students.

Interviews. I conducted several kinds of interviews over the course of the larger

AWP study and my dissertation study (See Appendices B & C). I interviewed the teacher several times before and after the unit regarding how she thought about and designed the instructional unit to teach the students to write about literature, I also interviewed her students about the writing and about how the unit went. The students were interviewed

58 about their histories as students, as writers and readers and then at length about their final essays. The case study student was interviewed a minimum of two times, once after the first quarter and at the end of the year. Below are sample questions asked during teacher and student interviews:

Teacher How would you describe your approach to teaching argumentative writing? What instructional strategies do you view as critical to teaching argumentative writing about literature? Did you change your mind about how to approach argumentative writing about literature this school year?

Students In your English class, (insert teacher’s name here) is teaching about how do argumentative writing: Writing which presents an idea or attempts to persuade someone. If you were to describe how the teacher is teaching you about argumentative writing about literature and how you are learning to do argumentative writing to someone who never visited your classroom, what would you say?

Collection of artifacts. All paper artifacts were collected and organized daily as well as any digital handouts, feedback, or student writing completed on Googledocs. All paper artifacts from the study were scanned and any student notes or writing that was not turned in was also scanned and organized into the data corpus. Because students were free to share with me their notes not all saved their work from the unit, and there are gaps due to this. The artifacts consisted of three major categories; teacher handouts, individual student writing (informal and formal), and finally group work.

Teacher handouts consisted of any documents given to students for teaching and learning purposes. These documents ranged from readings, assessments, and classroom activities. They were analyzed for how they positioned the teaching and learning of

59 literary argumentation with respect to the underlying approaches of “what counts as knowledge”.

Student writing was organized into informal and formal writing. Informal writing consisted of any writing the students completed over the course of the unit which was not a finalized draft which was submitted for a grade. The informal writings were notes, graphic organizers, and journals while the formal writings were an in-class essay, a character analysis, and the final literary analysis essay. The method of analysis for the student writing will be explained further in the next section, but the final essay was analyzed for intertextual traces.

Finally, group work comprised any artifacts produced by more than one student.

These artifacts illustrated how students worked together to take up and negotiate the tensions.

Data Analysis

In this dissertation, I analyzed how 11th grade students in an Honors classroom participated in literacy practices during an instructional unit on studying and writing a literature-related argumentative essay on The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald, 1925). I used multiple phases of data analysis which drew from the contextual layers (social historic, local, and curricular and pedagogical), the social construction of events, and finally how a case study student drew on shared events and curriculum to compose her written responses to literature.

Phase 1: Data Organization

As I collected data for this dissertation, I organized electronic folders to keep digital files for each class session observed. Within each class session observed corresponding video and audio files were renamed and placed with that class session’s folder. All classroom artifacts were placed into either two categories, class handout or student work. Blank copies were collected during every session as well as any work samples students were willing to share with me. Any student work was labeled and digitally copied and placed into a hard copy folder and a corresponding digital folder.

Field notes served as descriptive markers of what occurred during each class session and assisted in how the artifacts were organized. Because I noted major participant structures, handouts, and any key dialogue during the notetaking. I also created an overall outline for the unit by using the teacher’s lesson plan handouts as well as my own field notes to make an instructional chain (Newell, Bloome & Hirvela, 2015;

VanDerHeide & Newell, 2013) of the curricular unit. Table 3.3 includes key elements of the instructional chain used to map instructional events in Ms. Smith unit on the

American Dream in The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald, 1925).

Table 3. 3 Instructional Chain

Sessions 1 Sessions 3 – 6 Session 7 & 8 Session 9 - 21 Sessions 22 - & 2 24 • Annotated • American • Reading • Introducing Bibliography Dream • Evidence • Writing new Unit Writing Writing • Argument • Charerterization • Computerlab • Defining • Annotated • Brainstorming • Relationship the Bibliography • In-Class Essay American Presentation Essay dream 61

• Background author reading

Phase 2: Identifying Events

Drawing on field notes and teacher interviews, I identified telling cases (Mitchell,

1984) or repairs of literacy and social practices pertaining to the practices of writing written responses to literature. I identified the major events within the instructional chain as a starting point for identifying and locating literacy practices events across the instructional unit.

Events were identified “telling” from three sources: teacher interviews, student interviews, and field notes. Because I focused on the social and literacy practices of writing literary arguments I examined both discourse events during literature discussions of The Great Gatsby as well as discourse events where the focus was on the teaching of writing. Once the data were organized and categorized I realized that several instructional conversations highlighted tensions Ms. Smith discussed during several interviews. Also, since the case study student’s writing highlighted the same tensions, I focused on instructional conversations where the teacher and students discussed the novel.

Phase 3: Identifying Literary Argument Practices To identify the literary argument practices within and across events for patterns, I created transcripts of the key discourse events and then conducted textual analysis of key writing assignments. Key discourse events were transcribed using tenants from a microenthographic approach to discourse analysis (Bloome et al., 2005). The transcripts 62 were coded for how speakers socially constructed and marked the literary argument practices identified. Drawing on Green and Wallat’s (1981) approach to transcription which breaks discourse into message units for coding, I then mapped how practices are socially constructed across the event and then in future events. Because I was interested in identifying how the case study student drew on the curricular unit in the composing of her essays, I analyzed how the events were socially constructed by paying attention to the ways the teacher and students argued about the novel during literature discussions.

Phase 4: Microethnographic Discourse Analysis of Classroom Events

Once multiple key events were transcribed they were compared for how previous socially constructed events were tacitly entextualized (Silverstein, 2005) though talk.

This microenthnographic analysis also revealed how speakers tacitly warrant their literary arguments and whether they stem from literary topoi (Wilder, 2012) or the situated local warrant the teacher attempted to bring about.

After identifying key events in a classroom, video recordings of those key events were analyzed using procedures described in Bloome et al. (2005). In brief, the event was transcribed and an utterance by utterance analysis conducted of how the teacher and students acted and reacted to each other, constructed meaning, conceptions of argumentative writing, social relations among themselves and between themselves and others not present, social identities, the social and cultural ideologies indexed, and what they held each other accountable for. In order to capture how a key event was situated within the flow of classroom activity and learning, classroom lessons both before and after a key event were also analyzed. I also looked for analogous classroom events before

63 and after the targeted key event in order to understand how the teacher attempted to bring about literary argumentation practices within the unit observed.

As part of the analysis of key events, the teacher and students were interviewed about the event, how it fit into the broader context of classroom activity, and how they interpreted the meaningfulness of what occurred in the key event. The codes for the microethnographic discourse analysis were rooted in my observations of the classroom and reflect Bloome et al.’s (2005) attempt to understand the surface and underlying locations of knowledge with respect to the newer literary argumentation practices the teacher was incorporating into the instructional conversations. Table 3.4 illustrates the analysis as well as example codes and descriptions of how the codes were used.

Table 3. 4 Discourse analysis categories Example Description of Code Codes

Surface Level Conversational Framing Used to describe how the teacher and students Function Directing are responding to one another during Evaluating instructional conversations. Responding Interpreting Extending

Location of Teacher These codes describe where the most salient Knowledge Student location of knowledge for the message unit is. Text The class code describes the collective “we” of Class teacher and students.

Underlying Literary Argumentation Practice Conversational Framing Used to describe how the teacher and students Function Directing are responding to on another during Evaluating instructional conversations. 64

Responding Interpreting Extending

Location of Decontextual Describes whether the knowledge within the Knowledge Contextual message unit is decontextual or contextual in nature. Decontextual emphasizes the formalist and disciplinary ways of describing sources of knowledge. Contextual here means the local or social practices the teacher is bringing about.

Argumentative Claim Argumentative elements were taught in the Element Evidence course and are based on Toulmin (1958) Warrant Backing Counter Argument

Phase 5: Analyzing the Tacit warranting and intertextual traces

In this final phase, l conducted a contextual analysis (Prior & Bazerman, 2004) of a case study student’s final essay. In this analysis I conducted an intertextual analysis

(Prior, 1995; Wynhoff Olsen et al., 2018) of the traces of the tacit literary topoi (Wilder

& Wolfe, 2002) and the situated argument or local warranting. The use of intertextuality is drawn from Wynhoff Olsen et al. which see intertextuality as “how texts (and, more broadly defined, practices, ideas, and voices) are taken up and integrated into other texts”

(p. 60). I am limiting the analysis of intertextuality to the unit of study but include student writing, classroom talk, and artifacts during the observed unit when conducting the intertextual analysis.

I examined a case study student’s written product for evidence of the key events.

Drawing on Wynhoff Olsen and colleagues’, intertextual categories of thematic, structural, and lexical, I analyzed a case study students’ final literary argument essay for 65 how her argument drew on classroom literature discussions and her writings over the unit to compose her responses. I also interviewed the student about her writing (see Appendix

C). I asked the student to read her writing aloud and then describe how she composed it.

My goals in these interviews were (a) to understand how the student conceived of the writing task; (b) to trace features of previous instructional conversations, and (c) to find connections to their sources (primary and secondary sources).

Table 3.6 illustrates how I am appropriating the work of Wilder and Wolfe (2012) and Wynhoff Olsen et al. (2018) to analyze the case study student’s final literary argument essay. The key difference in my contextual analysis is the inclusion of the local warrant in the literary warranting coding category. The inclusion of the local warrant is akin to Prior’s (2005) use of Andrew’s (1995) understanding that argument can be understood as choreography and locally situated. By identifying local warranting within the coding scheme, I move to what Weyand, Goff, and Newell (2018) recognize as central in the study of classroom argumentation:

Rather, warranted evidence is socially constructed and interconnected to claim

and warrant in differential ways, leading to more complex argumentation and

more intellectually engaging ways of discussing and writing about ideas and

experiences. (p. 118)

For them, a discussion of argumentative writing practices needs to include how warranting is a socially constructed phenomenon. They do not explore the “possible interrelationships between the students’ written texts and our discourse analysis of telling moments that influenced the composition of those texts” (p. 119). But the analysis of the

66 case study student’s writing in phase 5 and Chapter 6 seeks to address how key discourse events might influence her literary argument essay.

Table 3. 6 Textual and Intertextual Writing Analysis Categories Text and Codes Description of Codes Examples Intertextual Features Argumentative Element Claim (C) Based on the writing assignment, the class (C) Her love for her status is also why she instruction, and Toulmin (1958) is married to Tom Buchanan.

Evidence (E) (E) Even though she describes him as being a “hulking”, “brute of a man” (Fitzgerald 13) and even though she knows that he is having an affair with Myrtle Wilson, she still stays with him.

Warrant (W) (W) Some people like a lot of frosting on their cakes, and some people like none at all., In the same way happiness and success have different levels of importance to different people

Backing (B) (B) The real reason as to why Daisy can’t leave Tom is not because she would be abandoning her husband, but because she would be abandoning her American Dream.

Counter (CA) N/A Argument (CA) 68

Text and Codes Description of Codes Examples Intertextual Features

Response to (RCA) N/A Counter Argument (RCA)

Tacit Literary Warrant Ubiquity (U) The writer points out a form (a device, an image, a temporal marker - “as the story linguistic feature, a pattern) repeated throughout a progresses” (2.4), “it goes from” (2.5), work. Either many examples of the same thing are and “the first time” (4.2) pointed out, or one thing is noted in many forms, up and down a scale of grandeur and abstraction.

Paradox (PX) The writer points out the unification of apparently opposites – “Even though she describes irreconcilable opposites in a single startling him as being a “hulking”, “brute of a dualism. man” (Fitzgerald 13) and even though she knows that he is having an affair with Myrtle Wilson, she still stays with him.”

Appearance/ The writer emphasizes a surface layer and below surface/ below surface – “Nick knows this Reality (A/R) the surface issues with the text. The writer focuses to be untrue”, and “She abandons the love on the below the surface issue. of her life, someone who could make her actually happy, to be with someone who could make her wealthy instead”

Paradigm (P) The writer fits a kind of template over the details of N/A a literary text to endow them with order, elucidate a 69

Text and Codes Description of Codes Examples Intertextual Features structure. Often in this fitting the writer seeks to modify understandings of the template as well as the text.

Context (C) In a variant of the paradigm topos, the critic context of text’s time – “unless the assumes historical and contextual detail should be information is made public, in which case brought to bear on textual interpretation and that her reputation would be on the line”, “The accuracy and anachronism are invalidating first time that she did this was when she concerns. stopped waiting for Gatsby to return from war and marries Tom Buchanan. She abandons the love of her life, someone who could make her actually happy, to be with someone who could make her wealthy instead.”

Social justice The critic, in an assumed connection between (SJ) N/A (SJ) literature and our present condition, seeks avenues toward social change.

Mistaken A variant of the appearance/reality topos, its (MC) N/A critic (MC) location of dualism is not in the literary text but in the critical discourse surrounding the text. Previous critics who treated the literary work under discussion did not see some aspect of the text correctly and are in need of correction.

Text and Codes Description of Codes Examples Intertextual Features Local (L) The writer draws on the local writing ecosystem to (L) Daisy is a person without any warrant the evidence they use to support their substance, she is devoid of all color and is claims. only concerned with one thing, her status.

Personal The writer draws on their own experience to (PE) To describe it in the best way that I Experience warrant evidence know how, I will compare the American (PE) Dream to a nice, frosted cake.

Intertextual Trace Thematic (T) borrows an idea, topic, or content from an “Probably the most obvious thing that originating text or event comes to one’s mind when they think of Daisy Buchanan is her money” (I/IT Essay)

Structural (S) borrows a syntactic or organizational structure from “What can be sure is that, for the most an originating text or event. part, there are at least two main ideas that are in everyone’s American Dream” (1/14 Timed Writing

Lexical (L) borrows a word or word phrase from an originating Class discussion on 1/4 Tiffany states “if text or event. you have a lot of money people will look up to you – it creates the appearance of the American dream, they have it all/ I think everyone’s American dream is different”

In the next chapter, I examine how, with my collaborative efforts, Ms. Smith sought to bring about literary argumentation practices through the use of writing assignments and instructional conversations. Through the analysis of teacher-led events and texts I will highlight how she worked to advance literary argumentation into her curriculum.

Chapter 4: Literary Argumentation as Social Practice in an Honors American Literature Class

In this chapter, I begin with a description of the larger historical, institutional and cultural features of the research site consisting of the classroom, the high school, the surrounding community, the Honors American Literature curriculum, the students, and the teacher’s approach to literary argumentation. I then move to explain how the contextual features identified are made apparent to the classroom community through the teacher and students’ use of language within naturally occurring literacy events. The events were analyzed for the social practices of literary argumentation in instructional conversations and in the writing the students were asked to produce throughout the unit.

It is through this analysis I hope to answer my first research question:

1. What does the teaching and learning of writing about literature look like in this

classroom during an instructional unit? What are the interactional and institutional

factors that shaped the teacher’s changing approach to literary argumentation?

Because this study is rooted in a sociocultural perspective of writing research it is paramount to understand the deep contextual layers of the research setting. As a reminder, a social historical perspective sees the teaching and learning of a written response to literature as a reflection and refraction of the social historical context, the local context, and the classroom curriculum. When understanding the nature of these contexts, it is integral to consider how the context was shaped by social interactions as well as broader contexts. 73

Sociocultural Context of the Classroom

I begin with a discussion of the sociocultural context of the classroom as well as the various intuitional, historic, and cultural contexts and describe their impact on the context.

Classroom and Davis High School High School

This study took place in an 11th/10th grade Honors American Literature course at

DHS, the newest high school of three in a large suburban community within 10 miles from Capital city. The community of West Franklin is expansive and one of the faster growing districts in the state. Davis High School’s website states that the districts comprise “approximately sixty square miles with the majority of the school district’s

87,000 residents being business, professional and blue-collar workers.” DHS is a four- year comprehensive public school with approximately 1600 students in grades 9th through

12th grade. DHS offers a wide range of Advanced Placement (AP) and Honors courses and in the year of this study sent about 50% of its graduates to four-year college or universities, another third to two year or technical schools and the remainder of their students joined the military or joined the workforce. DHS was built on the fringe of West

Franklin and surrounding farm land. As noted above, DHS pulls its students from a large diverse suburban area and its students generally are representative of West Franklin.

According to DHS’s school webpage 23% of its students qualify for the free and reduced lunch program.

Department focus. At the time of the study, the English department at DHS was made up of 13 teachers with 10 holding advanced degrees. In school year 2016-2017, the

74 department offered up to 31 courses ranging from the required courses (e.g. ENG 9, ENG

10) to AP courses, and media electives. To graduate from Davis High School students must earn a minimum of four credits in English (also a state level graduation requirement). The English department understood that many of their students would attend four-year colleges and universities. They also knew that many of their students would not, and because of this, one of their focuses was to have students “develop an appreciation and understanding of reading and writing as essential human skills that enable us to be active citizens and enjoy productive lives” (District Program of Studies).

During the course of my year-long observation, there was a district level initiative to shift the focus of the English department from literary analysis and whole class text analysis to an independent reading model (e.g., Kittle, 2012). The push from the district office away from literary analysis upset Ms. Smith and other members of the English department who felt they were being dictated to and questioned how they would implement a model they were uncomfortable with. Ms. Smith believed a curriculum which centered on argumentation could provide her evidence to push back against the proposed initiative. Argumentation, for Ms. Smith, was an answer to department’s dilemma between preparing students to be critical readers of literature while also allowing space for nontraditional texts into their more traditional English curriculum at

DHS.

Honors American Literature Course

The course was redesigned by Ms. Smith during the summer of 2016 as she learned about argumentation during the AWPs summer workshop. She included the unit 75 she designed about learning to argue as her first unit of the school year. The entire course, however, was meant to introduce students to American literature to allow them to discuss literary works and write literary analysis papers.

In previous years, Ms. Smith reported that the curriculum either followed a thematic or historical arc. The West Franklin school district was specific about what texts teachers could and could not select for their courses, and the Honors American Literature course was no different. During the summer workshop, I sat down with Ms. Smith to discuss which course she would like for me to observe for the AWP’s research process and the possibility of collecting additional research for my dissertation. After hearing about my research interests, Ms. Smith mapped out an overview of her curriculum. It was at this time when she shifted to think about key aspects of the teaching and learning of argumentation she learned about over the summer workshop and her curriculum. In the following except from that interview, she explains her rationale for selecting the Honors

American Literature course and her in-progress thinking about how the principles and practices the AWP wanted her to use in her teaching and planning might mesh with her current curriculum:

I thought it would be more skills. I guess I didn’t expect it to change so much. I

am coming out of this seeing it in a whole new light. I could form everything

around this framework and I really didn’t expect that .... I’ve used argument but it

was always in isolation and to a point. (Interview, 7/22/15)

Ms. Smith realized that she needed to change from a literary-historical approach to a curricular conversation (Applebee, 1996) that would allow a space for the student to build

76 an understanding or argumentation at the start of the year and then transition to making arguments about literary texts in the following units. Her struggle to let go of previous teaching practices is apparent as she wrestles with an approach that focuses on students’ ideas and experiences.

Arguing about Literature: The Focus of Collaboration. One of the key elements to Ms. Smith’s curriculum redesign had to do with teaching students to argue about literature. This was a new concept to Ms. Smith in that previously she taught the students to write responses to literature which generally focused on identifying themes and finding textual citations to support their thesis statements without describing these writing assignments as arguments. In her previous years, she drew upon traditional interpretations of texts to drive her instructional conversations and the types of formal written papers the students would write. She was a proponent of close analytic reading and writing of the text to make interpretations related to the theme of the text. Part of the challenge she faced in shifting to argumentation is that Ms. Smith assumed that argumentation was a set of structural features for students to take positions and persuade others using writing (Interview 7/22/15). This belief is widely held by many ELA teachers (Applebee, & Langer, 2013) but was in contrast to what she learned during the

AWP’s summer workshop. There she learned about argumentation as social processes

(Newell, Bloome & Hirvela, 2015), as contextualized rationality (e.g. Habermas, 1984;

Gadamer, 1976), as complex and inviting of multiple perspectives (e.g. Bakhtin, 1984), and as grounded in teachers’ argumentative epistemologies (Newell, VanDerHeide &

Wynhoff Olsen, 2014). During the subsequent school year, these ideas shaped our

77 collaboration. In the next section, I describe each of five instructional units with special attention on the “Gatsby” unit that was the focus of our collaborative planning.

Instructional Units. There were five major units in Ms. Smith’s 10/11th grade

Honors American Literature course. The first unit was meant to teach the students

Toulmin (1958) argumentation and was comprised of the readings and teaching strategies

Ms. Smith was introduced to during the summer workshop. For example, students were asked to use what they learned about argumentation and its terminology to discuss the podcast Serial’s (This American Life, 2014)) first season. During the unit they listened to the 12 episodes and discussed the claims, evidence, and warrants associated with the story which culminated in the students writing their own argument about what they think occurred in the court case.

The second unit was the first pivot away from non-fiction texts to literature as the students read The Scarlet Letter (Hawthorne, 1850). In this unit students focused on issues of justice and the American dream. The students read The Scarlet Letter and focused on the question: “How does justice/injustice change the definition of the

American dream?” The readings, in-class activities, and assignments led to writing character analysis essays describing how students’ chosen character changed over the course of the novel.

The third unit which concluded the second quarter and first semester was called the “freedom unit,” moved students to consider human rights issues in the United States and abroad by focusing on the question: “How does one’s view of freedom change the

American dream?”. The students read news reports and conducted independent research

78 projects about human rights violations based on the United Nations Declaration of

Human Rights and culminated in a class presentation. The fourth unit, which was the focus on my research, occurred at the start of the second semester and third quarter and is discussed in the next section.

The final unit in the Honors American Literature course took place in the fourth quarter and shifted the students to think about issues of isolation and belonging. The question driving the unit was: “How does feeling as if one belongs to a community or feeling isolated from a community affect the American dream?” The two major texts the students read were The Catcher in the Rye (Salinger, 1968) and The House on Mango

Street (Cisnernos, 1991). The major assignments this unit were split between each text.

The students wrote a response to a literary critic for The Catcher in the Rye. Specifically, they read scholarly articles about Holden in order to either rebut or agree with the critic.

And finally, for The House on Mango Street the students presented a close analysis of a vignette.

The Instructional Unit for Research: The American dream and The Great Gatsby.

Unit of study. The fourth unit in the year and the first unit of the second semester became the focus of my research. One of the reasons Ms. Smith and I selected this unit for this dissertation was that Ms. Smith wanted time at the beginning of the school year to develop a more in-depth understanding of argumentation and literary argumentation.

Additionally, the delay gave us more time and opportunity to collaborate on planning the unit. To prepare and to learn, Ms. Smith taught a unit on The Scarlet Letter to “see how it would go” and then make adjustments over the winter break. Similar to the other units

79 mentioned above, the unit was centered on the question: “How does one’s class or status affect how they viewed the American dream?” and the reading of The Great Gatsby.

The unit’s trajectory was built on the following pedagogical moves by Ms. Smith:

(1) students individually read and annotated six texts (poems, speeches, short stories) selected by Ms. Smith and then met in small groups to create an annotated bibliography of their six texts; (2) they then presented the three texts which their groups felt represented the American dream well and provided a rationale for the texts selected and not selected; (3) students wrote an in-class essay about the American dream using the texts read and at least a text from outside small group work to support their claim; (4) students read The Great Gatsby and created an ongoing reading journal in Googledocs for each chapter and the students then discussed issues of status and class in their journals; (5) they then wrote a one page character analysis using Martin Buber’s (1958)

I/It I/Thou philosophy to discuss how characters treated each other throughout the novel,

(6) Finally, the students last assignment was a literary argument about a character from

The Great Gatsby which required them to discuss the character’s relationship to the

American dream by drawing on the readings from the unit to support their arguments

(Appendix A for a detailed description of the unit).

Teaching The Great Gatsby. As we discussed her approach, Ms. Smith pointed out that she struggled with her love of The Great Gatsby and teaching the students to write arguments about literature. She wrestled with what parts of the novel students should know and how to avoid favoring a particular way of reading. During an informal interview Ms. Smith describes her dilemma by stating the following:

I just think, I just think that it’s tough. There are parts that I think. Well I mean

the green light is a good example. We were talking about where do we draw the

line? What do they need to know from the book? (Interview 2/25/16)

Ms. Smith’s struggle was to figure out the goals of what she wanted the students to know about the book versus her desire to have students come to understandings on their own or as a class. Her realization of her goals only came after the unit ended and after she assessed the students’ final writing assignments.

Writing Assignments. Over the school year, and during the five units discussed above, Ms. Smith assigned multiple types of writing assignments ranging from formal writing (argumentative essay, character analysis essay, class presentations, in-class essay, literary argument essay, scholarly article essay) and informal writing (reading notes, annotated texts, handouts).

The types of writing assignments Ms. Smith assigned were based largely on her experience as an English teacher at DHS. Because we collaborated over the summer to shape the curriculum around essential question and the American dream, we often discussed the final writing assignments. Ms. Smith always had a final writing assignment for each novel read throughout the year and usually asked my thoughts about the prompts. It was not until The Great Gatsby unit she asked for more input into how the other writing assignments and activities worked together. Part of her asking my opinion was rooted in her knowing I was focusing on the literary unit for my dissertation but she was also attempting to figure out how to have students develop literary arguments they cared about.

I saw that my role as a collaborator during The Great Gatsby unit was to ask questions to assist Ms. Smith in developing a central goal of the unit outside of the unit question. She wanted to teach an annotated bibliography and have the students write an argument but was not confident in how to best scaffold assignments and activities to support her students. I assisted Ms. Smith in developing a trajectory from writing assignment to writing assignment and offered guidance for activities when she asked.

Annotated bibliography. Figure 4.1 describes the annotated bibliography assignment which was intended to do two things: (1) to introduce students to the skills of annotating and summarizing the arguments of several texts, a practice that they are expected to take up more extensively in 12th grade; and (2) the students were being introduced to varying genres (newspaper, speech, poem, short story) which highlighted aspects of the American dream from multiple perspectives (e.g. immigrant). Additionally, the assignment was structured to move students from individual reading and annotating to small group discussion where they needed to come to consensus about what each text meant in the context of the American dream and then select three of those texts to present to their peers. During the group presentations students in the audience took notes which would aid them in writing their in-class essays.

Figure 4. 1 Annotated bibliography directions

Honors American Literature- Annotated Bibliography The American Dream

For each entry include… -Article Title and Author (if available) -A short (3-4 sentence) commentary on the article. In the commentary, you should include the genre of the article (news, short story, poetry) and connection with The American Dream or with Class/Status.

In-class essay. Figure 4.2 describes the in-class essay that required students to

synthesize the articles using the students’ initial ideas about the American dream with

evidence from the articles they read in their small groups. Another important facet to the

assignment was that students needed to include at least one article from another group.

The prompt of the in-class essay asked the students to define the American dream based

on the articles they read and to consider how social class and/or status affect that

definition. The students also needed to include in-text citations of any examples they used

when supporting their claims. Students were given a work day during the lesson prior to

writing their essays to organize and outline their arguments as well as read sources from

other groups.

Figure 4. 2 In-Class Essay Assignment

Honors American Literature The Great Gatsby

**DO NOT WRITE ON THIS DOCUMENT** Make a copy and then create your answer below the line on your copy. For the document title, add your last name in front of the current title. (Example: Smith In Class writing 1/14). Finally SHARE this file with Ms. Smith.

Define The American Dream based on the articles that you read? How does class and/or status effect that definition?”

Make sure your response is based on the articles that you read. You are welcome to use any of the articles explored by our class. You will need to reference either the article title or the author’s name as a citation for your examples. You need to include at least 3 sources in this writing but more are certainly allowed. One of those sources must be from another group.

Reading notes. The next assignment was the only ongoing writing that the students did though out the unit and was the only writing that engaged the students’ ideas about The Great Gatsby in any semi-formal way. The students wrote their in-class essays on Googledocs which the students used for their journal writing. Ms. Smith wanted the students to build on their initial beliefs about the American dream and read The Great

Gatsby for issues of status and class. As the students read they were asked to “make note of anything” from the assigned chapters that “would be a good addition” to their writing.

Students were free to make connections and organize their chapter notes however they wanted to. The notes were assessed by Ms. Smith as a quiz grade. Figure 4.3 includes a few examples.

Figure 4. 3 Sample of students’ reading notes

Chapters 1-3 Descriptions: The American Dream, for the most part, is made up of two key components; success, and the pursuit of happiness. In this book it seems as though the characters have prioritized success and money above everything else, therefore leaving them unhappy and restless. They think that because they have so much money, they are better than everyone else (especially Tom).

Tom Buchanan- • “One of the most powerful ends that ever played football at New Haven.” • “One of those men who reach such an acute limited excellence at twenty one that everything afterwards savors of an anticlimax.” • “His family were enormously wealthy - even in college his freedom with money was a matter for reproach.” • “Sturdy, straw haired man of thirty with a rather hard mouth and a supercilious manner.” • “Two shining, arrogant eyes had established dominance over his face and gave him the appearance of always leaning aggressively forward.” • “It was a body capable of enormous leverage--a cruel body.” • “There was a touch of paternal contempt in (his voice), even toward people he liked--” • He has a “girl” in the city. -I think he is unsatisfied with his current life and is searching for more. Money isn’t everything, yet he believes that it is. He even uses his money to spoil Myrtle and to sort of prove to her how much of a man he is. Chapters 4-6 focus a lot on Gatsby and we finally learn about his history, and how he fell in love with Daisy before the war. Although Daisy married Tom, Gatsby never got over her. He even moved his house to be near Daisy, just across the bay. Although this dream of making Daisy his is fine and dandy, Tom gets in the way all throughout chapter 6. He decides to criticize Gatsby and Daisy at his party, making them all not have a good time. I imagine that soon a huge conflict will arise between Gatsby and Tom over Daisy being in love with Gatsby. Tom doesn’t really have the right to fight though, because he has a mistress himself. These few chapters have highlighted Gatsby’s American dream like no other chapters have. It showed how even though he has all of this money and power (even over the police), he is still not happy without the girl he loves. At first his dream was to become rich, and he achieved this, DESPITE HIS LOW CLASS AND UPBRINGING. Although his methods are unclear, it still shows that class doesn’t have a particularly large effect on the American Dream, it just makes it slightly more difficult to achieve. 85

Buber essay. A whole class discussion on 1/26 led to the teacher and students discussing how characters treated each other over the course of the novel. After class I spoke with Ms. Smith about the philosopher Martin Buber (1958) and his philosophical view of I/IT and I/Thou. Ms. Smith thought the conception might help students see how the characters in the novel treated each other. She also thought that the students might be able to understand how the character’s relationships are not static but change depending on the events of the novel. Ms. Smith wanted the students to understand the complexity of the character’s relationships and used Buber (1958) as a frame to scaffold the understanding.

Figure 4. 4 Buber (1958) Writing Assignment Directions

The students turned in their drafts on 1/28, and before they submitted them to Ms.

Smith for a grade they completed another writing assignment where they were asked to read three other essays and provide comments (praise and critique).

Argumentative Literary Essay. The final essay and culmination of the instructional unit was a literary argumentative essay in which students were asked to 86 select a character and analyze how that character would feel about the concept of the

American dream each student had developed during the unit. To do so, students were asked to draw on their in-class essays and the articles, as well as their chapter notes for evidence to support their claims. Ms. Smith wanted the students to write an argument about the novel but also wanted the students to incorporate the unit’s essential question about status, class, power, and the American dream but was unsure of how to best combine them.

She asked for my input early on in the unit and we spoke several times over the course of the unit until she decided that they could use their initial in-class writing to build an argument which included issues of the American dream as well as character analysis details they discussed throughout the unit. I assisted in shaping the assignment’s prompt but not the evaluation criteria. Students were given several work days in the computer lab before the essays were due on the 10th of February. Figure 4.5 describes the assignment and how Ms. Smith assessed the students, including the scoring rubric.

Figure 4. 5 Literary Argument Essay Directions and Rubric

Instructional Conversations. Similar to most English language arts classrooms’

concern for discussing literature, instructional conversations during The Great Gatsby

unit were a reoccurring activity (193 minutes of 1200 minutes for the unit) for the

88 teaching and learning of literary argumentation. During the instructional conversations, students explored ideas collaboratively after having read and written notes individually.

While frequent, instructional conversations in this class asked students to share their ongoing interpretations while Ms. Smith guided the students’ close reading and rereading from the book. As noted above, Ms. Smith also had a difficult time understanding her role during these instructional conversations-- they functioned more like recitations than explorations of students’ responses to the texts under study. Her struggle was grounded in a desire to, on the one hand, use whole class discussions to ensure her students’ understandings of longstanding interpretations of The Great Gatsby, and, on the other hand, to reshape her role in shaping the students’ literary interpretations. In the next section I will outline how her understanding of the role of literary argumentation began to shift by highlighting how the theoretical roots of argumentation and literary theory played out in the instructional conversations.

Tensions of authorizing interpretations and warranting evidence. As noted above, literature instruction in many secondary ELA classrooms are built on multiple theoretical framings which are sometimes at odds with each other (Applebee, 1993).

Those framings were also present in Ms. Smith’s course and the theoretical differences were compounded when she pivoted to teach the students literary argumentation. An ongoing question for my collaborative work with Ms. Smith throughout the year was: what exactly is literary argumentation? Ms. Smith was familiar with the teaching of evidence and claims as she saw the close connection to her existing teaching practices and her beliefs about the teaching of literature but warrants became a sticking point when

89 she planned assignments and lessons. As Tessa noticed above, Ms. Smith’s English class was different. The teacher and students did all of the same types of English “stuff” that the students recognized but now students were asked to make warrants which connected the evidence they selected to their claims. The warrants established in the course were built on an inquiry foundation, meaning, the students and Ms. Smith were guided by an overarching question for the year which acted as a boundary for determining how they would read each text and what sorts of annotations were pertinent to their ongoing discussion.

For Ms. Smith a key challenge was what literary argumentation was and how it was different than literary analysis. She adopted the principles and practices which foregrounded the social practices of argumentation but she felt that she needed to establish a common thread which thematically linked the texts, activities, and writings the students completed over the course of the year. Her solution was to examine the

American dream using the overarching question “what is the American dream” and a unit level question for every unit. These questions provided frames for the course which narrowed the ways in which they “read” the literature. The questions were only a boundary, but the boundary was informed by New Criticism and close reading practices and reader response practices. Meaning, the students continued to engage in disciplinary practices like close reading and annotation, but those practices were used to engage with the unit and course’s guiding questions. What follows is an analysis of the ways in which

Ms. Smith socially constructed through language and through her pedagogical decisions a literary argument approach to the teaching of The Great Gatsby.

For example, Ms. Smith mentioned that she was hesitant to join the AWP during the summer workshop for fear of losing her curriculum and what she was comfortable with. She enjoyed that ELA afforded students an opportunity to use figurative language to support their literary analysis essays but once she began to have conversations with me, her colleagues in the AWP, and the new approach she was not sure if figurative analysis was enough.

Figure 4.6 represents what I see as Ms. Smith’s approach to incorporating literary argumentation into her curriculum. She was comfortable with formalist and disciplinary ways of warranting interpretations and made it clear that reader response was more about

“personal experience” (Interview 7/22/15). My discussions with Ms. Smith over the course of the first semester were about her thoughts and feelings and what went right.

When she asked about how to support the students in a literary argument essay we discussed how to scaffold the unit with activities and writing assignments. The figure illustrates how Ms. Smith and my discussions about theory and research fit into how she thought about her classroom, her activities, her assignments, and her students.

Figure 4. 6 Ms. Smith Moving toward a social practice/dialogic perspective in teaching literary argument

Formalist Disciplinary Social Reader •Close Reading •ELA Practice/ Response •Text as Authority •Literary Topi Dailogic •Individual reader •Shared and in transaction negotiated with text interpretations •Framed Readings

Literary argumentation practices are social in that they are communicative acts in which the students engage with others to use language to socially construct new knowledge though social interaction (Newell et al., 2017). Newell et al. also highlight the social ways in which warrants are constructed through talk. For example, at the far left of

Figure 4.6 the arrow represents the decontextual practices of literary analysis where warrants are tacitly perceived through problem solving practices and systematized analysis of a text in isolation. The practices of formalism and disciplinary based practices of English Language arts are shaping the ways in which Ms. Smith and her students understand and discuss literature. Similarly, on the far left of the figure the other arrow represents reader response practices which represent warrants from the reader’s transaction with the text. In the middle of the arrows sits a social practice perspective or a

92 dialogic perspective which draws on both approaches but maintains a localized cohesion by creating rules or shared criteria for how the reading has been framed.

What we decided to do was build one writing assignment upon the other so that the students would be able to draw upon their own writing in the unit to support the composing of their final essays. What was not as clear in our discussions and in her instructional chain was the role the literature discussions would play in supporting the students’ final literary analysis essays.

Literary Argumentation Practices in The Great Gatsby Unit

Rosenblatt’s (1978) transactional theory, is a perceived relativism of literary interpretations as being equal because they stem from an individual’s reading and as such are warranted (Faust, 2000). What Rosenblatt and, within the context of literary argumentation, Newell et al. offer as a way to describe the socially constructed “way to read” a text is the concept of warranted assertability (Dewey,1941). Assertability, for

Rosenblatt, is a “shared criteria concerning methods of investigation and kinds of evidence” (p. 1078). Analyzing “shared criteria” within the social plane of Ms. Smith’s unit will reveal how she understood literary argumentation and how she wanted her students to negotiate the unit.

To analyze the literary argumentation practices within the unit I focused on two major categories: writing practices and literary interpretation practices. Within each set of practices, I highlight the typical practices which Ms. Smith asked the students to engage in over the course of the unit. By focusing on the instructional conversations about

93 writing and literary interpretation and the writing assignments, attention can be paid to how Ms. Smith construct the ways of reading and writing within the unit through language-in-use. As will become apparent, she often found herself and her students shifting from text-centered approaches—a legacy of her own teaching and learning—to more inquiry-based approaches during the instructional unit. However, this shift was challenging for her, and, at times, her students were a bit confused. This challenge is explored in the next section.

Literary Argumentation Writing Practices

The following analysis of writing prompts and key instructional conversations builds a foundation for my further examination of Ms. Smith and the students’ “shared criteria” for literary argumentation writing practices. By focusing on both the writing assignments and the key instructional conversations surrounding the writing practices, it is possible to capture both the process of entextualizing (Silverstein, 2005; Newell et al.,

2015) accountability of the practices through activity and assessment but also how the teacher and students use social interaction to constitute those practices during instructional conversations.

In the next section Table 4.1 represents the major writing assignments during the unit of study with their respective prompts which have been coded within the four literary argument frames discussed above. The writing assignments serve as curricular anchor points for the social practices being socially constructed. The unit began with Ms. Smith taking stock of what they had learned as a class since the start of the year and the unit level questions they had discussed as a class before she introduced The Great Gatsby

94 unit. The unit functioned like the previous unit but the focus during the observed unit was on issues of status and class and the American dream. The trajectory of the major writing assignments in the units largely function to build a contextualized understanding of what does and does not constitute appropriate arguments about the American dream within the context of status and class.

In establishing a coherent frame for reading the literature in a particular way, Ms.

Smith sought to draw on the students’ individual understandings as they collected evidence from the various genres to support their claims. While the writing tasks echo familiar disciplinary literacy practices the teachers and students were used to, they are nevertheless building a shared interpretive frame for “reading” the text together. By moving from the individual students’ reading to collect annotations to small group the students are negotiating their individual interpretations amongst each other and then ultimately with the entire class.

Table 4. 1 Frames of Major Writing Assignments

Literary Argument Frames

Writing Assignment & Writing Prompt

Formalist Disciplinary Social Practice Reader Response Annotated Bibliography “a short (3-4 sentence) commentary on the Annotations based on students’ article. In the commentary, you should include the genre of the article individual interpretations of the (news, short story, poetry) and connection with The American Dream American dream or with Class/Status.”

In-class Essay Students synthesize citations from their “Define The American Dream based on the articles that you annotated bibliographies and include a read? How does class and/or status effect that definition?” citation from another group. Students Make sure your response is based on the articles that you read. You also need to explain how class and status are welcome to use any of the articles explored by our class. You will affect their definitions need to reference either the article title or the author’s name as a citation for your examples. You need to include at least 3 sources in this writing but more are certainly allowed. One of those sources must be from another group.”

Reading Notes Students individually annotate “Make note of anything” which “would be a good addition” to their based on their understandings of thinking about the American dream. the American dream

Character Analysis Essay Students “Consider the relationships we have discussed in The Great Gatsby. individually wrote We may not be able to neatly categorize these relationships as I-It or I- an analysis of Thou relationships but instead, these may be dynamic relationships that Tom’s relationship 96 go through stages. Relook at either Tom or Daisy’s or Tom and with Daisy or Myrtles’s relationship through Buber’s (1958) philosophical Myrtle using framework. Evaluate the status of their relationship throughout the philosophical course of the novel to this point.” frame in their analysis

Literary Argument Essay -Textual citations Contextual “Pick a character from The Great Gatsby and analyze how that Character analysis warrant of character would feel about your definition of The American Dream the (from your In Class Writing on 1/14). Review your notes from each of American the chapter sections in order to gather the evidence before you pick a dream character or make a claim.”

The first assignment was an annotated bibliography in which students needed to learn the skill of creating an annotated bibliography because it was a requirement for

English 12 at DHS (Teacher Interview 2/25/16). After the assignment was introduced, the students worked independently to read their articles and select three texts which they feel best represented the American dream. Once they had been given work time to annotate and established a rationale for why certain texts should be presented to the class, they then met in small groups of students who had been given the same texts to read and annotate. The small groups worked to agree on the three texts to present to their peers.

From there students developed notes and prepared for their in-class essays on January

14th.

The in-class essays were individual writing assignments that were based on small group and whole class understandings. The students were asked to create their own definition of the American dream based on their individual, small group, and finally whole class understandings. Their definitions were not based on The Great Gatsby, rather, they were based on their ongoing understandings, their personal experience, and the texts they read for their small groups. The in-class essay served as a major anchoring point for the unit because it became the foundation for the students’ ongoing understandings of the American dream and The Great Gatsby. Figure 4.7 below represents the practices that feed into the assignment and the trajectories for the remainder of the unit.

Figure 4. 7 Writing Assignment Trajectory for The Great Gatsby Unit

Annotated Bibliography *Individual In-Class Reading *Disciplinary Essay Notes *Small Group *Individual *Individual *Consenus *Diciplinary *Diciplinary Literary *Whole Class Analsyis Essay *Individual *Disciplinary Character *Framed Analysis Analysis Essay *Disciplinary

Building a shared frame for literary interpretation is supported with local evidence. A major practice for Ms. Smith and the students was to select evidence to support their interpretations of the text. This practice is common to the ELA discipline, but the way in which the class came to narrow what counted as evidence was an important facet of the unit. The undergirding literary frame impacts how the teacher and students viewed what counted as appropriate evidence during the unit. In order to build a

“shared criteria” by which to read, argue, and make interpretations, the students and teacher focused on establishing a shared understanding of the American dream by using a set of shared readings.

To establish a shared frame for the literature unit, the assignments, the reading discussions and the summative writing assignment, Ms. Smith asked the students to 99 consider the following questions: “Has our vision of the American dream changed after reading the Scarlet Letter? After listening to Serial? After talking about justice? Than at the beginning of school when we first talked about this?” (1/4 Class). By framing the new unit within the context of a continually evolving definition of the American dream Ms.

Smith is recontextualizing their past understanding of the American dream readings, assignments, and writing as they explore issues of status, class, and power in The Great

Gatsby unit. While the idea of the American dream is not new to the students this is the first time they focused on class and status as an interpretive frame for reading the text throughout the unit.

Also important is the order in which Ms. Smith built the interpretative frame. In the first lesson of the new unit she asks students to think about the American dream, the old units they’ve studied, write a quick-write about how they think about the AD and then she introduces the annotated bibliography assignment. The first assignment worked as a way to bridge several practices; (1) disciplinary practices, which Ms. Smith also explains is an assignment they are expected to complete in English 12 as well as in college, (2) background knowledge, (3) multiple perspectives based on several genres and other students’ understanding of the American dream, (4) offer a public discourse through class presentations for building a shared understanding and rationale for annotated texts, and finally (5), the initial assignment was meant for students to gather multiple pieces of textual evidence to warrant their definitions of the American dream for their upcoming in-in class essays on January 14th.

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Ms. Smith worked to establish minimum criteria for viable evidence for her unit.

Similar to Rosenblatt’s (1988) discussion of multiple interpretations which suggested that having a public understanding for the basis of interpretations allows different interpretations to “satisfy the criteria more fully than others” (p. 8) what mattered to Ms.

Smith was that students were able to articulate thoughtful definitions of their own stances of the American dream with textual support from multiple perspectives and to carry those understandings with them as they read The Great Gatsby. While the final essay prompt was largely a work in progress, the nature of the assignments, the instructional conversations and the in-class work all built toward a final writing task which was rooted in those criteria.

The in-class essay acted as a bridge to the contextual knowledge produced by the students in the annotated bibliography assignment. The essay was timed and meant to segue from the disciplinary literacy practices and skills, both declarative and procedural, of English Language Arts (e.g. in-text citations) through the prism of social-interaction

(e.g. small groups and whole-class presentations) where students engaged in learning to argue tasks (Newell et al., 2015) which reinforced the unit’s essential question about the

American dream and status and class. The in-class essay also asked students to come to terms with or in other words, shore up, their ongoing understandings before being introduced to The Great Gatsby the following day (1/15).

In Chapter 6, I present findings from an analysis of a case study student’s final essay. The tracing reveals how she drew on the writing assignments as she composed her final essay. The analysis of the case study student’s writing demonstrated that she drew

101 widely on her own writing as she responded to the prompts when she backed her evidence to her claims but that she also pulled evidence which was not directly tied to her own writing. This suggests that Ms. Smith’s understanding of a social practice approach to literary argumentation was evolving. Ms. Smith understood the connections and importance of linked writing assignments across the unit but did not fully integrate her use of classroom literature discussions to support her students composing.

Teacher-led Events: Creating a Context for Reading the Great Gatsby

In this section I analyze how Ms. Smith built a context for discussing the novel over the course of the unit which paralleled the overarching learning trajectory for the school year about the American dream. The events selected for analysis focused on how the teacher framed the important practices which built toward a shared understanding of the novel encouraged students to consider a range of possible interpretations, and taught students argumentative practices using multiple writing assignments which Ms. Smith intended as practices students could engage in as they crafted their written responses. To simplify the presentation of the unfolding practices, the events are broken up into reading events and writing events. I also focus on how Ms. Smith introduced each task and entextualized (Silverstein, 2005) how the assignments fit into the larger trajectory of events and practices she is trying to shape.

How to “read” The Great Gatsby

Newell and Bloome (2017) argue for a framing of literature instruction which asks these two important questions 1) “How can this text be read here, now, among us

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(the people present)?” and 2) “How might it be read in the future, in other spaces, among other people?” (p. 379). The role the teacher plays is integral in determining the ultimate possibilities for how interpretations are socially constructed. While not deterministic, the role of the teacher is key into understanding how students are provided opportunities for taking up a range of the practices offered (Smagorinsky, Smith & Marshall, 1995).

Building from previous units, Ms. Smith used the first day of the unit to introduce and then connect the new unit within the larger course question about the American dream. Transcript 4.1 illustrates how Ms. Smith connected the reading of The Great

Gatsby with the previous units. She identifies the upcoming unit and the overarching question: “What is the American dream?” but adds they are going to be “looking at status and power”.

Transcript 4. 1 January 4th whole class instruction, explaining the unit

Speaker Message Unit 1 Teacher This nine weeks we’re going to switch up that idea we’re going to look 2 at class and status 3 and how that plays into the American dream. 4 So 5 our focus is going to be around that idea of class and status how does it 6 affect the American dream 7 and with that we are going to be reading The Great Gatsby. This week though we are going to look at xxx that idea of the American 8 dream 9 looking at status and power and how that plays into the American dream

As Ms. Smith frames the new unit of study in transcript 4.1 is, she frames how they will read the text together. In transcript 4.1 she identifies the “idea of class and status” and how they “affect the American dream.” Starting on line 7 she reveals that the

103 class will first learn about the idea of the American dream by working together to read multiple texts which feature the American dream in varying genres (e.g. short stories, poems, and news articles). Transcript 4.2 echoes her calls for the class to read the text in a narrowed way but she also introduces the character, Gatsby.

Transcript 4. 2 January 4 whole class instruction, foreshadowing the reading

Speaker Message Unit 1 Teacher So 2 we are going to look at Gatsby 3 and Gatsby connects with this very nicely because he has a very 4 defined dream 5 he is able to attain that dream and yet there is still something missing 6 for him 7 he is at the top he understands consequences but at the same time he has the status he 8 has the power he has the rags to riches story that we love from the 9 early nineteen hundreds and yet something is missing for Gatsby his American dream can’t be easily defined by money he thinks it can but it can’t 10 so big picture we’ll wrap up here were going to continue to go back to this idea of defining the American dream but really more focusing in on that idea of class, status, power how does that play into the American dream

While the introduction of the titular character seems innocuous, it foreshadows how the class will learn about the American dream and the text. The students will explicate how central characters attain or fail to attain the American dream by understanding what “play[s] into the American dream”. The focus on understanding key characters’ relationship to the American dream is a thread which stitched together many of the writing assignments and class discussions over the course of the unit. The culminating assignment, the literary analysis essay, illustrated how importantly Ms.

Smith saw the connection between how she thought The Great Gatsby should be read and 104 how the framing of the identified themes of status and class related to the text’s characters. Specifically, Ms. Smith’s repetition of the words “status” in lines 7 and 10 call attention to her positioning of the new unit but also how she links the frame she established with the previous units (line 10) to the overarching inquiry into the American dream.

Framing Tensions in Reading and Writing Practices

Writing as disciplinary practices. As noted earlier in this chapter, the writing assignments in this unit were designed, introduced, and structured to cultivate practices for analyzing the content of the novel and habits of mind related to argumentation. The trajectory of writing assignments is representative of an integrated chain because Ms.

Smith returned repeatedly to the frame she introduced on January 4th (Transcript 4.1) as well as her use of multiple varying activities to engage the students in literary argumentation (Newell et al., 2015). Instructional conversations, however, were not used to reinforce the practices Ms. Smith sought to establish in the writing assignments.

The summer prior to my yearlong observation, Ms. Smith worked to redesign her curriculum to include her newly gained knowledge of argumentation and writing from the

Argumentative Writing Project’s three-week summer course. She was hesitant to do so but understood that to scaffold her students’ understanding of argumentation and the texts she wanted to teach, she needed to treat her assignments as “stepping stones”. In our first interview (7/22/15), she explained how she viewed adding argumentation to her existing curriculum and the practices she wanted the students to learn. “As I am planning, I am thinking about the formative and summative assessments and as I chose what we were

105 going to do this year, the argumentative framework has been at the forefront of my mind.” Ms. Smith also understood, however, that the framing of learning to argue and arguing to learn might be at odds with how she thinks about teaching and learning literature. In an interview she commented that

I feel like very clearly my view [of literature] is right. I would never say that [to

the students], of course, but I very clearly have a right answer in my mind and

sometimes when kids are so far on the other side of the argument than I am I feel

going back and looking at that discussion, I clearly pushed what I thought was

right. I’m going to try and be conscious of that. (7/22/15 Interview)

Ms. Smith was not comfortable with the idea that argumentation could lead to interpretations which might not be correct according to her previous experiences as a student and teacher of literature. She cites Applebee’s article, “Toward Thoughtful

Curriculum: Fostering Discipline-Based Conversations” (1994) which she read during the summer workshop as an important turning point for how she would take a step back from authorizing a particular reading of the novels they read. She wanted to be conscious of her asymmetrical position as a teacher within literature discussions and cited Applebee’s work as helpful in helping her realize that she needed to cultivate spaces for students to offer their interpretations within her curriculum.

When asked how she would sustain a yearlong examination of the American dream and argumentation she responded, “Tension. I think the idea of tension and finding tension will help.” Tension as a teaching tool and practice became central to how she thought about her role as a teacher when giving students latitude to make their own

106 arguments but the idea of tension was reinforced in the writing assignments she wanted the students to engage in as they read. Ms. Smith believed that,

Writing helps them practice their skills and should lead to the summative

assignment. I guess. I guess I see it [the formative writing assignments] as a way

to help them be successful for the paper. (Interview 7/22/25)

Ms. Smith believed that writing gave students the chance to practice their ideas and skills. Even though she does not name a set of practices she saw writing in two ways.

First, writing is a way for students to practice what they have learned in class and two, writing is a way to support students in their final writing assignments.

As Ms. Smith adopted literary argumentation into her curriculum, she began to shift from writing processes and disciplinary knowledge of literature to include writing arguments about literature. Meaning, skills and the procedural knowledge associated with writing were present prior to the adoption of literary argumentation, but she now needed to include the skills of Toulmin (1958) argumentation.

Writing assignments for Ms. Smith became a thread to maintain continuity of the argumentative skills she was attempting to teach. It made the practices visible and allowed the students to see the progress they were making. Her students began to understand some of these shifts in Ms. Smith’s teaching. For instance, during an end of unit interview, one of Ms. Smith’s students, Tiffany, agreed that the writing they did in class was different compared to her previous English classes but thought the

“Assignments we did made sense. Like. They worked with each other.” The difference for Tiffany and many of the other students was that the assignments were integrated with

107 one another and that there “were no right or wrong answers” (Sam, Interview, 6/2/15) or

“she wasn’t looking for a correct answer in the papers…she [Ms. Smith] just wanted you to justify it” (Caleb, Interview, 6/1/15)

At the end of the unit Ms. Smith concluded that the Gatsby unit “mostly worked.”

She believed that the students used the assignments and activities throughout the unit as they were supposed to but hinted that some students still didn’t get it. For instance, one student, Sarah, was asked to rewrite her paper by Ms. Smith because Ms. Smith felt she did not use the class writing and activities enough in her final paper. A successful paper for Ms. Smith, “drew on the American dream definitions they came up with, the character stuff [Buber I/It I/Thou assignment, 1/29/15], their reading journals, and the in-class writing they did” (2/18/15).

In other words, Ms. Smith believed successful student writing drew on students’ individual background experiences of the American dream, their in-class writing assignment, their reading journals, and their classroom discussions. The writing served as a way to practice and participate in the unfolding contextual understanding of the text.

The American dream assignments were used to engage students in the practices valued.

Instructional conversations, on the other hand, were treated very differently than the writing assignments—some of the tensions that emerged in Ms. Smith’s instructional conversation are considered in the next session.

Tensions in talk. If the writing assignments in the Gatsby unit were an integrated chain, the instructional conversations were a series of discrete episodes. Our initial

108 planning session (7/22/15) revealed her hesitation to avoid students’ responses and in her view giving “right answers”. Recall that she stated,

I feel like very clearly my view is right. I would never say that [to the students],

of course, but I very clearly have a right answer in my mind and sometimes when

kids are so far on the other side of the argument than I am I feel going back and

looking at that discussion, I clearly pushed what I thought was right.

She understood that she needed to be conscious of how she presented her interpretation of characters and scenes she thought were important—she was concerned that she might overly influence the students. Ms. Smith was aware that during classroom discussions she might have asymmetric power dynamic over what counted as a meaningful interpretation (Marshall, Smagorinsky, & Smith, 1995) when she responded to my questions about her role as a teacher during literature discussions.

While Ms. Smith worked to provide opportunities for her students to “try out” literary argumentation practices throughout the unit, tensions arose between how the underlying warrants were being brought to bear in the writing assignments as compared to the instructional conversations. Meaning, the roots of the writing assignments favored a social practice approach to understanding the novel in terms of the units’ inquiry, where the instructional conversations tended to be rooted in New Criticism and disciplinary practices. Warranting evidence for Ms. Smith was based on problem solving or literary topos and stemmed from her experiences teaching literature at DHS. Implicit warrants which tacitly answered why evidence was worth citing were circulating during talk and dominated many of the conversations, but the shared criterion for warranting their

109 contextual understanding and driving their “shared reading” were in tension with disciplinary practices. For example, on January 20th Ms. Smith facilitated a literature discussion about interpreting a character’s actions,

Transcript 4. 3 Warranting toward a shared reading

Speaker Message Unit Teacher Hmm he could leave her he’s not going to though Right Anna he would probably just freak out a bit Sam he would just laugh Teacher she has no recourse right she has no power to do anything

Prior to this exchange, Ms. Smith asked the students if Daisy had any options when dealing with her husband, Tom. A student replied that Daisy could leave and Ms.

Smith replies that he [Tom] could leave her [Daisy] but that she could not leave him, and that “she has no power to do anything”. What this interaction demonstrates is that Ms.

Smith wants the students to move beyond a textual interpretation but one which also includes the classes’ framed reading of power, class, and status. While brief, this interaction highlights a movement toward the unit’s inquiry question and attempts to connect the students’ understanding of Daisy. Ms. Smith asks the students a question about Daisy but the student’s response does not include the criteria or power so Ms.

Smith revoices Anna’s interpretation to include the word “power”.

In this chapter, I described some of the institutional and interactional forces that shaped Ms. Smith’s plans for and enactment of literature-related argumentative writing in the Honors American Literature classroom. It was evident that Ms. Smith carefully

110 considered our initial and ongoing discussions to establish a frame for reading the novel and created assignments to support the students’ literary argumentation practices.

Ms. Smith’s decisions regarding argumentation and a more exploratory approach were encouraged by my collaborative efforts as well as from her participation in the

AWP which began in summer 2016 and unfolded across the 2016-2017 school year. As changes in approach to literature and to related writing assignments shifted from pre- planned templates and a legacy of New Critical beliefs to concern for students’ sense- making it became clear that Ms. Smith was evolving in her understanding of how writing supported her students. What was less clear was how instructional conversations supported her students’ literary argumentation practices and understandings.

In the next chapter I take a microethnographic discourse analysis approach to instructional conversations of three key events where tacit literary warranting was central to the teaching and learning of literary argumentation.

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Chapter 5: Analyzing Tacit Warrants in Literature Discussions

In this chapter, I focus on how Ms. Smith and her students discussed The Great

Gatsby by returning to the social practices identified in Chapter Four. In doing so I examine events which were telling in how they suggested the shared or local criterion of what constituted appropriate literary argumentation practices within the unit. The previous chapter included an analysis of Ms. Smith’s literary argument practices and was illustrative of how she struggled to adopt new practices. While it is important to understand how a teacher constructs the curriculum in a way to engage their students in a particular curricular conversation (Applebee, 1996), that analysis only provides a partial picture into what is happening within a social practice perspective. Students are agentive learners within a social practice perspective and an analysis of key events within the unit should illustrate how they adopt, adapt, reflect and refract the practices Ms. Smith was attempting to establish within the unit through her use of writing and literary interpretation practices. Those practices identified in Chapter Four were Ms. Smith’s attempts to establish resources for the class to build a shared understanding of The Great

Gatsby within the context of the American dream and the themes of status and class, in particular.

This chapter presents a discourse analysis of language-in-use of naturally occurring classroom events focused on building “shared criteria” of literary argumentative practices. “Shared criteria” refers to Rosenblatt’s belief that establishing

112 shared criteria for reading also included beliefs about what counted as evidence. As noted from the findings in Chapter Four, the shared criteria of literary argument practices in the

Honors American Literature course were built from multiple literary frames depending on the writing assignment and how the instructional conversations were framed in relation to the central question of the unit. The events analyzed in this chapter are telling in that argumentation was being implicitly or explicitly communicated. I focused on three events where literary warrants were central to the discussion. These events were selected as telling cases (Mitchell, 1984) because they illustrate how literary argument practices become constructed socially though interaction across time as the events’ thematic coherence (Bloome et al., 2005). Also, key in these events is how the teacher and students work together though talk to present textual evidence as their underlying locations of knowledge demonstrate the emergence of tensions.

My work as a collaborator was most apparent in my support of Ms. Smith’s long- term goals. Those goals were centered around big picture planning; focusing on an inquiry based curriculum like the American dream and in the planning of writing assignments across the unit. However, Ms. Smith did not ask about instructional conversations and I only asked what her plans were if I interviewed her after I observed a literature discussion, when I would ask “how she thought it went?”. Literature discussions were not a topic we covered during our collaborations aside from my formal and informal interview questions. My analysis of the events reveals that Ms. Smith’s use of instructional conversations are not coherently linked to the larger inquiry trajectory.

There are attempts to make connections to the local or shared criteria for reading the

113 novel on the surface, an analysis below the surface reveals that Ms. Smith’s favored decontextual or disciplinary knowledge during the literature discussions.

Bloome and colleagues (2005) argue for an approach for emically understanding classroom literacy events, and in particular shifts in the location of knowledge within the ongoing events. They suggest that multiple levels of analysis are needed to distinguish the possible locations of knowledge. That is, when observing and making claims about the cultural practices, care should be taken to understand that knowledge is “continuously contested, dynamic, and intermediate” and that “multiple, parallel and even competing locations of knowledge” are present in and across literacy events (p. 91). By using multiple levels of analysis, inferences can be made about how Ms. Smith is attempting to pivot the location of knowledge away from herself as authorizer of literary interpretations to one which is contextual and generated within the community of learners. The above the surface analysis highlights the location of knowledge within the context of speakers and the text while the below the surface level analysis demonstrates the cues Ms. Smith is giving to the students about what counts as an interpretation within the class’s shared frame within the context of argumentation. I also demonstrate in the selected events times when Ms. Smith does not make the location of knowledge clear or when she focuses on decontextual understandings to warrant the evidence for students’ interpretations.

The events selected are strong representations of the identified practices enacted during instructional conversations and were typical of Ms. Smith’s instructional conversations. The general ebb and flow of this unit could be summarized as students reading independently and then preparing for structured whole class discussions with

114 activities focusing on argumentation, writing, and literary analysis mixed throughout. The unit had three major reading discussion phases before the students prepared for their final literary analysis essays.

As was mentioned in Chapter Three and Chapter Four, the focus of writing best represented an integrated chain while the instructional conversations were not clear in how they supported the students final writing assignment and Ms. Smith’s goals. The writing assignments best represented an integrated chain and the instructional conversations closely represent a collection chain. As VanDerHeide and Newell (2013) note, an instructional chain is a sequence of sessions or events which leads up to and are directly tied to a summative writing assignment. The instructional chain provides a warrant for the typicality of the events analyzed as the curricular events generally related to the final literary argument essay. Because the writing events in this chain are integrated based on Ms. Smith’s planning and to some extent our collaborative efforts, the writing lessons and prompts build toward the final essay. Also, key in the integrated writing assignments was Ms. Smith’s attempt to design assignments which highlighted opportunities for students to “try out” literary argument practices. The only lesson which built adjacently toward the summative essay was the characterization essay which focused on explaining two character’s relationship in terms of Martin Buber’s I/It I/Thou philosophy (1958) because the prompt was more about characterization and understanding the relationship between two characters (e.g. Tom and Daisy).

Instructional conversations, while fruitful opportunities for students to discuss the novel and interact with each other and Ms. Smith, were more problematic as they did not

115 align with the literary argument practices identified in Chapter Four. Rather, many of the discussions were based on decontextualized and disciplinary “readings” of The Great

Gatsby. What follows are typical events which demonstrate how Ms. Smith organized writing and instructional conversations to support the teaching and learning of literary argument practices within the unit.

Description of Events

The three events selected for analysis were central to establishing the shared frame for Ms. Smith and the students. Also important is that Ms. Smith believed that she was providing meaningful opportunities for students to engage with the topics within the contextual frame she and the class were co-constructing but also that the topics should be used by the students as they composed their final literary argument essays at the unit’s end.

The framing of “how to read The Great Gatsby” from January 4th, as discussed in

Chapter 4, acted as a foundation for the class to understand the nature and role of their new unit of study and how they would create a shared understanding over the course of their reading. It also created a context which dovetailed with the overall framing presented by Ms. Smith at the start of the school year. What follows are closely analyzed instructional conversations surrounding the teaching and learning of writing- and literature-based events, as well as key events where literary argumentation was being taught.

Events were analyzed and transcribed, demonstrating how Ms. Smith and her students discussed both the literary features of the novel while attempting to develop their 116 understanding of the text through argumentation. The analysis of the instructional conversations in these events pays attention to the surface level of the ongoing interaction with respect to the locations of knowledge (e.g. Teacher, text, student) and then finally the underlying level which focuses on the ways in which the instructional conversation includes contextual or decontextual notions of literary interpretation as well as what particular argumentative elements are being offered during the conversation.

Bloome et al. (2004) present a microethnographic discourse analysis of classroom literacy practices using the surface and underlying levels to analyze when practices are being maintained and changed in talk. I also analyzed classroom talk as the dual layer analysis allows for comparison of surface level practices of a literature discussion and the underlying layer for literacy practices Ms. Smith was attempting to bring about in her teaching practice.

Disciplinary Practices within a Literary Argument Frame

As part of our ongoing collaborative discussions we often discussed how to best scaffold her writing and activities to support students’ opportunities for engaging in literary argumentation practices. While my support as a collaborator was consistent throughout the year-long study including during The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald, 1925) unit, Ms. Smith only asked my advice with regard to planning. Ms. Smith did not ask for my input for how literary argumentation practices would impact her instructional conversations. However, Ms. Smith sought to introduce the students to literary argumentation in their writing by establishing several literary argument practices during the unit (e.g. multiple perspectives, evidence as contextual, warranting as local, and

117 writing tasks as anchors of literary argument practices), but interactional analysis of those practices revealed that below the surface the tacit warrants used during the discussions varied greatly. While the practices Ms. Smith employed in this unit were meant to strengthen students’ understandings of the novel, and tensions between students’ understandings about how to make literary interpretations remained as they were highly influenced by the disciplinary literacy practice they brought with them into Ms. Smith’s class.

Instructional conversations. Over the course of the unit there were four events which were illustrative of the literary argument practices Ms. Smith was attempting to bring about with her students. The events span the length of the unit and focus on the literary argumentation practice of warranting. Warranting became an important link to the underlying tensions in Ms. Smith’s understanding about evolving to a social practice perspective of argumentation and is a larger tension in the field of English Language

Arts, as noted in Chapter One.

Literature discussions, as noted by Marshall, Smagorinsky, and Smith (1995) in all the classrooms they studied and across ability groups revealed that there were tensions in the ideas about literature discussions. They found that literature discussions were largely based on the text and that teachers did most of the leg work weaving a discourse to achieve their goals which often left students in passive roles. Ms. Smith was aware of her own biases in making sure students read the text in specific ways. The dynamics of instructional conversations demonstrated how she easily reverted to teacher-centered moves.

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For example, Ms. Smith attempted to move away from her conventional discourse patterns where she authorized “right” responses to one which provided opportunities for students to engage with each other and the text in substantive ways. This effect was consistently part of our discussions over the course of my observations. She repeated time and again that she wanted the students to draw their own conclusions but was unsure of what that would look like in impromptu flow of discussion.

Event 1: Warranting Evidence with Multiple Perspectives (January 20th)

Ms. Smith reported in an interview that she sought to teach her students that literary arguments were more complex and thus stronger if students considered multiple perspectives when they discussed and ultimately wrote about The Great Gatsby

(Fitzgerald, 1925). While the concept of multiple perspectives was not one which Ms.

Smith came to on her own, the AWP had ongoing discussions with the participating teachers about tensions which made the ensuing discussion, interpretations and arguments more complex. After the first literature unit on The Scarlet Letter (Hawthorne,

1850), Ms. Smith wanted to be clearer about the practices she wanted to engage her students in. In an interview on December 3rd she stated the following. “I think it went well. The papers were generally ok. I still think they [the students] tend to pick the same evidence. And we didn’t really get into warranting much. I’m going to”. This illustrates that Ms. Smith was reflective about how she was thinking about her teaching practice and how her students responded to her instruction and planning but was unsure of the moves to make within instructional conversations to signal this to her students.

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During the winter break, Ms. Smith mentioned that she wanted to spend more time planning how the writing and discussion topics would work together. Additionally, she wanted to bring complexity into the discussion by including multiple perspectives.

Below in transcript 5.1 is Ms. Smith’s introduction of multiple perspectives when considering how characters perceive each other’s actions (see Appendix D for a detailed discourse analysis). Ms. Smith is attempting to engage the student in a discussion of a scene by asking a series of questions. The analysis includes a focus on the surface levels of the instructional conversation and the underlying practices which illustrate how Ms.

Smith uses questions to frame and reframe the disciplinary practices by including contextual warrants.

Transcript 5. 1 Warranting evidence through multiple perspectives

Speaker Message Unit 1 Ms. Smith thinking about the perspective of characters 2 is there justification for breaking Myrtle’s nose 3 what happens? 4 same scene what does Nick think? 5 Nick we know gives what I think is the appropriate response 6 start to think about the differences of perspectives within the same scene 7 What about the party goers 8 What was their reaction?

Ms. Smith selected a controversial scene from the novel as a way to explore how other characters might perceive what is happening. The scene was controversial because of the content of their discussion which centered on the justification for a male character

[Tom] breaking a female character’s [Myrtle] nose. By focusing on an event which lends itself to tension and multiple points of analysis, she transitioned from a more traditional

120 disciplinary approach of sourcing textual evidence to warrant a response to one which could reframe the analysis to include contextual analysis of their shared reading. For instance, when Ms. Smith asks in line 2 “is there justification for breaking Myrtle’s nose” she is asking for backing to explain why Tom acts the way he does. She is framing the introduction of multiple perspectives by asking a question which could be answered by looking within the text. In the next lines, line 3 and 4, Ms. Smith continues by asking what happens. The answer to that question again could be answered without having a contextual understanding of the impact of status and class within the text.

In line 5, Ms. Smith continues the frame established in line 2 to ask Nick’s thoughts about the scene. While this move appears to reframe the interpretative question

Ms. Smith asks in line 2, she is really asking students to relay what the narrator [Nick] thinks. She continues in the following line (6) to evaluate her question from line 5 to say that Nick gives the “appropriate response”. While this whole interaction is rhetorical, it reveals an attempt by Ms. Smith to pivot from a typical literary analysis question in lines

2 and 4 where the location of knowledge can be found in the four corners of the text and is decontextual in that the interpretation is couched in formalist or strong disciplinary practices. What Ms. Smith is (rhetorically) asking is that students first think about a scene from the text and consider how they might provide backing to support their interpretation about Tom’s actions. What follows starting in line 6 is the result of Ms. Smith attempts to introduce how multiple perspectives provide complexity in how the students should think about argumentation.

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When Ms. Smith asks the students to “think about the differences of perspectives within the same scene” in line 6, she is pushing the students to consider the backing and ultimately warrants they are implicitly using when considering their initial analysis whether there is justification for breaking Myrtle’s nose. By reframing the question to include the party goers, Ms. Smith is including the larger social historical values, which is brought up in a later discussion and appears in many of the students’ final literary argument essays.

What this means is that Ms. Smith is asking the students to add complexity to their interpretations by pushing the students to consider multiple perspectives to consider the evidence. Meaning, students should warrant the initial evidence differently when they consider how the party goers might understand an interaction.

Event 2: Interpreting a Character’s Actions: Tacit Warranting (January 20th)

The second event occurs on January 20th and focused on an activity called “Save the Last Word for Me.” I used this activity as a teacher and with my student teachers as a way to get students to practice discussing the novel in detail. When introduced to the activity early in the unit, Ms. Smith liked the idea and waited to use the activity when the students were deeper into the novel. The point of the activity is to work in small groups and select a quote which best described the group’s assigned character. Students then are given time to individually write a line down on paper from the chapters the teacher assigned. The activity was meant to allow students to discuss the readings as a class but also provide the class with possible textual citations that they might find useful in composing their final essays.

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What follows is an analysis on the group who discussed Daisy. This was an important event for the class because it builds upon previous discussions of character analysis to include issues of contextual or local warranting. Local warranting refers to the inclusion of the shared frame Ms. Smith and the students were using to read the novel

(status, class, and power). As with the analyzed event before, the underlying movement between decontextual and contextual locations of knowledge are important as Ms. Smith is attempting to pivot the students from literary analysis practices which foreground slotting evidence to support interpretation which is often not warranted.

Transcript 5. 2 Warranting evidence based on a character’s actions

Speaker Message Unit 1 Karl Our quote is on page 17 and it’s uh “I’m glad it’s a girl and I’ll hope she’ll be a fool that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world. A beautiful fool” 2 Ms. why does that sum up Daisy? Smith 3 Pete so cynical 4 Like 5 Pete it not only describes her 6 it is kind of who she is trying to be xxx 7 John xxx she wishes she was ignorant to all of this 8 Smith she knows Tom is having an affair right? 9 But from the outside world what does it look like? 10 Anna she’s dumb 11 Pete Having a good time 12 being rich 13 Ms. yeah Smith 14 right 15 sit down and eat your pork chops forget about the mistress calling in the middle of dinner 16 so you said she wishes she were innocent to it all or ignorant of it all 17 But 18 is that the face 19 she is trying to put on 123

20 So, is it for herself or is it for society? 21 John seems like more for herself than for society 22 like it’s painfully obvious there are so many problems between her and Tom 23 So, at that point it would be very difficult if xxx she had not been close it 24 but if she’s just doing it all the time then she xxx distract herself from the situation 25 Ms. Okay Smith 26 what happens? 27 I love this quote 28 “I hope she will be a fool that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world a beautiful fool” 29 So, what happens if she pushes the issue? 30 you said she hates her domestic situation 31 what are her options? 32 first of all 33 Pete Xxx 34 Ms. do you think Tom would do that? Smith 35 Pete I don’t know 36 Ms. maybe to Myrtle Smith 37 do you think he would do that to Daisy? 38 Students No 39 Ms. why not Smith 40 Anna because Daisy’s higher class

The discussion began after students shared in their small groups and selected a quote which best summarized their group’s character. In line 1 Karl reads out loud the quote from his group, “I’m glad it’s a girl and I’ll hope she’ll be a fool. That’s the best thing a girl can be in the world. A beautiful fool”. Selecting evidence is an important practice in this classroom and is a point of emphasis within the language arts discipline.

It is also one that Ms. Smith continued to teach over the course of the year. Ms. Smith asks in line 2 “Why does that sum up Daisy?” What she is attempting to do is continue 124 the practice of sourcing and identifying textual evidence which supports the claims the class is co-constructing throughout the instructional conversation and, in part, over the course of the unit.

After Ms. Smith asks the class how the group’s textual evidence summarizes

Daisy as a character, several students offer interpretations. Pete, a student in Karl’s group, suggests in lines 3 to 6 that the selected quote is “so cynical” and that “it [the quote] not only describes her it is kind of who she is trying to be”. John, also in the same small group, adds in line 7 that “she wishes she was ignorant to all of this”. The responses from Pete and John attempt to provide textual backing but Ms. Smith pivots and extends the discussion in line 8 to remind the students that Daisy is aware that Tom is having an affair. While subtle, the question by Ms. Smith in line 9 reframes the interpretations by Pete and John, which are largely interpretations based on textual support and literary analysis. Ms. Smith seeks to reframe the analysis to include the values of society by asking “but from the outside world what does it look like?” Ms.

Smith is attempting to reframe the students’ cursory interpretations by asking the students to build upon their previous discussions of making their interpretations more complex by drawing on multiple perspectives in their arguments.

At the start of the discussion, once textual evidence has been provided, students have responded in ways that are not contextually rooted in Ms. Smith’s unit question of the American dream status, class, and power. Pete and Karl are responding in ways that are typical to most large class discussions of literature in that they are doing what

Marshall, Smagorinsky, and Smith (1995) call informing by providing a kind of

125 reasoning where they have made interpretations. Once Ms. Smith reframes the conversation by pushing students to understand Daisy’s character from multiple perspectives the conversation moves to include the society as a force upon the characters’ actions. The movement of viewing Daisy’s actions, and the unfolding analysis of her as a character and her relationship with Tom, within the context of society allows Ms. Smith to dig deeper into understanding the complexity of Daisy’s relationships.

Later in the discussion Ms. Smith asks more pointed questions about Tom and if

Daisy has any power to divorce Tom and introduces Myrtle to juxtapose Daisy’s options

(lines 29 to 39). What Ms. Smith is attempting to do is move the students past sourcing evidence and providing interpretations that are based solely on literary analysis practices and instead asking questions to drive students back to the classes’ shared criteria of class, status, and power. Anna sensing the shift responded, “because Daisy is high class” (line

40). Ms. Smith pauses and repeats “Daisy’s higher class” (line 41). This is a key shift in the discussion for complicating the actions and motivations of the characters and their relationships. What follows is a more complex discussion about the relationship between

Daisy and Tom and how they navigate society, class, and power.

Transcript 5. 3 Warranting Evidence Regarding Social Class and Power

Speaker Message Unit 41 Ms. Daisy’s higher class Smith 42 Okay 43 It’s not cool to beat up on your high class wife it’s okay to beat up on your low class mistress? 44 Elise I think it’s because doesn’t really 45 I want to say he loves her because that’s the only word I can think of right now but he just

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46 Myrtle is his mistress and he is not going to leave Daisy’s for Myrtle 47 Like 48 she thinks that but he’s not really going to leave Daisy he hasn’t done it with any of the other women and won’t do it with Myrtle 49 so he kind of just views her as an object and not as a person and he views Daisy as a person 50 Ms. Okay Smith 51 So, Tom 52 Jerk Tom views Daisy a real person 53 you think he puts value on her where he doesn’t on Myrtle 54 guess Myrtle xxx money and time

After Ms. Smith repeats Anna’s claim that Tom and Daisy will not divorce because of Daisy’s class the discussion pivots to include Tom. Ms. Smith points out in line 43 that “it’s not cool to beat up on your high-class wife it’s okay to beat up on your low-class mistress”. The role of status and class are integral in how the class is beginning to understand Daisy positioning as a character and what power she has at her disposal.

But key to the ongoing literary argument practice Ms. Smith has been attempting to bring about is the practice of looking at evidence though the lens of multiple perspectives.

Eileen’s contribution in lines 44 to 49 illustrate how students are using other characters and their actions to add complexity.

Eileen replies to Ms. Smith that “I want to say he [Tom] loves her because that’s the only word I can think of right now”. What Eileen is attempting to do is argue using the same evidence previously discussed that Tom is in love with Daisy and that he “kind of just views her [Myrtle] as an object and not as a person and he views Daisy as a person” (line 49). Eileen is articulating a view of Tom and Daisy’s relationship by

127 drawing on the ways status and class affect personhood. Ms. Smith extends Anna’s interpretation by revisiting issues of status and class to “value” (line 53).

Continuing the discussion in Transcript 5.4 Ms. Smith pushes the students to understand Daisy’s lack of power in terms of her positioning as a married woman in society.

Transcript 5. 4 Warranting Evidence Regarding Social Class and Power

Speaker Message Unit 84 Ms. total exclusion right Smith 85 social suicide 86 they would never be accepted back into society 87 so is this all about money for Daisy is this about social acceptance for Daisy why in the world is she staying with this jerk? 88 Anna she’s a gold digger 89 Ms. (laughing) she’s a gold digger Smith 90 do you think so? 91 Anna a bit but she has a xxx a think there’s a lot of factors 92 Elise I think she won’t leave him for the same reason he won’t leave her 93 Ms. why’s that? Smith 94 Elise because they care about each other but not as much as 95 they both cheat 96 but I don’t know how to explain it 97 Ms. they care about each other but not enough to not cheat Smith 98 so think about 99 you guys brought up 100 let’s just talk about Tom for a second 101 do you think if there is any recourse for Daisy to go to Tom and say stop it 102 what happens if she pushes this issue? 103 Student he could leave her 104 Ms. Hmm Smith 105 he could leave her 106 he’s not going to though 107 Right 128

108 Student he would probably just freak out a bit 109 Student 2 he would just laugh 110 Ms. she has no recourse right Smith 111 she has no power to do anything 112 think about 113 Student 2 what would make him stop 114 Ms. Okay Smith 115 that’s a good point 116 what would make him stop? 117 she has no way to make him stop does she 118 he knows that 119 he totally knows that 120 he’s not going to stop having affairs 121 he’s a man right xxx 122 he knows she has no power to stop him 123 Heather and in the chapters we read Tom kind of seems distracted a lot by the fact that Myrtle 124 like he’s going to meet Myrtle soon 125 like at that apartment and he kind of brushes off the topic when people bring it up 126 so I feel like Daisy brought up the topic of Myrtle he would just brush it off and ignore her 127 Ms. Okay Smith 128 so you don’t think he would even have a response to her 129 Katie Also 130 right now she’s kind of “I think this is happening” 131 she might be afraid to find out 132 Ms. kind of like they were saying Smith 133 putting on the face of stupid 134 pretend it’s not happening so it doesn’t hurt so bad

The discussion then shifts to the idea if Daisy had the social capital to divorce

Tom (lines 55 to 80) before Ms. Smith asks, “so is this all about money for Daisy is this about social acceptance for Daisy why in the world is she staying with this jerk [Tom]?”

(line 83). After Anna jokes that “She [Daisy] is a gold digger” in line 84 Eileen rejoins

129 the discussion claiming that “I think she won’t leave him for the same reason he won’t leave her” (line 88). She unpacks her claim to say that “they care about each other but not as much as/ they both cheat/ but I don’t know how to explain it” (lines 90 – 92). At this point of the discussion Ms. Smith wanted to explore Daisy and Tom’s relationship by asking questions about divorce and how society might view it in terms of Daisy’s options. What the Ms. Smith is working toward is building on how the class can warrant

Daisy’s actions by drawing on her relationship with Tom. By asking questions in lines

87, 90, 93, 102, and 116 Ms. Smith is attempting to weave the initial quote that Karl posed in relation to Daisy wanting her daughter to be a “beautiful fool” to the underlying contextual shared criteria that status, class, and power are of consequence which making claims, providing evidence, and ultimately warranting the evidence. After Ms. Smith’s question in line 116 the discussion shifts to include turns by students who provide additional backing for how Daisy lacks power within her relationship before Ms. Smith ends the discussion by suggesting that Daisy is “putting on the face of stupid” and that she “pretend[s] it’s not happening so it doesn’t hurt so bad” (line 134).

The movement across this event from the initial quote to Ms. Smith’s conclusion illustrates how Ms. Smith is attempting to add complexity to the students’ preliminary interpretations. It also highlights how Ms. Smith is attempting to remind students through her questioning, reframing, and contextualizing of the role status, class, and power held in their arguments about Daisy and the quote offered by Karl. Ms. Smith is not explicit in her discourse about how students should consider how the focus on multiple perspectives adds to the complexity of their arguments. While Ms. Smith is not explicit it does

130 illustrate her evolution by attempting to change her practices, however, this is a difficult bar to achieve. It may also explain why when students make interpretations they often provide backing to the general argument without making clear the warrants they are supporting.

Event 3: Symbolism in the Novel (February 2nd)

The third event occurs during a whole class discussion about symbolism that the class hadn’t discussed. The event took place on February 2nd and was one of the last discussions of the novel before students worked on writing their literary arguments which would be due the following week. As Ms. Smith welcomed the students to the class for the day she had previously written the words; white, seasons, and green light. As the bell rang she explained that in their class that day they would be discussing the “idea of symbolism that we haven’t really talked about.” What Ms. Smith is referring to is an effort she made over the course of the unit to not “give” students what she found valuable about the novel but instead ideas which may or may not contribute to the students’ understanding of the novel within the context of their shared goals and criteria. Applebee and Langer’s (1993) discussion of intentionality in the context of instructional scaffolding offers a way to consider how she thought about the “goals” of their reading and literature discussions and how they would apply within their unit questions and the how she may have been able to make her moves more clear to her students.

What Ms. Smith made clear from the onset of her transition to teaching literary argument was how she might incorporate quotes, symbols and scenes from the novel which she found compelling. She stated in several interviews her hesitation to “do too

131 much” and that she didn’t want to “influence their readings” (Interview, November

2015). What Ms. Smith was struggling with was what Marshall, Smagorinsky, and

Marshall (1995) found in their study of classroom literature discussions that teachers were, more often than not, the ultimate authorizers of students’ interpretations. She understood that as the teacher she wielded asymmetrical power during class discussion and she attempted to frame class activities and discussions back to the unit’s focus on class, status, and power. Ms. Smith’s attempts to “stand back” from interfering with students’ interpretations can be seen in how she has to explain to the students that symbolism isn’t something they focused on in their readings. The event was the first since the initial discussion of symbols and authorial intent on January 15th. The transcript starts on line 6 after Ms. Smith gave directions and then brought the groups back discuss as a class. The full transcript is in Appendix D.

Transcript 5. 5 Symbolism Discussion

Speaker Message Unit 6 Elise ok so we decided that white was very closely tied to Daisy and sometimes through Jordan 7 I took notes yesterday so I’m just going to read it 8 white symbolizes immaculate and pure beauty, nobleness, unblemished morality and purity but it also symbolizes emptiness superficiality ruthlessness and selfishness to a great extent in the novel in the novel and we said this because of Daisy in the beginning 9 Like 10 xxx oh she is pure and beautiful and that is how everyone describes her 11 and um 12 she comes out with a sparkling reputation even though after she associates herself with a drink at the party and she doesn’t do that so she is thought of as clean

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13 but the color white is also very bland and tasteless and it’s just boring and simple and it could be related to daisy because she herself isn’t very deep person 14 she is very shallow and very self-centered so eventually in the end the color white describes that xxx

The first group to respond is the White group and Elise shares her group’s answer to the question of symbolism and its role within the novel and how “it [the symbol] furthers our understanding as readers”. Elise states her group’s claim in line 6 that the color white is tied to the character Daisy and occasionally through Jordan and she continues in line 7 to say that she is going to read her response to the class. In lines 8 through 10 she read her notes and focuses on what the color white might mean generally before she transitions to include its connection to Daisy or Jordan. In her response, Elise also establishes a structural binary between how the symbol white might be perceived.

She states, “white symbolizes immaculate and pure beauty, nobleness, unblemished morality and purity” (line 8). But then pivots to say, “but it also symbolizes emptiness, superficiality, ruthlessness and selfishness to a great extent in the novel” (line 8). This is an important moment for many in the class as an analysis of students’ final essays revealed that of the students who wrote about Daisy all included this pivot in their analysis.

Continuing Elise’s response to the class she moves to provide backing to her claim that Daisy and the color white are closely tied. In lines 10 through 13 she links her analysis of the color white and its duality to Daisy, “oh she is pure and beautiful and that is how everyone describes her” and she is “thought of as clean” and has a “sparkling reputation”. But in line 13 and 14 she pivots to explain how white and Daisy are “bland 133 and tasteless”, “boring and simple”, and that “she [Daisy] herself isn’t a very deep person” and is “very shallow and very self-centered”. On the surface Elise’s analysis of the color white is a thoughtful interpretation to the symbolism and how it is linked to

Daisy, but below the surface Elise is offering a claim that the symbol of white is tied to

Daisy and then suggests through backing that Daisy is similar to their analysis of the color white. Unlike event two, where textual evidence was at the forefront of the discussion and students had their books out, the evidence is not textual but rather a type of literary backing where the connection and importance are tacitly implied (Wilder &

Wolfe, 2002).

Transcript 5. 6 Symbolism Discussion

Speaker Message Unit 15 Ms. Ok Smith 16 do you buy what she said here 17 you gave us a lot to think about 18 Tara we also said that her name daisy like the flower daisy is white on the outside and yellow on the inside and yellow is commonly thought of as 19 like 20 gold money and so it kind of shows that on the outside 21 she’s like 22 pretty and clean and stuff but on the inside she’s self-centered 23 Ms. so Smith kind of that inner outer view because on the inside 24 You’re right

Following Elise’s interpretation, Ms. Smith asks the whole class for input (line 15

– 17). Ms. Smith’s question of “do you buy what she is saying” could be interpreted to mean that she wants the students to offer up more evidence to the class, or that she wants students to push back based on Elise’s interpretation, but she doesn’t specify her question 134 so the students respond generally. Tara who is also in the same group as Elise, follows

Elise’s thoughts by adding that they also discussed how Daisy’s name is “like the flower,

Daisy is white on the outside and yellow on the inside”. Tara adds that the color yellow is similar to “gold” or “money” and like the character Daisy she is “on the outside/she’s like/pretty and clean and stuff but on the inside, she’s self-centered” (lines 18 to 22). The structure of Tara’s interpretation follows Elise’s initial interpretation where she points to the color white and the duality of Daisy as a character. What Tara adds to the interpretation, and may be in response to Ms. Smith’s question in line 16, is the focus on

Daisy and money. A central shared criterion of how the class chose to “read” The Great

Gatsby was through the lens of status, class, and power. Tara’s interpretation and claim that “she’s [Daisy] self-centered” is using the same backing which Elise draws on but reframes the interpretation to include ideas of money and status. Ms. Smith acknowledging the duality, revoices Tara in line 23 to 24 stating, “so kind of that inner outer view” and that they are “right”.

Transcript 5. 7 Ubiquity of the color white

Speaker Message Unit 28 Ms. Yeah well what they’ve said about Daisy why keep putting this color Smith white throughout? 29 I mean what color suit is Gatsby wearing when he meets Daisy? 30 A white one for sure. 31 At the end after he dies Nick at one point goes back over to his house and goes 32 makes a big deal about the pristine white steps 33 some kids taken like a rock and written I don’t know 34 stupid dead guy or something on the steps 35 and Nicks like scuffling it out with his foot on the pristine white steps

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As the discussion of white continues Ms. Smith repeats the original goal of the discussion by asking “why keep putting this color white throughout?” (line 28). Ms.

Smith then shares the color of Gatsby’s suit (29), the steps of Gatsby’s house (32), and

Nick’s actions with the white steps (35). Ms. Smith is indirectly drawing on the literary topoi of ubiquity to make the case to the students that the color is important. The color white is referenced across multiple points of the novel which is a tacit marker for importance, but the shared criteria of the local ways to read the novel are not included.

The analysis of these three events over the course of the unit revealed that Ms.

Smith’s change and understanding of literary argumentation was not universally transformative. She did not change her discourse patterns entirely, but what these events illustrate is how at the interactional level and often below the surface Ms. Smith was attempting to pivot students to consider the literary argument practices the class was working toward. In the first event Ms. Smith pushed the students to read the text from multiple perspectives and wanted the students to understand Tom’s action by reframing the students’ interpretations to include multiple perspectives. Once Ms. Smith reframed the discussion she was able to push the students to consider the role of class, status, and power within the scene.

The same shift to interpreting the text in terms of class, status and power can also be seen in Event 2. Ms. Smith again pushed the students to interpret the character’s actions through the lens of their shared frame. The move toward the shared frame of class, status and power was also used to add complexity to the students’ interpretations.

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Event 3 represented a sort of anomaly because Ms. Smith did not discuss figurative language or authorial intent with her students. In fact, she often described in interviews her reticence to “give” students “right” answers through class discussions. She believed that when she spoke of symbolism or for example, the green light from the novel, she was providing students with her preferred interpretation. What these events demonstrate is that Ms. Smith worked to position her interpretations alongside her students and sought to pivot her students toward complex interpretations by drawing on the classes’ shared frame. The dual layers of analysis were necessary because Ms. Smith did not name the argumentative elements she wanted the students to consider.

In the next chapter I move to analyze a case study student’s final literary argument essay for features of argumentation, literary warranting and their intertextual traces back to key texts in the classroom context.

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Chapter 6: Contextual Analysis of Students’ Final Argumentative Essay

In this chapter, I report the results of a contextualized analysis of one case study student’s writing assignments and final summative essay. I focus on the intertextual connections and traces to the practices discussed in Chapter Four as well as key events described in Chapter Five. In doing so I address my third research question:

How does a case study student’s essay reflect and refract the curricular context in

terms of literary argumentation practices?

In this question, the curricular unit refers to the writing, literary discussions and classroom practices which Ms. Smith and her students were engaged in throughout the

Gatsby unit. The analysis demonstrates how the literary argumentation practices Ms.

Smith attempted to foster (see Chapter 4) and how instructional conversations supported those practices in the unit (see Chapter 5).

My motive here is to trace how Tiffany drew on those practices and telling events in her writing over the course of the unit and in her final, summative essay. By conducting a tracing analysis of a case study student’s questions related to Ms. Smith’s, change can be clarified. For example, if Ms. Smith used writing as a way to facilitate her changing practice then an intertextual analysis of student writing reveals how they used the curriculum. Also, if there were tensions in how Ms. Smith used writing and instructional conversations within the unit those tensions may also be revealed in the case study student’s written products.

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Trajectory of Writing Assignments

As I outlined in Chapter 4, the writing assignments designed by Ms. Smith were meant to support students’ practice of adding to a list of the ideas they discussed in class as well as provide the procedural practices of argumentation so the students could be successful on the summative writing assignment. The trajectory of the writing prompts focused on the students’ own understanding of the American dream with their burgeoning understanding of the literary text, as framed by Ms. Smith. The in-class essay, completed on January 14th, grounded in the unit’s early activities surrounding the annotated bibliography assignment, was foundational in shaping how the students “read” The Great

Gatsby and then responded to the summative assignment. The essay also served as a platform for students to continually return to their initial thinking as they took notes as they read.

Newell et.al. (2015) offer an example of contextual analysis of student writing to argue for the link between classroom events and how and what students produce text.

Such a close analysis is designed to reveal the sources and types of argumentative writing practices. While their analysis of student writing products identifies how several teachers responded to the situational and contextual demands in their teaching of argumentative writing practices, there is still more to uncover when considering how those practices emerged in the students’ writing over time. Wynhoff Olsen, VanDerHeide, Goff, and

Dunn (2018) suggest that a closer analysis of classroom context to student writing reveals the intricate ways in which students participate in the classroom community to produce their writing. The analysis offered in this chapter is influenced by both approaches

139 mention above and discussed in Chapter Three to showcase how Tiffany negotiated the argumentative writing practices Ms. Smith sought to bring about in the assignments and during instructional conversations and illuminates the tensions and reservations Ms.

Smith had about changing her teaching practice described in Chapter 4.

Organization

To best illustrate the relationship between the instructional context and the case study student’s final essays I adapt Newell et al.’s (2015) approach, which focuses on the interactional and institutional forces, and Wynhoff Olsen et al.’s (2018) approach, which focuses on the tracing and resonances across multiple settings. Central to these approaches, and the rationale behind this chapter’s organization, is the interplay between the students’ written products and the unfolding curricular unit which provides an avenue of analysis for studying the students’ in-class writing products. Because of the nature of this analysis, and the theoretical assumptions I have previously outlined, the findings will be organized by focusing on Tiffany’s final literary argument essay. The analysis includes the following areas of focus, argument, tacit warranting, and then finally intertextual traces linked to her previous writing assignments and key literature discussions.

Contextual Analysis of Tiffany’s Final Literary Argument Essay

The final essay was not set in stone and was not described to the students until the students had finished reading the novel. Ms. Smith’s reason for not sharing the prompt with the students earlier was because initially she struggled with how to align the writing

140 assignment with the ideas about novel that unfolded during the instructional conversations. About halfway into the unit Ms. Smith asked my thoughts on the final literary analysis essay prompt (Figure 6.1). We discussed how to have the prompt build from her previous writing assignments but also tied in her need for textual support in the students’ arguments.

Ms. Smith was unsure of how to frame the prompt in a way which gave the students space to draw on the classroom curriculum but wanted to try it anyway. For example, in an interview after the unit concluded, she stated, “I was kind of building the ship as I was going” (2/25/16). Ms. Smith knew she wanted the students to write about the knowledge they accumulated about status, class, and power during instructional conversations about The Great Gatsby, including their developing understandings of the

American dream. Simply put, she was not sure how to develop a writing assignment which could encompass what she was attempting to do. Eventually Ms. Smith presented an assignment which wove the students’ understanding of the American dream, the articles the students read for their annotated bibliographies, textual evidence for the novel, and character analysis activities to make the assignment below.

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Figure 6. 1 Prompt for final essay

For the final assessment on The Great Gatsby, you will create an essay to answer the following prompt.

Pick a character from The Great Gatsby and analyze how that character would feel about your definition of The American Dream (from your In Class Writing on 1/14)? Review your notes from each of the chapter sections in order to gather the evidence before you pick a character or make a claim.

Do not change your original writing from 1/14! Instead, create a new document. For the document title, add your last name in front of the current title. (Example: Smith Final Assessment). Finally SHARE this file with Ms. Smith. This essay will use MLA format with the correct heading and in-text citations.

You are welcome to include any of the articles that were initially used in class if you deem appropriate to support your argument. Please do support your argument with examples and quotes from The Great Gatsby.

The assignment asks the students to select a character from the novel and analyze how that character would feel about their [the students’] definition of the American dream. For example, recall from chapter 4 that the students’ definitions were derived from their in-class writing from January 14th (Appendix E). Students were also informed that they could support their arguments by including evidence from their notes and articles from their annotated bibliography assignments. But Ms. Smith made clear that students should also support their arguments with examples and quotes from the novel.

The assignment was worth 36 points total and students were assessed on the following criteria:

Table 6. 1 Rubric for literary analysis essay Claim Claim is related to the original outline of the American Dream writing and is clearly discussed throughout the essay. Evidence Evidence provided is clearly connected to the claim and is the best evidence to support the claim.

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Counterclaims Counterclaims are considered in the discussion.

Writing Writing is clear and coherent throughout.

MLA MLA citations are included and correctly formatted.

While the rubric for the final essay appeared structural, Ms. Smith’s use of the rubric was less stringent. Meaning, Ms. Smith did not grade to the rubric but assessed the essays based on how she thought the students did in relation to the task, the arguments they made, and their use of the curriculum. Recall in Chapter 4, Sarah was asked to rewrite her essay because she did not include enough curricular support into her paper.

While Sarah’s paper may have fulfilled Ms. Smith’s rubric, it did not satisfy Ms. Smith’s belief that the essays should be linked to the frame she and the students were constructing throughout the unit.

Analysis of Tiffany’s Literary Argument

Tiffany’s final literary analysis essay (Figure 6.2) reflects and refracts the curricular context by responding to the localized arguments Ms. Smith attempted to engage her students in. The analysis of the essay is organized by paragraphing and then following Wynhoff Olsen et al. (2018) analyzed on a sentence level as the unit of analysis. The sentence level of analysis focuses on three areas; 1) argument elements of claim, evidence, warrant, and counter argument; 2) tacit literary argument warranting; and finally, 3) the intertextual trace. A full coded analysis of Tiffany’s essay with comments can be found in Appendix E.

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Figure 6. 2 Tiffany’s final literary argument essay

To describe it in the best way that I know how, I will compare the American

Dream to a nice, frosted cake. You see, the American Dream is made up of two

things; the fluffy cake part, or the success, power and money, and the nice icing

on top, happiness. In my opinion, these two parts are equally as vital to having a

nice cake, or success in living your American Dream, but everyone has their own

preferences. Some people like a lot of frosting on their cakes, and some people

like none at all. In the same way happiness and success have different levels of

importance to different people. Because of all of this, it is very hard to clearly

define the American dream, because it changes based on the person. Mrs. Daisy

Buchanan is one of those people who put little importance on the icing on top of

the cake, meaning she cares more about status than she does about true

happiness, and you can find evidence of this through the correlation between her

and the color white, her relationship with Tom, and also her relationship with

Gatsby.

Throughout the whole book Daisy, and Jordan too, is associated with the

color white. At first, white might be interpreted as being a symbol for innocence

and elegance as shown when Nick sees Daisy for the first time in East Egg, he

narrates, “They were both in white, their dresses were rippling and fluttering as if

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they had just blown back in after a short flight around the house” (Fitzgerald 8).

Nick is taken by the beauty of Daisy and of her life, and almost enchanted by it. As the story progresses and you learn more about her, the symbolism of white compared to Daisy changes. It goes from being a symbol of her elegance to a symbol of the blandness of her personality and her superficiality. Daisy is a person without any substance, she is devoid of all color and is only concerned with one thing, her status. Daisy is a very two-dimensional character because of this.

Her love for her status is also why she is married to Tom Buchanan. Even though she describes him as being a “hulking”, “brute of a man” (Fitzgerald 13) and even though she knows that he is having an affair with Myrtle Wilson, she still stays with him. To justify her not leaving Tom, Nick is told that Daisy cannot divorce Tom because “She’s a Catholic” and “They don’t believe in divorce”

(Fitzgerald 33), but Nick knows this to be untrue. The real reason as to why Daisy can’t leave Tom is not because she would be abandoning her husband, but because she would be abandoning her American Dream. Her dream is to have status and to have money, and getting rid of the person providing that to her is not an option. With her love for money holding her heart, she doesn’t mind that Tom is having an affair, because at least she still has the money that she so craved,

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unless the information is made public, in which case her reputation would be on the line and they would have to move again.

Due to her preoccupation with keeping her status and her money by being in an unhealthy relationship with a racist, Daisy neglects a key part of my

American Dream; happiness. The first time that she did this was when she stopped waiting for Gatsby to return from war and marries Tom Buchanan. She abandons the love of her life, someone who could make her actually happy, to be with someone who could make her wealthy instead. Jay did not have the resources to give her the life that she really wanted, being the money and the status, and so he could not provide her with her American Dream.

The most obvious way in which Daisy’s American Dream differs from mine is that she only focusses on half of it. She sacrifices her happiness to focus on obtaining and then keeping her status, money and to try to make it seem like she is successful. With the symbolism of white being superficial and two-dimensional mostly in correlation to her, and the reason for abandoning Gatsby to be with Tom being money, Fitzgerald conveys the idea in his writing that Daisy’s American dream is to be wealthy, rather than happy.

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Introduction. Tiffany uses the character of Daisy to make the argument that

Daisy is representative of Tiffany’s understanding of the American dream. To support her argument Tiffany draws on the duality of Daisy and the duality of the American dream, the color white as a symbol for understanding Daisy’s character, and her relationships with both Tom and Gatsby.

Table 6. 2 Analysis of introduction

Sentences AE5 TLW6 Trace7 1.1 To describe it in the best way that I know how, C PE I will compare the American Dream to a nice, frosted cake. 1.2 You see, the American Dream is made up of C A/R T/S/L two things; the fluffy cake part, or the success, Local power and money, and the nice icing on top, happiness. 1.3 In my opinion, these two parts are equally as C PE T/S/L vital to having a nice cake, or success in living Local your American Dream, but everyone has their own preferences. 1.4 Some people like a lot of frosting on their W Local Lex cakes, and some people like none at all. 1.5 In the same way happiness and success have W Lex different levels of importance to different people. 1.6 Because of all of this, it is very hard to clearly C Local Lex define the American dream, because it changes based on the person. 1.7 Mrs. Daisy Buchanan is one of those people C Local T who put little importance on the icing on top of U Lex the cake, meaning she cares more about status than she does about true happiness, and you can find evidence of this through the correlation between her and the color white, her relationship with Tom, and also her relationship with Gatsby.

5 Argumentative essay element from Toulmin (1958, 1972) Claim, Evidence, Warrant, Backing 6 Tacit Literary Warranting from Wilder and Wolfe (2012) Ubiquity, Appearance/Reality, Personal Experience, Local, Context, Paradox 7 Intertextual trace from Wynhoff Olsen et al. (2018) Thematic, Structural, Lexical 147

Tiffany begins her introduction by making a series of claims before she gets to her central claim in the last sentence of the introduction (1.7). The paragraph also includes multiple intertextual traces as well as three types of literary warranting. She uses a metaphor to start the essay by comparing the American dream to a frosted cake (1.1). She uses the line to set up her claim in sentence 1.2 that the American dream is “made up of two things” the first being “power and money” and the second being “happiness”. The sentence and claim that the American dream is two things is reminiscent of the tacit literary topoi of appearance vs. reality from Wilder and Wolfe (2009) because she is pointing out two entities for analysis where one is on the surface and the other deeper and the object of her analysis. The sentence also has a thematic and structural trace to her own in-class essay where she wrote “What can be sure is that, for the most part, there are at least two main ideas that are in everyone’s American Dream” (1/14 Timed Writing).

The structure that the American dream is “two ideas” follows the structure of her previous essay closely. There is also a lexical trace present because she uses the exact wording from her own writing where she wrote “money or success, and the pursuit of happiness” (1/14 Timed Writing).

In the second half of her introduction paragraph Tiffany draws on her initial claims and structure of “two things” to further connect her own opinion to the argument she will make in the essay. In sentence 1.3 she works to clarify and connect the thematic and structural traces to the localized warranting that the American dream is tied to status, class, and power. There is also a lexical trace from a class discussion on the first day of the unit when Ms. Smith described the unit and asked the students to define the American

148 dream. The trace comes from Tiffany’s own words where she states that “I think everyone’s American dream is different” (1/4). The next three sentences follow the same lexical trace and connecting of claims from her definition of the American dream to the structure of appearance/reality warrant that the dream has “different levels.” Sentence 1.6 further elaborates her argument and pulls on her own in-class essay and definition of the

American dream where she adapts the language from “elusive” to “hard to clearly define” but maintains that the dream “changes” based on the person.

Tiffany then moves to transition her argument from the ideas that the American dream operates on multiple levels and means many things to the prompt’s question of how a character from The Great Gatsby would think about her definition of the American dream. The final sentence (1.7) of the introduction paragraph represents Tiffany’s central claim and forecasts the contents of her argument to her audience. She inserts Daisy into her argument by connecting Daisy to the cake metaphor she worked to explain the duality of the American dream, but she includes the unit’s central shared criterion of “status”.

Tiffany then shares the contents of each body paragraph: white, her relationship with

Tom, and finally her relationship with Gatsby.

The central claim draws on both the tacit literary warrant she began at the start of the introduction but moves to connect the literary warrant with the local criterion, and finally with her analysis of the character from the novel. Thematic traces are prevalent in

1.7 and were rooted in the I/IT writing assignment completed 8 days earlier. Tiffany’s argument (see Appendix E for the complete assignment) in the essay is that Daisy and

Tom’s relationship is representative of Martin Buber’s (1958) characterization of an I/It

149 relationship. Another thematic trace comes from peer feedback written in the margins of a draft of Tiffany’s I/It essay. Heather writes that she likes the Tiffany wrote about Tom and Daisy’s relationship and that she “agree[s] with your theory of their marriage” (1/30

I/It peer feedback). The final intertextual traces in sentence 1.7 are lexical and come from three different texts. The first is from Tiffany’s I/It essay where she adapts her writing from “Chances are her money was really her father’s money that she loved to spend. Her dad also gave her the status that she so loved” (I/It Essay) and “Daisy loved the money more, which is my theory as to why she married Tom. He had money, and he had status, and he practically showed up in her lap with a nice, shiny, white bow,” (I/It Essay) to

“meaning she cares more about status than she does about true happiness, and you can find evidence of this through the correlation between her and the color white, her relationship with Tom” (Tiffany’s final essay). The other lexical traces come from her notes and a whole class discussion on February 2nd where the color white is either written about or discussed in relation to Daisy. The analysis in body paragraph one will illustrate the traces in more depth.

Body paragraph one. Tiffany then moves to describe how the color white is associated with the characters Daisy and Jordan. In this paragraph (Table 6.3) Tiffany follows her central claim she established in the introduction but now focuses on the color white (2.1). Tiffany supports this claim by citing textual evidence (2.2) from the novel and connecting the tacit literary warrants of ubiquity and appearance/reality to the local argument. She also draws heavily on the intertextual traces from her notes, class discussions and her previous writing.

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Table 6. 3 Analysis of body paragraph one

Sentences AE TLW Trace 2.1 Throughout the whole book Daisy, and Jordan too, C U T/S/Lex is associated with the color white. 2.2 At first, white might be interpreted as being a E U S/Lex symbol for innocence and elegance as shown when A/R Nick sees Daisy for the first time in East Egg, he narrates, “They were both in white, their dresses were rippling and fluttering as if they had just blown back in after a short flight around the house” 2.3 Nick is taken by the beauty of Daisy and of her life, and almost enchanted by it. 2.4 As the story progresses and you learn more about B U T her, the symbolism of white compared to Daisy changes. 2.5 It goes from being a symbol of her elegance to a U symbol of the blandness of her personality and her superficiality. 2.6 Daisy is a person without any substance, she is B Local Lex devoid of all color and is only concerned with one thing, her status. 2.7 Daisy is a very two-dimensional character because B Local T of this. U Lex

Tiffany’s first body paragraph focuses on the color white and is largely influenced by the tacit literary warrant ubiquity. Tiffany uses the words and phrases “throughout”

(2.1), “at first” (2.2), “progresses” 2.4, and “it goes” (2.5) to mark the repetition of the symbol white across the novel. Tiffany also tacit warrants her selected quote by recalling the appearance/reality duality she uses to discuss the American dream and the color white with Daisy’s characterization. In sentence 2.2 she cites textual evidence ‘“They were both in white, their dresses were rippling and fluttering as if they had just blown back in after a short flight around the house”’. The warrant for the evidence is tacitly understood as being of significance because it reoccurs as the novel progresses, but it also reveals the

151 deeper levels of Daisy’s character which Tiffany uses to locally warrant the evidence back to her central claim that Daisy at her deeper levels cares more about status (2.5).

Tiffany relies on thematic and lexical intertextual traces to support her argument within body paragraph one. As with the overall argument she stays close to the structure of her arguments that the American dream can be understood on two different layers.

Tiffany’s focus on the color white and Daisy has a connection to many events over the course of the unit but its primary association is to a whole class discussion on 2/2. The event was discussed in Chapter 5 as event 3 and the full analyzed transcript is in

Appendix E. Tiffany draws heavily on the discussion of the symbolism of the color white even though she was not a member of that small group. During that whole class discussion Elise makes the argument that “white was very closely tied to Daisy and sometimes through Jordan” (line 6, 2/2). Elise later introduces the appearance/ reality analysis that Daisy initially is symbolic of “unblemished morality” but later comes to represent “superficiality” and “blandness”. Tiffany was not in the same group as Elise but can be seen on video paying attention and writing notes as Elise is speaking. Tiffany adapts and adopts the language Elise uses during the whole class discussion when she borrows the same appearance/ reality structure in sentences 2.1, 2.2, 2.3 and uses Elise’s exact words “blandness” and “superficiality” in sentence 2.4. “Superficiality” is also used by Ms. Smith to explain what the reader understands about Daisy that Gatsby can’t, “we early on are like it’s not going to work she’s superficial she’s married she’s not going to leave tom get it in your head” (Appendix E). In Tiffany’s notes (Appendix E) she writes sections on “Weather”, “White”, and “The Green Light”, and under the section “white”

152 she takes note of “Daisy and Jordan’s clothes”, “associated with purity and innocence”, and that white represents “shallowness, very 2 [sic] dimensional and boring, just like

Daisy” (Notes). Tiffany directly uses the word “innocence” (2.2) and “Daisy and Jordan”

(2.1) in her argument but also indirectly draws on the structural issues of the ubiquity topoi as well as she writes about Daisy as being “2 dimensional and boring” in her notes.

Body paragraph two. In Tiffany’s third paragraph (Table 6.4) and second body paragraph she moves to argue that the relationship between Daisy and Tom is illustrative of Daisy’s American dream. She supports her thesis (1.7) by using textual support to argue that Daisy cares more about status than happiness. She draws on literary topoi and the local criterion to connect her evidence with her overall argument and draws on multiple texts and discussions to support her claims within this paragraph.

Table 6. 4 Analysis of body paragraph two

Sentences AE TLW Trace 3.1 Her love for her status is also why she is married C Local T to Tom Buchanan. 3.2 Even though she describes him as being a E PX T/L “hulking”, “brute of a man” (Fitzgerald 13) and even though she knows that he is having an affair with Myrtle Wilson, she still stays with him. 3.3 To justify her not leaving Tom, Nick is told that E C Daisy cannot divorce Tom because “She’s a A/R Catholic” and “They don’t believe in divorce” (Fitzgerald 33), but Nick knows this to be untrue. 3.4 The real reason as to why Daisy can’t leave Tom B Local T is not because she would be abandoning her husband, but because she would be abandoning her American Dream. 3.5 Her dream is to have status and to have money, B Local T and getting rid of the person providing that to her is not an option. 3.6 With her love for money holding her heart, she B C T/L doesn’t mind that Tom is having an affair, Local 153

because at least she still has the money that she so craved, unless the information is made public, in which case her reputation would be on the line and they would have to move again.

The focus of body paragraph two is analyzing Daisy’s relationship with Tom as a means of understanding Daisy and how she thinks about the American dream. Tiffany uses textual evidence from two different locations in the novel (3.2 & 3.3) to support her claim that Daisy marries Tom for status (3.1). She vacillates between literary topoi of paradox (3.2), context (3.3; 3.6), and appearance/reality (3.3) to tie the evidence she selected back to her claim and her overall claim that Daisy sacrifices happiness for status.

She also includes the local criterion of status (3.1, 3.4, 3.5, & 3.6) to weave the literary warrants and evidence back to the central claim of the American dream and a character from the novel.

The source for the intertextual traces vary like the previous traces but more closely follow a thematic trace where the content has been adapted to fit her argument. A key source for Tiffany was the social issues impacting Daisy’s power and freedom due to the contextual and historic nature of marriage. The contextual literary topoi supported her warrant evidence and was rooted in a whole class discussion on January 20th (transcript can be found in Appendix D). An analysis in Chapter 5 event 2 illustrated that the contextualizing mattered in how the students needed to warrant Daisy as a character and provided insight into how they considered and locally warranted Daisy’s status, class, and power. The role of society and its effect on Daisy’s marriage also occurs in Tiffany’s notes over the course of her reading and in her I/It essay. The I/It essay provides thematic

154 traces for Tiffany’s understanding of Daisy and Tom’s relationship. In the essay she writes, “She also some-what patronizes Tom on the down low at dinner when Nick is over, proving that she doesn’t really enjoy the company of her husband all that much”

(I/It Appendix E). She uses that content to provide evidence of Daisy’s concern for status but also adapts the words from the I/It essay “she wouldn’t risk the blow to her status or the loss of her precious money” (I/It Essay) to “With her love for money holding her heart, she doesn’t mind that Tom is having an affair, because at least she still has the money that she so craved” (3.6).

Body paragraph three. The final body paragraph is similar to the previous body paragraphs in their structure but she does not directly cite textual evidence to support her claim, rather she uses summary as a way to provide evidence (4.2). As with the other paragraphs she continues to weave literary warrants with the local warranting of status and class and continues to pull from her previous writing to support her argument.

Table 6. 5 Analysis of body paragraph three

Sentences AE TLW Trace 4.1 Due to her preoccupation with keeping her status C Local T/L and her money by being in an unhealthy relationship with a racist, Daisy neglects a key part of my American Dream; happiness. 4.2 The first time that she did this was when she E U T stopped waiting for Gatsby to return from war and C marries Tom Buchanan. 4.3 She abandons the love of her life, someone who B C T could make her actually happy, to be with A/R someone who could make her wealthy instead. 4.4 Jay did not have the resources to give her the life B Local T/L that she really wanted, being the money and the status, and so he could not provide her with her American Dream.

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In this paragraph Tiffany uses the same types of literary warrants as before, but this time she uses local warrants as the first and last sentences of her paragraph.

Previously she used local warrants but they were in conjunction with literary topoi. Also, different in this paragraph is that Tiffany does not directly cite the novel to support her claim. Instead, she states the events in sentence 4.2 to support her claim in line 4.1 that

Daisy neglects a “key part of the American dream; happiness”. The underlying topoi

Tiffany uses are ubiquity (4.2), context (4.3), and appearance/ reality (4.3).

The intertextual traces are, like her previous body paragraphs rooted in her previous writings and in whole class discussions. Tiffany’s notes (Appendix E) provided a large source for her adaption. Her notes on the green light symbol are a strong example of a lexical adaptation Tiffany uses to support her claim that Daisy’s status interferes with an important facet of the American dream: happiness (1.7, 4.1). She wrote,

He looks at the end of her dock, and it’s so close that he feels he can almost touch

it, it is just across the bay. What Gatsby doesn’t know, or isn’t willing to accept, is

that he will never be able to get the green light and get to Daisy. He will never

have enough money or the status that Daisy so craves. Even though it is just

across the bay, close enough it seems he could easily just take a boat across to get

to her, he never can and never will. (Tiffany’s Notes)

She then adapts the symbolism and analysis of Gatsby as a character to include Daisy and the local tacit warranting of status and the American dream. In her final essay she uses the phrase “Jay did not have the resources to give her the life that she really wanted, being money and status” (4.4) which has been adapted from “He will never have enough

156 money or status that Daisy so craves”. She adapts the symbolism of the green light and the interpretation that Gatsby has a failing of his dreams to one that argues within the local context as she states it is really a failing of Daisy and her American dream (4.4).

Conclusion. Tiffany’s conclusion (Table 6.6) wraps up her argument by repeating the language she used in the introduction but moves beyond “my opinion” (1.4) to

“Daisy’s American dream differs from mine” (5.2). The use of the personal pronoun was difficult for students to get use to because to the students “it just was different/ we didn’t do that last year” (Interview, Tessa, 11/15). By inserting herself into the argument and arguing how Daisy would feel about her [Tiffany’s] definition of the American dream she has moved fully into the underlying local warrants Ms. Smith wanted the students to engage in.

Table 6. 6 Analysis of conclusion

Sentences AE TLW Trace 5.1 The most obvious way in which Daisy’s American C Local T/S/L Dream differs from mine is that she only focusses PE on half of it. 5.2 She sacrifices her happiness to focus on obtaining B Local T and then keeping her status, money and to try to make it seem like she is successful. 5.3 With the symbolism of white being superficial and B U T/L/S two-dimensional mostly in correlation to her, and A/R the reason for abandoning Gatsby to be with Tom Local being money, Fitzgerald conveys the idea in his writing that Daisy’s American dream is to be wealthy, rather than happy.

The final paragraph is the shortest in the essay and contains the most localized warranting. There is also a return to the initial structure which Tiffany established earlier in the essay (1.3, 1.4, 1.7). In the final sentence (5.3) she returns to the literary topoi of 157 ubiquity and appearance/ reality as she rewords her thesis statement from the introduction

(1.7). She also adds the author in sentence 5.3 writing, “Fitzgerald “conveys the idea in his writing that Daisy’s American dream is to be wealthy, rather than happy”. Naming

Fitzgerald’s intent is something Tiffany had not done earlier in her writing or previous drafts, but the directions from the symbolism activity from February 2nd ask the students to consider “why Fitzgerald put these [the symbols] into the book?”.

Tiffany’s use of Argument, Tacit Warranting and Texts

In summary, Tiffany’s literary argument essay reveals how she made claims, provided evidence, used backing, tacitly warranted her evidence, and drew upon the classroom context in her writing. Her essay showed how she drew on class activities and added complexity to her argument which brought to bear multiple literary topoi but also the local warranting discussed in Chapter Four and Chapter Five.

Argument. Tiffany’s argument follows what has typically been found in terms of its structure with regards to claim, evidence and warrant. The claims in the essay are located in the introduction where Tiffany attempts to build toward her central claim and the heart of her argument in sentence 1.7. After the introduction all topic sentences are sub-claims which she forecasts in her central claim. The forecast sentence (1.7) lets her audience know that she will be arguing about the color white, Daisy’s marriage to Tom, and finally Daisy’s preoccupation with status. The sub-claims are always followed by evidence. In body paragraph one and two Tiffany uses textual evidence from the novel and in body paragraph three she uses summary evidence to support her argument.

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The evidence in the essay is largely textual citations from the novel with her last body paragraph being a summary. As stated above, the structure of her essay follows the more traditionally found pattern of claim, evidence, support/backing/warrant, and the same holds true for her use of evidence. The evidence she uses is always located in the second sentence of the paragraph (2.2, 3.2, and 4.2) but she also adds another piece of evidence in body paragraph two (3.3).

Tacit warranting. The evidence is also always tacitly warranted with literary topoi but the underlying topoi is different for each piece of evidence. For example, her evidence is tacitly warranted with ubiquity (2.2 & 4.2), paradox (3.2), appearance/reality

(3.3), and context (3.3 & 4.2). After she cites evidence she then uses backing statements.

They are backing statements because they do not include the word “generally” or attempt to move toward broader generalizations. In the three body paragraphs Tiffany moves from her claim in the topic sentence to her evidence in the next and then uses the rest of the body sentences to establish the backing to support her sub-claim within the paragraph.

Her backing statements preceding the evidence are largely tacit literary topos where she is marking phrases to align with particular topoi.

Ubiquity: temporal marker - “as the story progresses” (2.4), “it goes from” (2.5),

and “the first time” (4.2)

Paradox: opposites – “even though” (3.2)

Appearance/reality: surface/ below surface – “Nick knows this to be untrue”

(3.3), and “She abandons the love of her life, someone who could make her

actually happy, to be with someone who could make her wealthy instead” (4.3)

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Context: context of text’s time – “unless the information is made public, in which

case her reputation would be on the line” (3.6), “The first time that she did this

was when she stopped waiting for Gatsby to return from war and marries Tom

Buchanan. She abandons the love of her life, someone who could make her

actually happy, to be with someone who could make her wealthy instead.” (4.2 &

4.3).

The use of the literary topoi warrants her evidence back to the central claim but they still do not fully warrant her central claim and the prompt of the essay. To make the final connection the final sentence of each paragraph draws on the local topoi to warrant the evidence and backing of the tacit warranting to include the local knowledge of the

American dream. In sentences 2.6, 3.4, 3.5, and 4.4 in the body paragraphs she includes the local knowledge Ms. Smith wanted her students to use as they analyzed their chosen characters. Ms. Smith began the unit of study on January 4th telling the students that they would focus on “status, class, and power” within the novel and continue their understanding of the American dream. The markers for Local warranting are: “only concerned with one thing, her status” (2.6), “abandoning her American dream” (3.4),

“Her dream is to have status and to have money” (3.5), and “Jay did not have the resources to give her the life that she really wanted, being the money and the status, and so he could not provide her with her American Dream” (4.4).

Intertextual Traces. Tiffany drew widely on the classroom resources to compose her literary argument. The largest intertextual resource for Tiffany was her own writing.

The trajectory of writing assignments designed by Ms. Smith was purposeful and it

160 makes sense that Tiffany used her own writing to support her final argument. Tracings, borrowing the categories from Wynhoff Olsen et al. (2018), are what was borrowed from the original text or event. As is noted in Chapter Three, the analysis of the categories is not as detailed as Wynhoff Olsen and colleagues’ methodology, because I do not account for their third and fourth phases. Instead, the analysis in this study affords a more in depth look into how Tiffany made sense of the curricular context.

Of the three intertextual categories identified, Tiffany uses them all. Thematic traces were the most widely found with 18 sentences coded. Thematic traces occur when

Tiffany borrows content from the originating text/event. The content of Tiffany’s tracings were mostly found in her own writing. In the thematic traces she draws widely from her previous drafts, her in-class essay, the Buber character analysis essay, peer feedback and her own notes. Lexical traces were the next most coded at 15. Tiffany pulls most of her direct words from classroom discussions on January 4th, January 20th and February 2nd.

After talk, writing products were the next widely used sources for her lexical traces. She again draws on her in-class essay on January 14th, the Buber character analysis essay and her own notes. Finally, the structural traces of Tiffany’s essay are not as widely coded but they point to her use of the prompt as a structuring device as well as her own writing to provide the organizational structure for her essay.

Literary Argument, Topoi, and Traces

Taking a step back to look at Tiffany’s literary argument several patterns emerge.

First, the four pieces of evidence Tiffany uses were literary topoi and not from the local classroom. Further, the textual citations pulled from the novel (2.2, 3.2, & 3.3) stem from

161 the contextual and ubiquity warrants. Within those warrants they can be directly traced to class discussions from January 20th and February 2nd (Events 2 & 3 from Chapter Five).

What this means is that the heart of Tiffany’s tacitly warranted evidence comes from literature discussions where the focus of the discussion was sourcing evidence (1/20) and symbolism (2/2). While there were points during the discussions where the American dream was explicitly mentioned, most of the time was spent discussing the novel’s context (1/20) and symbols which occur throughout the novel and why the author used them (2/2). Just as Ms. Smith was attempting to try to change her approach to teaching the novel by incorporating argument so too was Tiffany. She drew on multiple topoi to tacitly warrant her argument while still attempting to respond to the specific local argument Ms. Smith wanted the students to engage with.

The contextual analysis of Tiffany’s writing reveals that she was attempting to respond to Ms. Smith’s teaching practice by adopting the use of the shared frame as she attempted to back her evidence to her argument. The tracing analysis of her writing also reveals that, Tiffany’s own writing during the unit, was the resource she drew on the most in her final essay. It appears then that Ms. Smith’s thoughtful planning of writing assignments over the course of the unit assisted Tiffany as she responded to the final prompt. But, Tiffany also wove figurative language into her writing as major sources of evidence supporting her argument. This suggests several things, first, is that Tiffany was attempting to use the shared frame Ms. Smith was working to bring about, second, that figurative language and text-based interpretations supported Tiffany’s situated argument.

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My collaboration with Ms. Smith to construct an assignment which reflected the curricular practices she was attempting to bring about can be seen in Tiffany’s final essay. Tiffany’s use of the whole class literature discussions stands out in this analysis because they were not points of emphasis in our collaboration but they became important pieces of evidence in her argument. This could be because Tiffany, like Ms. Smith, was struggling with how to best source and provide evidence which supported her analysis. It could also point towards Ms. Smith’s reliance on explicit textual evidence during the literature discussions discussed in Chapter Five.

In the next chapter, I discuss the findings from Chapter Four, Chapter Five, and

Chapter Six and offer implications for classroom teachers and future research.

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Chapter 7: Conclusion and Implications

With the advent of the Common Core standards and a push toward teaching argument, there is little research which seeks to understand how English Language Arts teachers are making sense of argumentation and literary argumentation and how a teacher in transition is changing. In this dissertation study, I have examined one curricular unit within an English Language Arts classroom where I studied a teacher undergoing change, an interactional analysis of the change in literature discussions, and finally a case study student’s writing that reflects and refracts some of those instructional changes. I have argued, from a social practice perspective, that Ms. Smith attempted to change the literacy practices surrounding the discipline of writing about literature in her course. By analyzing key instructional conversations as well as tracing one case study students’ final literary argument essay back to the classroom context, I provided evidence of the teacher’s change as well as some of the shortcomings of her efforts to become more dialogic. I will unpack how Ms. Smith attempted to become more dialogic in her teaching later in this chapter. I have also sought to understand how the teacher attempted to organize her curriculum to cultivate a “way to read” the text and a “way to write” about the text in a shared manner. This dissertation study, and the questions I sought to answer, is a response to the current tensions in the field of ELA which I identified in Chapter

One.

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Change for Ms. Smith was not a binary, rather, Ms. Smith’s change most closely represents a spectrum of change. Ms. Smith was similar to many teachers that Richardson and Anders (1994) describe in that she was undergoing change all the time and was deeply reflective about her practice. However, I found that Ms. Smith’s attempts to change her practice occurred most in the writing she assigned. The instructional conversations were contested points where change was rooted in the vestiges of her and the students’ literacy practices. What Ms. Smith’s attempts to change illustrates is that for substantive change to occur constant attention to the goals need to be addressed.

Meaning, through the year-long collaboration we made clear to each other through our discussions how the writing practices could build from one unit to the next and how the shared frame for understanding the American dream could support those practices.

Nonetheless, we were not explicit as to how the literature discussions could provide a space to expand on those practices. Therefore, the disciplinary or theoretical foundations of those literature discussions could influence the momentum of Ms. Smith’s change if she strived to become more dialogic in her teaching of literary argumentation.

Ms. Smith’s change best represents what scholars have termed a “dialogic stance”

(Boyd & Markarian, 2011; Juzwik, Borsheim-Black, Cauglan, & Hentz, 2013). Taking a dialogic stance has been described as having “an orientation to knowledge and knowing” but also as “students’ [develop] growing understanding… as they bring their current experience-based knowing to bear on school-sanctioned contexts and ideas” (Boyd &

Markarian, 2011, p. 159). Ms. Smith’s practice and curriculum are attempting to establish a dialogic stance as she engaged students in novel literacy practices. Ms. Smith is also

165 developing a dialogic stance as she works to change her teaching practices. Meaning, Ms.

Smith is A closer definition of Ms. Smith’s evolution resembles Juzwik et al.’s (2013) view that the enactment of a dialogic stance is when “[teachers’ are] learning how to share responsibility with students for how talk unfolds in the classroom” (p. 14). So, change is twofold for Ms. Smith: on one level Ms. Smith is working to understand that the teaching and learning of literature is more than problem solving to uncover “right” answers, and two, Smith is learning to share the construction of learning with her students as they frame their local understandings of the literature. Based on my work with Ms.

Smith, here are three points about the nature of teacher change:

1. Change is more likely to occur if the teacher has time and a place to discuss what

the change might look like.

2. Change is a long-term process which needs continual reflection to address the

teacher’s implicit assumptions about their teaching practices and pedagogical

choices. The agenda and goals of the change need to be revised and updated as the

teacher and collaborator encounter contextualizing factors of the day-to-day

classroom. Maintenance is necessary for the teacher and students. Knowing and

doing are equally important for change to be successful.

3. Successful change is not binary but a spectrum depending on the teacher’s goals

and enactment of change. Change is not a universal blanket which covers all

facets of a teacher’s practice, instead, change may only impact a narrow scope of

a teacher’s practice while other areas are in transition.

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Next, I summarize the findings of Chapters Four, Five and Six in relation to the three research questions.

Research Question 1: What does the teaching of learning of writing about literature look like in this classroom in the unit studied? What are the contextualizing factors that impact how the teacher changes her literary argumentation practices?

Drawing on an interpretive analysis of classroom observations, field notes, interviews, and artifacts, I found that there was an attempt by the teacher to change her instruction and her curriculum for the teaching of literature. The major changes occurred in how she provided opportunities to write and the nature of the writing assessments over the course of the unit. There was also an attempt to frame a “shared criteria” for how they

(the teacher and students) would read the novel. The shared criteria for literary argument was not explicitly instructed over the course of the unit, rather, Ms. Smith discusses the importance of reading the text while paying attention to issues of status, class, and power.

The new (for Ms. Smith) approach moved away from structural approaches and literary analysis which focused on thematic analysis to one which focused on the class’ contextual knowledge of the American dream. Ms. Smith’s use of writing assignments was central in how she attempted to bring about curricular change and literary argumentation practices. Over the course of the unit, the writing assignments worked to maintain a trajectory which worked to reinforce the situated argument (Prior, 1995).

The instructional conversations, however, were not as well conceived in how they fit into the goals of the literary argumentation practices Ms. Smith sought to bring about in the unit.

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Research Question 2: How do the teacher and students use instructional conversations about literature to socially construct a shared criterion for literary argumentation?

The instructional conversations analyzed revealed that the teacher attempted to

“stand back” from discussions and the interpretations students were making for fear of being authoritarian in the classroom. Rather, the teacher attempted to use literature discussions to change the literary analysis practices students were accustomed to with practices such as adding complexity though multiple perspectives, warranting evidence, or engaging in the discussion of symbolism in the novel. The role of my collaboration to push Ms. Smith to consider the nature of the role writing had was clearer, but I did not push, Ms. Smith to consider how the instructional conversations fit into her change.

A microethnographic approach toward discourse analysis revealed the tensions between decontextual and contextual understandings of what counted as literary interpretations. Also, central in the analysis of the literature discussions was that the content of the discussions did not always fit the curricular shifts Ms. Smith was attempting to bring about. The final discussion of symbolism stands out because it did not fit the literary argument practices Ms. Smith worked to develop in the students’ writing assignments.

The symbolism event was powerful for the case study student because she drew substantially on the event in her final literary argument essay. While the instructional conversations focusing on the novel maintained a certain level of tension between traditional disciplinary English Language Arts practices and the practices Ms. Smith was

168 attempting to bring about, the symbolism event was the most explicit in how the teacher and students discussed how particular symbols helped them understand the novel. The position of uncovering an answer through sourcing evidence with particular types of figurative language is representative of the tensions highlighted in Chapter One.

Research Question 3: How does a case study students’ essay reflect and refract the curricular context in terms of literary argumentation practices?

The close analysis of the case study student’s final literary argument essay revealed that she brought to bear multiple intertextual “texts” in her writing. She drew on multiple literary topoi to warrant her chosen evidence. Perhaps most significantly,

Tiffany’s evidence is largely sourced from in-class discussions discussed in Chapter Five.

The structure of Tiffany’s final essay at first glance is reminiscent of the five- paragraph essay which is often seen as a deficit (Johnson, Thompson, Smagorinsky, &

Fry, 2003). Yet, Tiffany also drew widely on her own writing to support the structure of her final essay as well as the content and in several instances her own words. She demonstrated that she participated in the classroom context and in discussion through her writing (Wynhoff Olsen et al., 2018).

While Tiffany used the symbolism event from Chapter Five to support her main argument, a move which could be interpreted as resisting Ms. Smith’s attempts to bring about curricular change, Tiffany does incorporate local literary warrants established in the curricular context. The teacher wanted the students to make arguments rooted in their local shared reading. The case study student’s final writing illustrated Ms. Smith’s

169 attempt to weave the newer approach to literary argument with her background as a writer.

Teaching The Great Gatsby

Teaching the novel, The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald, 1925), is commonplace in

American high schools and its canonical nature may be indicative of teachers such as Ms.

Smith’s struggle with change: any list of required reading an English department prescribes suggests a possible reluctance of sort to change the curricular conversation

(Applebee, 1996) about the role of literature in the lives of adolescents. After years of rehearsing what can said about a text such as The Great Gatsby, the content to be covered can become ossified as to what a teacher may want her students to learn and to write about a text. For instance, Ms. Smith’s use of instructional conversations was at odds with how she evolved to think about the teaching and learning of literature in her classroom. She was aware of her reticence to “give” students “right” answers during instructional conversations but did so anyway largely because she felt an obligation to cover, that is, to talk about The Great Gatsby a certain way.

Ms. Smith’s struggles may mirror the struggles of other teachers who want to break from traditional “readings” of canonical texts but continue to transmit historical readings and regurgitated interpretations about images such as the “green light” in The

Great Gatsby. What Ms. Smith’s case highlights is that planning for instructional conversations is not a small or simple task, because, as Tiffany’s writing demonstrates, students tend to gravitate toward canonical readings (e.g., Tiffany’s use of the color white). To provide a coherent experience for the study of literature, teachers need to think

170 deliberately about the role of literature in their classrooms and how they are integrating writing and instructional conversations so that they work in tangent toward the final writing assessment. But perhaps even more significant is the need to consider what their curriculum is about, how instructional conversations enact what it is about, and how the literary texts fit into the stream of such planning and enactment of the aboutness of a curriculum. This may mean that rather than tossing out The Great Gatsby that a new domain be developed about, say, why characters such as Jay Gatsby find change so impossible and why resistance to change can lead to personal disaster.

Theoretical Implications

This dissertation seeks to contribute to the theoretical knowledge of teaching and learning of writing in several ways, a teacher attempting to change how they teach writing about literature, how instructional conversations reveal the deeply imbedded theoretical tensions, and finally how students’ writing reflects and refracts the change.

Teacher Change

Underlying this study of literary argumentation, instructional conversations, and student writing is a teacher attempting to change her teaching practice. Understanding

Ms. Smith’s change and evolution is paramount when considering how a case study student negotiates the curricular context to compose their writing. Richardson & Placier

(2001) suggest in their review of teacher change literature that further research on teacher change is needed in these three areas; 1) the effects teacher change has on student learning, 2) the relationship of change between individual teachers and their schools, and

171 finally 3) developing the construct of communities of practice in relation to teacher change. I see this dissertation study building on Richardson’s (1994) work and her call for future research on the relationship between a teacher undergoing change and its influence on learning.

Changing to a social practice perspective. A key change for Ms. Smith was how she acknowledged her role in shaping what counted as appropriate literary interpretations in her classroom. Also, central to her awareness were the underlying tensions which tacitly warranted the reasons she taught literature. Specifically, prior to our collaboration she believed that learning to read and study literature involved problem solving and finding textual clues to support literary interpretations within the boundaries of the text. But, as she evolved in her understanding so did her beliefs about how to structure her curriculum. Ms. Smith began to construct a clearer sense of the role writing instruction had within her curriculum and the change in her writing instruction was apparent. On the other hand, the role instructional conversations had within her curriculum were less clear. Ms. Smith’s change to a social practice perspective and her development of a dialogic stance (Juzwik et al., 2013) within instructional conversations within the unit were more complicated as a microethnographic analysis revealed Ms.

Smith’s reliance on disciplinary warranting influenced the scope of her change.

Returning to Figure 4.6 from Chapter Four, Ms. Smith’s evolution toward a social practice perspective is complex but is illustrative of what Richardson and Placier (2001) see for the future of teacher change scholarship. They argue that teacher change efforts need to account for students, as well as communities of practice. The findings from this

172 study begin to build on this work by highlighting the complexity of Ms. Smith’s understandings of why she was teaching literature the way she was and how to best change her practice so that her students could then be successful.

Figure 7.1 Ms. Smith Moving toward a social practice/dialogic perspective in teaching literary argument

What this case of teacher change illustrates is that care needs to go into figuring out how individual teachers consider the theoretical implications of their practices, how they are enacting those theories in their day-to-day teaching practices, and finally how students are learning within the evolution of the teacher’s practice. By considering the multiple levels of change, a fuller understanding of the change process can be seen.

On another level, Figure 7.1 suggests how ELA teachers might disrupt canonical readings which may limit how students are engaging with the texts. By framing the reading of canonical texts in situated ways, students and teachers might come to new understandings about the novel, each other, and themselves in the process. 173

Studies of Writing about Literature

At the heart of this study is the disconnect and tension in how one teacher taught literature in her classroom and taught writing in relation to that tension. VanDerHeide

(2014) citing Applebee (2000) believes that the field has conflicting models of writing development and that in turn instructional models maintain varying assessments for those models. She argues that Applebee’s model supports a belief that students need appropriate knowledge within a discipline to take action, and the classroom she studied with an apprenticeship framework supports Applebee’s call for newer ways to consider how writers develop in relation to their contexts. The apprenticeship model is supportive of how researchers might consider what writing about literature entails.

Recall that Chapter Two argues that scholars have understood writing as changes in text, cognition, and situated contexts. Any study of writing about literature needs to address what counts as writing and what counts as literature. The theories for understanding what writing about literature is in classroom contexts have not come to terms with the deeply held beliefs about how the undergirding theories of literature influence their methods and findings.

Marshall, Smagorinsky, and Smith (1995) articulate how theories of speech genres, and more generally disciplinary ways of thinking highlight the theoretical tensions at play:

Further, because the speech genre of classroom discussions of literature has

conditioned the ways that students think about literature even when teachers

invite them to respond in new and different ways, students might refuse or fail to

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recognize those invitations. We have all had the experience of leading what we

thought of as a scintillating discussion only to have a student ask a question about

our "lecture." [I]f students are to learn new ways of talking about literature, they

must be actively engaged in doing so. (p. 131).

Theories of writing and writing about literature need to take into account how the disciplinary speech genres influence the ways teachers and students engage in writing and discussions of literature. As Marshall et al. (1995) note, this a type of conditioning that has occurred in English Language Arts classrooms, and students and teachers are invested in particular ways of thinking which are difficult to disrupt. Ms. Smith was aware early on that she viewed her role as an English teacher a certain way, but her recognition did not lead to changing literacy practices in her instruction.

One thing that was clear from the study of Ms. Smith’s teaching was her need to address and make clear to herself and to her students how she was framing the teaching and learning of literature. Wilder and Wolfe (2012) and Lewis and Ferretti (2009) argue that being explicit in the teaching of literary warranting improved the quality of students’ writing, but questions still remain about how the role of literature discussions in the context of explicit teaching of literary argument features.

Writing Tasks and Literature Discussions

The structured process approach of writing (Smagorinsky, Johannessen, Kahn,

McCann, 2010) which is rooted in the work of Hillocks (1987, 2011) and Applebee

(1986) is the most effective model which elucidates Ms. Smith’s teaching. Hillocks

(1985) believed that the best approach for the teaching of writing involved developing

175 tasks and the declarative and procedural knowledge which supported learning. General writing skills and procedures don’t apply universally, rather, specific and goal directed tasks are used to support writers for in their particular contexts.

James Marshall’s (1987) study of writing was an important early example for the study of classroom writing. In his multiphase analysis which included observation of classroom talk, he sought to understand the effects of different writing prompts. Later, when recalling his earlier work in The Language of Interpretation he writes,

if we change the writing students do after they have read, we can change the kind

of knowledge they employ while they are reading and talking about literature. In

his study, he considers the impact of changing a formal writing assignment to a

more personal prompt, as in the following two examples:

Formal: In "Just Before the War with the Eskimos" Ginnie's feelings toward Selena appear to change. In a well-argued essay, use quotations and other evidence from the text to explain why Ginnie has a change of heart toward Selena.

Personal: In "Just Before the War with the Eskimos" Ginnie's feelings toward Selena appear to change. Write an essay in which you explain how your own feelings are affected as you meet some of the people who populate Ginnie's life.

These changes may seem minor, yet our studies have helped Jim understand that

responses to the two prompts call on fundamentally different ways of thinking and

speaking about literature. The changes imply that the rules of the classroom are

not those to which students have become accustomed: textual knowledge is not

privileged over personal knowledge; coherence is not privileged over

configuration; and students must be active meaning makers. And they enable 176

students to break the rules of discourse that govern academic thinking and

writing, providing them with opportunities to respond to literature in ways that are

similar to those described by adults and students outside the classroom walls. (p.

132)

What James Marshall is suggesting is that the prompts teachers ask students to write shape the kinds of knowledge they employ as they read to make meaning. This is reflective of Ms. Smith’s literary argument prompt for the instructional unit and how it shaped the instructional conversations students engaged in, but the ways Ms. Smith and the students used language during the literature discussions were deeply rooted in their understandings. Because of this, the instructional conversations did not employ the literary argumentations as much as Ms. Smith would have liked.

Activities as anchors. The environmental mode (Hillocks, 1987) and by extension, the structured-process approach (Applebee, 1986) of the teaching and learning of writing provide a backdrop to exploring the role literature discussions have in relation to providing resources for developing students’ topical knowledge. In the case of Ms.

Smith’s classroom, the writing assignments were well thought out in regard to how they aligned within the inquiry frame of reading the novel in a particular way and the final literary argument essay. But what was missing was the procedural practice associated with how students should use the framed inquiry system they co-constructed throughout the unit. Instead, students were free to choose how they would compose their essays with respect to the prompt’s directions.

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Anchors provide a useful metaphor for illustrating how teachers might consider particular gateway activities (McCann, 2010) and how they anchor particular ways of knowing. For example, Tiffany’s in-class essay from 1/14 from Chapter 4 and Appendix

E was an intertextual resource which Tiffany drew widely upon in her final essay. That resource provided Tiffany a type of continuity of practice which Ms. Smith was attempting to bring about. Tiffany was able to return repeatedly to her writing to reflect and refract as she came across new questions and content later in the unit. Considering the role particular events play as teachers and students transition their practices could provide rich points of analysis for teachers and researchers.

Pedagogical Implications

An important facet of this study was to understand a teacher in transition. While this study sought to understand how she made sense of that process it also sought to understand how that process unfolded within literature discussions and finally, in student writing. In the onset of the study, Ms. Smith explained her reticence to change how she had done things. She wasn’t sure about her stance on how literature should be taught, but knew her background as an English major was important in shaping what she thought was meaningful about literature. While not explicit in her approach to teaching literature, she leaned toward new critical theory, because that’s what made sense to her and it’s how her English Department taught literature. But, once Ms. Smith was introduced to literary argumentation and she thought about how argumentation could facilitate a yearlong curriculum, she pivoted away from literary analysis for literary analysis sake. Meaning,

178 she sought to use the yearlong question about the American dream as a pseudo boundary by which to “read” in particular ways. Change is difficult to achieve when teachers’ practices are tied into their institutional systems, as Marshall, Smagorinsky, and Smith

(1995) note,

It is not surprising, therefore, that teachers who seek change are likely to be

thwarted not only by institutional structures (Brown. 1991), but also by their own

deeply instilled sense of the "right" way for schooling to proceed. (p. 131)

Ms. Smith’s beliefs about how to teach literature were in transition and she was aware of the tension throughout my time observing. Ms. Smith’s use of discussions were not rooted in a structured process approach, but it’s important to note that she was not attempting to align with a “right” or “wrong” approach, rather she made pedagogical choices based on her expertise as a teacher and for her, they tended to support close reading strategies.

This study could also provide meaningful questions for how English teachers are taught. While I wanted to understand a teacher in transition, this was not the entirety of this study. My experience seeing Ms. Smith for an entire school year as well as the summer workshop allowed me to see her growth and comfort with literary argumentation. Ms. Smith noted in our first interview that she wished other teachers at her school could experience the time to think about how to incorporate argumentation to foster critical thinking and learning across the school year instead of as a single unit. Her comments suggest that teachers need time, space, and ongoing support to develop a strong acumen for teaching literary argumentation.

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My work with preservice teachers highlights another concern I have for how best to teach students literary argumentation. My experience as a high school English teacher and my working with cooperating teachers in the local school districts suggests that

English teacher training can vary greatly from program to program. How teachers are taught literature and what counts as knowledge within those programs will be important if the role of argumentation continues to grow.

Methodological Implications

This study is in many ways an extension of my attempts to understand how students are drawing on their classroom contexts to compose their written products. What

I have come to understand is that no method paints the entire picture of any complex process. My recent work with colleagues (Wynhoff Olsen et al. (2018) echoes this sentiment,

no method, however complex, can fully represent an individual’s social writing

processes, but attention to intertextual analysis, however incomplete, gives a more

complex picture of how students socially participate in classroom writing (p. 27).

What has become clear in this study is that intertextuality is an important marker for understanding how students make sense of their contexts and classroom resources in their writings. What is also clear to me is that any study of writing needs to include students’ writing products and social interactions in which the writing is being produced. Lastly, what is also clear to me is that scholars of writing need to rely on multiple layers of analysis to make sense of the complexities of student writing.

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Concluding Thoughts

While this study only focused on one classroom it is clear from my experiences as a former high school English teacher, my work teaching preservice English teachers and their cooperating teachers, and my work with teachers in the AWP’s study that teachers who teach literature could benefit from these findings. I have observed English classrooms where the teacher expects a disciplinary discourse of new criticism when their students discussed literature, and I have seen classrooms where the teacher wanted the students to just simply read and enjoy reading. What I observed in Ms. Smith’s classroom was an attempt to transition her teaching and writing assessments to account for new kinds of discourse and new kinds of knowledge. What I found was that the writing assessments positioned knowledge of the text in a specific local way while the literature discussions were less directed in the types of knowledge that counted. Once the writing was analyzed, patterns could be viewed which linked how the case study student warranted her literary argument.

To conclude this dissertation study, I would like to highlight a recent forum article in the Research of the Teaching of English. Prior’s (2017) article “Setting a Research

Agenda for Lifespan Writing Development: The Long View from Where?” pushes back against “The Long View” of writing development (Bazerman, Applebee, Berninger,

Brandt, Grahma, Masuda, Rowe, & Schleppegrell, 2017) and offers a window into the possibilities on the horizon for writing research. He believes that, “Viewing writing as sharply distinct from orality risks reigniting Great Divide theories that had so many

181 problematic effects on research, pedagogy, and people” (p. 212). His point is one that I agree with and have attempted to unite to a degree in this study. While he encourages the field to consider research on lifespan writing development built on foundations of embodied, mediated, and dialogic semiotic practices for their units of analysis, his point is clear: as we ask more complex questions of what writing is, scholars need to think deeply about how the units of analysis they use foreground and background the “deeply entangled domains” of people’s lives. If scholars continue to see writing as a static document then they will continue to use the same tools to understand that process which will restrict the horizon of possible findings.

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Appendix A. Unit of Study

Week Reading Writing Monday 1/4 Free write – what words define the American dream? - Individually Tuesday 1/5 Annotated Bibliography – teacher-led Whole Class Reading - F. Scott model for creating annotated bibliography Fitzgerald biography – of the F. Scott Fitzgerald biography Individually Wednesday 1/6 Independent Reading - students Annotated Bibliography – students individually read their articles worked individually annotating their 1 articles Thursday 1/7 Annotated Bibliography – students wrote their annotated bibliography entries on a Googledoc in small groups Entry Slip – 3-2-1 American dream writing Friday 1/8 Annotated Bibliography – students wrote their annotated bibliography entries on a Googledoc in small groups Monday 1/11 Annotated Bibliography Notes – Students took notes as they listened to the groups present Tuesday 1/12 Annotated Bibliography Notes – Students took notes as they listened to the groups present Wednesday 1/13 Read Outside Articles – students Article Notes – students worked read two articles outside of their individually to annotate the new articles 2 group to prepare for their in-class to prepare for their in-class writing writing assignment Thursday 1/14 In-class writing - “What definition of The American Dream can you derive from the articles you read? How does class and/or status effect that definition as derived from the articles read?” Graphic Organizer – location comparison 200

Week Reading Writing Graphic Organizer - characterization Friday 1/15 Independent Reading - students Reading Journal – Students take notes Read The Great Gatsby (GG) for each chapter about the American chapters 1-3 dream Monday 1/18 NO SCHOOL NO SCHOOL Tuesday 1/19 Independent Reading – students Reading Journal – Students take notes read independently chapters 1-3 for each chapter about the American dream Wednesday 1/20 Quote Activity – students completed Close reading – class discussion save the last word for me quote activity of chapters 1-3 & quote selection independently and then discussed in small 3 groups Thursday 1/21 Argument Activity – students worked in two groups where they created claims and responses to claims silently Friday 1/22 Close reading – teacher-led Reading Journal – Students take notes discussion of chapters 4-6 for each chapter about the American focusing on status and class dream Independent Reading – students read independently chapters 4-6 Monday 1/25 TEACHER ABSENT TEACHER ABSENT Tuesday 1/26 Characterization Activity – students wrote questions about characters and perspectives Wednesday 1/27 Philosophy Reading – students Character Relationships Essay – read excerpt about Martin Buber’s students write a one page response I/It and I/thou philosophy identifying a major character’s 4 relationship using Buber’s philosophy Thursday 1/28 Independent Reading – students Reading Journal – Students take notes read independently chapters 7-9 for each chapter about the American dream Friday 1/29 RESEARCHER ABSENT RESEARCHER ABSENT Buber Essay Reading – students Buber Essay Editing – students read 3 read 3 other essays other essays and provided comments 201

Week Reading Writing 5 Monday Independent Writing – Students write Tuesday 2/1

Wednesday 2/2 Class Discussion Thursday 2/3 Buber Character Mapping

Friday 2/4 Individual Reading

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Appendix B. Teacher Interview

End of Year Interview for Teachers (30 minutes)

Remind participant of his/her rights to end the interview at any time and that they do not have to answer any questions they would prefer not to answer.

The target class • Now that you have completed the school year, tell me about what you wanted your students to take with them from your work on literary argumentation and the extent to which you feel you were successful/less successful. How do you know? • Tell me about how argumentative writing fits into the course as a whole. How often have you taught it this school year and how often do you plan to return to it after today? How is argumentative writing related to the readings you assign or other parts of your curriculum? • When you began the school year, what did you assume that your students knew about argumentative writing? What would you like them to know as they begin the school year and what would like them to know by the end of the school year?

Looking Back • What is your current understanding literary argumentation? • How have you changed across the school year in regard to… o your understanding of literary argumentation and… o how to teach it? • Of all of the events that you engaged in this year with the AWP, which events offered particularly rich opportunities to learn? How did the events work for you as opportunities to learn? • What are your perceptions/observations regarding how your students have changed in regard to understanding literary argumentation?

Conceptual framework for teaching argumentative writing about literature • How do you define argumentative writing? What are the key components of argumentative writing? How is it similar to and different from other types of writing? Did you understanding of argumentation and argumentative writing change at all during the school year? • How would you describe your approach to teaching argumentative writing? What instructional strategies do you view as critical to teaching argumentative writing about literature? Did you change your mind about how to approach argumentative writing about literature this school year?

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• When you respond to a student paper involving argumentative writing about literature, what do you look for? What is your approach to responding to student papers? Why do you take this approach? • What are your general goals for teaching argumentative writing? (Prompt for teaching reasoning, considering other perspectives, learning from other people’s arguments, deep understanding of the topic, etc.) Have your goals for teaching argumentative writing change across the school year?

Five Principles of our Curricular Intervention: Which of these principles are important to you in you approach to literary argumentation and argumentative writing, and how have they become part of your teaching this school year? What ones are you still working on or not sure about? • Developing complexity through multiple perspectives • Orchestrating multiple social practices (e.g., writing, discussing, reading, arguing, etc.) • Developing a discourse (way of talking about) for literary argumentation • Developing a curricular framework (e.g., thematic, big ideas, literary period, great works, etc.) • Adapting to students’ backgrounds • Developing a reflective toward teaching literary argument

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Appendix C. Student Interview

End of Year Interview for Case Study Students (30 minutes)

(To be conducted outside of instructional time for 30 minutes. Remind participant of his/her rights to end the interview at any time and that they do not have to answer any questions they would prefer not to answer. After the student gives an answer, you should consider following up on any item related to the teaching and learning of argumentative writing by asking, “Can you tell me more about ….?).

Overall Impressions • What different kinds of things do you do in this class?( e.g., reading, writing, films) Which of these seems most important? Which of these seems least important? • How are activities related to one another? What do you like best about this class? What do you like least? How is the class different from last year's class?

Literature Selections • What were some of the things you read early in the year? More recently? Did you study these separately or were they grouped in some way? If grouped, how and why? What connections, if any, were there between books you read? How was the reading organized? What do you think you will study next in this class? Why?

What Counts Knowing Literature • Did you notice any changes across the school in terms of what your teacher wanted you to know and think about literature? Can you think of an example of what changed?

• What kinds of things did you do in class when you studied [title]? What kinds of questions did the teacher ask? What kinds of discussions did the class have about it? What kinds of tests did you have on it? What does it take to do well in class? How does your teacher decide grades? What matters most in giving grades?

• When you are discussing ideas and/or literature in your English language arts classroom, what does the teacher seems to focus on? Please give me an example.

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• When you or other students discuss ideas and/or literature with your teacher, do you ever disagree with one another? How do your teacher and the other students seem to feel about disagreements?

Writing about Literature • Did you notice any changes across the school in terms of how your teacher wanted you write about literature? Can you think of an example of what changed? What kinds of writing do you prefer to do and why?

• In your English class, (insert teacher’s name here) is teaching about how do argumentative writing: Writing which presents an idea or attempts to persuade someone. If you were to describe how the teacher is teaching you about argumentative writing about literature and how you are learning to do argumentative writing to some one who never visited your classroom, what would you say?

• If you had to give advice to a new, incoming student at the beginning of the school year, about doing argumentative writing, what would you say? If you had to give them advice about doing well in (insert teacher’s name here)’s class, what would you say?

Miscellaneous Imagine you could change what would be studied in your class. What would you change? What would you keep? What is your favorite subject in school? Why? What is your least favorite subject? Why?

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Appendix D. Analytic Tables for Transcripts

Section Event Date Page #

Section D.1 Warranting evidence through multiple 1.4.16 195 perspectives

Section D.2 Interpreting a character’s actions 1.20.16 196

Section D.3 Symbolism in the novel 2.2.16 210

207

D.1 Warranting evidence through multiple perspectives 1.4.16 3 minutes

# Speaker Message Unit Surface Level Underlying Level: Literary Practice (Conversational (Location of (CF) (LK (Argumentative Function) Knowledge) Contextual/De- Element) contextual) 1 Smith thinking about the Introducing new Teacher Introducing Context Warranting perspective of topic new topic characters 2 is there justification Framing Teacher Framing LA Context Warranting for breaking Myrtle’s Question of multiple nose perspectives 3 what happens Soliciting Soliciting 4 same scene what does Reframing Teacher Reframes to Teacher Warranting nick think? include evidence from another Contextual another character character’s perspective 5 Nick we know gives Evaluating Teacher Evaluates Teacher – the Warranting as a what I think is the teacher reader appropriate response comments start to think about the Framing Teacher Framing Teacher Warranting differences of evidence based perspectives within the Contextual on characters’ same scene perspectives 6 What about the party Soliciting goers 7 what was their Soliciting reaction

208

D.2 Interpreting a character’s actions 1.20.16 25 minutes

Speaker Message Unit Surface Level Underlying Level: Literary Practice # (Conversational (Location of (CF) (LK) (Argumentative Function) Knowledge) Element) 1 Karl Our quote is on page Responding Text Responding Text Sourcing textual 17 and it’s uh “I’m evidence to glad it’s a girl and I’ll support claim hope she’ll be a fool that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world. A beautiful fool” 2 Smith why does that sum up Framing Framing the Context Warranting Daisy? Question evidence to be warranted 3 Pete so cynical Interpreting Student Responding Context 4 Like Holding a turn 5 Pete it not only describes Interpreting Student Responding Context Backing her it is kind of who she is trying to be xxx 6 Joe xxx she wishes she Interpreting Student Responding Context Backing was ignorant to all of this 7 Smith she knows Tom is Extending Teacher Extending Text Framing to having an affair right? Extend Discussion

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8 But from the outside Framing Teacher Framing Text/ world what does it Context look like? 9 Anna she’s dumb Interpreting Student Responding Text/ Backing Context 10 Pete Having a good time Interpreting Student Interpreting Context Backing 11 being rich Interpreting Student Interpreting Context 12 Smith yeah 13 right Evaluating Teacher Evaluating Context 14 sit down and eat your Role Teacher ? Context Ventriloquizing pork chops forget students as the about the mistress character of calling in the middle Daisy of dinner 15 so you said she wishes Revoice Teacher Framing Context Evaluating you were innocent to warranting of evidence it all or ignorant of it textual all evidence 16 But Holding a turn Holding a turn 17 is that the face Reframing and Teacher Context Reframing extending textual evidence analysis from backing to warranting 18 she is trying to put on Reframing Context 19 so is it for herself or is Solicitating Solicitating Context it for society? 20 John seems like more for Responding and Student Responding Context Moving from herself than for Interpreting and backing to society Interpreting warranting

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21 like it’s painfully Interpreting Student Responding Context obvious there are so many problems between her and Tom 22 so at that point it Interpreting Student Responding Context would be very difficult if xxx she had not been close it 23 but if she’s just doing Interpreting Student Responding Context it all the time then she xxx distract herself from the situation 24 Smith Okay Evaluating Evaluating 25 what happens Holding a turn 26 I love this quote Evaluating Teacher 27 “I hope she will be a Repeating Text Repeating Decontextual Reframes fool that’s the best textual citation textual backing/warrant- thing a girl can be in citation ing by student to this world a beautiful textual evidence fool” 28 so what happens if she Reframing with Teacher Reframing Context Reframes by pushes the issue question with question asking what could happen 29 you said she hates her Revoicing Student Revoicing Context Revoicing domestic situation backing from John 30 what are her options Reframing Teacher Reframing Context Complicating question backing by asking what is in Daisy’s control

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31 first of all 32 Pete Xxx 33 Smith do you think Tom Reframing Teacher Reframing Context Complicating the would do that? question question backing by including including Tom Daisy’s relationship with Tom 34 Pete I don’t know Responding 35 Smith maybe to myrtle Extending Complicating the interpretation by including Tom’s relationship with Myrtle 36 do you think he would Reframing Reframing the do that to Daisy? question interpretation of Daisy to consider the relationship he has with both women 37 Students No Responding Responding

38 Smith why not Soliciting a Soliciting a Context Clarifying the response response contextual 339warranting of Daisy’s power 39 Anna because Daisy’s Responding Student Responding Context Warranting higher class

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40 Smith Daisy’s higher class Repeating

41 Okay Holding a turn 42 It’s not cool to beat up Revoicing an Teacher Revoicing an Context Warranting to on your high class interpretation interpretation include issues of wife it’s okay to beat power, status, up on your low class and class mistress 43 XXX I think it’s because Responding Student Responding doesn’t really

44 I want to say he loves Interpreting Student Interpreting Context Complicating the her because that’s the backing of the only word I can think Daisy and Tom’s of right now but he relationship and just the issues of power 45 Myrtle is his mistress Interpreting Text and Interpreting Text Claim and he is not going to Student leave daisy’s for myrtle 46 Like Holding a turn 47 she thinks that but Interpreting Text and Interpreting Context Backing the he’s not really going Student claim that Tom to leave daisy he is not going to hasn’t done it with any leave Daisy of the other women and won’t do it with myrtle

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48 so he kind of just Interpreting Context Interpreting Context Warranting – views her as an object labeling Tom’s and not as a person view of Daisy as and he views daisy as an object a person 49 Smith Okay Holding a turn Holding a turn 50 so Tom Holding a turn Holding a turn 51 Jerk Tom views Daisy Evaluating and Teacher Revoicing Context Revoicing the a real person Revoicing claim 52 you think he puts Revoicing Student Revoicing Context Backing analysis value on her where he of character doesn’t on myrtle relationships 53 guess myrtle xxx Extending Teacher Extending Context Extending money and time student’s backing to issues of power 54 Anna he has a big house and Interpreting Text and Interpreting Context Offering backing a big estate and like a Student which includes daughter so who’s power and going to take care of character it? relationships 55 like myrtle? Reframing Student Reframing Claiming question 56 because she’s married Explaining Text Explaining Decontextual Evidence so like 57 he needs someone of a Interpreting Student Interpreting Context Backing of respectable class to evidence take care of

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everything and everyone while he goes and does his own thing 58 Student? also like he and daisy Interpreting Text Interpreting Decontextual Evidence are married

59 he doesn’t really care Interpreting Student Interpreting Context if he emotionally hurts her xxx 60 Smith you bring up an Evaluating Student interesting point 61 can Daisy leave? Question Teacher Question Context Power 62 Student? I mean she can Responding Responding Claim 63 I don’t think she Evaluating Evaluating Context Evaluating the would claim 64 Smith ok 65 so Daisy can Questioning Teacher Questioning Context Questioning and technically leave extending the evaluation of the claim 66 can she divorce him Questioning Questioning 67 Student Yeah Responding Responding Evaluating the claim 68 Smith she could technically Responding Teacher Context divorce him 69 no in this time frame it Explaining Teacher Explaining Decontextual Explaining the was really hard for historical women to file for backing/ divorce and actually warranting of the

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have that happen there claim as it would have to be relates to the some pretty damning novel’s time evidence and I think period going into court and saying things like my husband is cheating on me 70 I don’t know enough Hedging and Teacher Hedging and Decontextual Explaining the about the legal law in Explaining Explaining historical that time frame but it backing/ might not have been warranting of the enough to be even claim as it granted a divorce but relates to the still much easier for a novel’s time man to be granted a period divorce 71 what if she just says Reframing Teacher Reframing Context Reframing social I’m through with you question issue of time to jerk I’m taking the kid character’s and leaving actions/power 72 is that an option? Soliciting Teacher Soliciting Context 73 Student XXX 74 Smith technically she could Explaining Teacher Explaining Decontextual Explaining the leave him but in this /Contextual historical time period it was not backing/ okay she could be like warranting of the okay I’m just going to claim as it go on my own jerk relates to the I’m out novel’s time period 216

75 No Revoicing Student Revoicing Contextual Smith revoices students’ shaking their heads “no” claim 76 you couldn’t go and Explaining Teacher Explaining Decontextual Warranting of just get an apartment “no” with on your own with your temporal child it was not universals of socially acceptable acceptance 77 if she were to leave she would go back to her family 78 what would either one Explaining the of those actions mean historical for her and tom other backing/ than the fact that they warranting of the would be living claim as it separately relates to the novel’s time period 79 socially what would that look like 80 Anna total exclusion Responding Student Responding Contextual Claiming 81 Smith total exclusion right Revoicing Student Revoicing Contextual Claiming social suicide Revoicing Revoicing Contextual/ Backing decontextual back to social mores

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82 they would never be Explaining Teacher Explaining Contextual/ Backing accepted back into decontextual society 83 so is this all about Distilling* Teacher Distilling* Contextual/ Returning to money for daisy is this Decontextual claim based off about social of Daisy’s acceptance for daisy character, her why in the world is power, and she staying with this social forces jerk 84 Anna she’s a gold digger Responding Student Responding Contextual Claiming 85 Smith (laughing) she’s a Revoicing Student Revoicing Seeking gold digger evidence/ backing 86 do you think so? Soliciting Soliciting Seeking evidence/ backing 87 Anna a bit but she has a xxx Explaining and Student Explaining Contextual Claiming a think there’s a lot of Hedging and hedging factors

88 XXX I think she won’t leave Responding and Student Explaining Contextual Backing the him for the same Extending claim of Daisy reason he won’t leave not leaving by her including Tom 89 Smith why’s that Solicitating Solicitating Seeking evidence/ backing

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90 XXX because they care Explaining Student Explaining Contextual about each other but not as much as 91 they both cheat Providing Text Providing Contextual Evidence to evidence evidence support claim in contextual argument which adds complexity to the relationship between Daisy and Tom 92 but I don’t know how Hedging Hedging Unsure of how to explain it of what evidence to back claim 93 Smith they care about each Revoicing Student Revoicing Context Seeking backing/ other but not enough evidence for to not cheat claim 94 so think about 95 you guys brought up 96 let’s just talk about Reframing Reframing Context Evidence and Tom for a second backing through Tom 97 do you think if there is Questioning Teacher Questioning Context/ Seeking backing/ any recourse for Daisy Decontextual evidence of to go to Tom and say Daisy’s options stop it 98 what happens if she Questioning Extrapolating Contextual Extrapolating an pushes this issue? imagined option for Daisy

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99 Student he could leave her Responding Student Responding Contextual

100 Smith Hmm Holding a turn 101 he could leave her Holding a turn 102 he’s not going to Evaluating Teacher Evaluating Contextual Claiming though 103 Right Holding a turn 104 Student he would probably Responding and Student Responding Contextual Claiming just freak out a bit interpreting and interpreting 105 Student he would just laugh Responding and Student Responding Contextual Claiming 2 interpreting and interpreting 106 Smith she has no recourse Revoicing Revoicing Decontextual Claiming right / Contextual 107 she has no power to Evaluating Teacher Evaluating Contextual Claiming do anything 108 think about 109 Student what would make him Questioning Student Questioning Decontextual Seeking backing/ 2 stop / Contextual Evidence 110 Smith Okay Responding Responding

111 that’s a good point Evaluating Evaluating 112 what would make him Revoicing Revoicing stop 113 she has no way to Explaining Teacher Explaining Contextual Backing make him stop does she 114 he knows that Interpreting Teacher Interpreting Backing 115 he totally knows that Extending Extending Backing

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116 he’s not going to stop Interpreting Teacher Interpreting Contextual Backing having affairs 117 he’s a man right xxx Explaining Text Explaining Decontextual Backing to / Contextual warranting based off of social issues discussed previously 118 he knows she has no Explaining Teacher Explaining Contextual Warranting power to stop him based off of Tom’s behavior decontextual and relationship social issues to Daisy 119 Heather and in the chapters we Extending Text Extending Contextual Evidence of read Tom kind of Tom’s behavior seems distracted a lot by the fact that Myrtle 120 like he’s going to meet Explaining Text Explaining Contextual Evidence Myrtle soon 121 like at that apartment Interpreting Text Interpreting Contextual Backing of and he kind of brushes evidence off the topic when people bring it up 123 so I feel like Daisy Interpreting and Student Interpreting Contextual Backing of brought up the topic of extrapolating and evidence to Myrtle he would just extrapolating claim brush it off and ignore her 124 Smith Okay Holding a turn 125 so you don’t think he Questioning Questioning would even have a response to her

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126 Katie Also Holding a turn 127 right now she’s kind Interpreting and Student Interpreting Context Backing of of “I think this is extrapolating and Daisy’s options happening” extrapolating 128 she might be afraid to find out 129 Smith kind of like they were Revoicing Student Revoicing saying 130 putting on the face of Revoicing Student Revoicing Context Claiming stupid 131 pretend it’s not Interpreting Student Revoicing Context Backing of the happening so it claim that Daisy doesn’t hurt so bad is “playing dumb”

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D.3 Symbolism in the novel 2.2.16 5 minutes

2 But hopefully you Framing Teacher Framing LA Context Warranting been thinking about Question of multiple since we looked at that perspectives color white in the first chapter 3 you’ve been thinking Soliciting Soliciting about that as you’ve been reading 4 So I’m going to divide Reframing Teacher Reframes to Teacher/LA Warranting you into three groups I include evidence from want you to kind of another another make the argument character character’s think about what is our perspective author doing with the symbol

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# Speaker Message Unit Surface Level Underlying Level: Literary Practice (Conversational (Location of (CF) (LK (Argumentative Function) Knowledge) Contextual/De- Element) contextual) 5 what is the point of Evaluating Teacher Evaluates Teacher – the Warranting as a purposely putting in teacher reader and how does it help comments further our understanding as readers? 6 Elise ok so we decided that Responding Student Responding Decontextual Claim white was very closely tied to Daisy and sometimes through Jordan 7 I took notes yesterday Responding Student Responding so I’m just going to read it 8 white symbolizes Interpreting Student Responding Decontextual Evidence immaculate and pure beauty, nobleness, Backing unblemished morality and purity but it also symbolizes emptiness superficiality ruthlessness and selfishness to a great extent in the novel in the novel and we said this because of Daisy in the beginning 224

# Speaker Message Unit Surface Level Underlying Level: Literary Practice (Conversational (Location of (CF) (LK (Argumentative Function) Knowledge) Contextual/De- Element) contextual) 9 Like 10 oh she is pure and Responding Text Responding Decontextual Evidence beautiful and that is how everyone describes her 11 and um 12 she comes out with a Interpreting Student Interpreting Decontextual Evidence sparkling reputation event though after she associates herself with a drink at the party and she doesn’t do that so she is thought of as clean 13 but the color white is Interpreting Student Interpreting Decontextual Claim also very bland and tasteless and it’s just boring and simple and it could be related to Daisy because she herself isn’t very deep person 14 she is very shallow Interpreting Student Interpreting Decontextual Claim and very self-centered so eventually in the Evidence – Tacit

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# Speaker Message Unit Surface Level Underlying Level: Literary Practice (Conversational (Location of (CF) (LK (Argumentative Function) Knowledge) Contextual/De- Element) contextual) end the color white describes that xxx 15 Smith Ok Holding 16 do you buy what she Soliciting Class Soliciting Contextual Does the said here evidence support their claim and tacit warrant 17 you gave us a lot to Class Backing think about 18 Tara we also said that her Responding Student Interpreting Decontextual Backing name Daisy like the flower daisy is white on the outside and yellow on the inside and yellow is commonly thought of as 19 like Holding a turn Holding a turn 20 gold money and so it Interpreting Student Interpreting Contextual Backing kind of shows that on the outside 21 she’s like Holding a turn Holding a turn

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# Speaker Message Unit Surface Level Underlying Level: Literary Practice (Conversational (Location of (CF) (LK (Argumentative Function) Knowledge) Contextual/De- Element) contextual) 22 pretty and clean and Interpreting Student Interpreting Decontextual Backing stuff but on the inside she’s self-centered 23 Smith so kind of that inner Revoicing Student Revoicing Decontextual Backing – Tacit outer view because on Paradox the inside 24 You’re right Evaluating Evaluating 25 we see her she comes Elaborating Teacher/Text Elaborating Backing by away from parties and elaborating on stuff sober where the Tara’s ideas rest of them are drunk and acting like idiots and she does come across like people think of her as very pure and upright and we do see the selfish side of her 26 Ok Holding a turn Holding a turn 27 do you guys buy this Soliciting Soliciting Backing/ Evidence – Teacher asks for responses 28 Yeah well what Elaborating Text Elaborating Decontextual Backing - they’ve said about Ubiquity

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# Speaker Message Unit Surface Level Underlying Level: Literary Practice (Conversational (Location of (CF) (LK (Argumentative Function) Knowledge) Contextual/De- Element) contextual) Daisy why keep putting this color white throughout? 29 I mean what color suit Elaborating Text Elaborating Decontextual Backing/ is Gatsby wearing Evidence when he meets Daisy? 30 A white one for sure. Res Decontextual Backing 31 At the end after he Elaborating Text Elaborating Decontextual dies Nick at one point goes back over to his house and goes 32 makes a big deal about Elaborating Text Elaborating Decontextual Backing the pristine white steps 33 some kids taken like a Elaborating Text Elaborating Decontextual Backing rock and written I don’t know 34 stupid dead guy or something on the steps 35 and Nick’s like Elaborating Text Elaborating Decontextual Backing scuffling it out with his foot on the pristine white steps

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Appendix E. Tiffany’s Writing

Section Event Date Page #

Section E.1 In-Class Essay 1.14.16 217

Section E.2 Great Gatsby Notes 1.15.16 - 219

2.20.16

Section E.3 Buber Character Essay 2.2.16 222

Section E.4 Final Essay 2.10.16 225

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E.1 Tiffany’s Timed In-class Essay

1.14.16

Much like Johnny Depp, the American Dream wears many different hats, and has many different faces. By that I mean that the elusive “American Dream” cannot be summed up by one meager definition. The American Dream is always changing, and always evolving. It means many different things to many different people. What can be sure is that, for the most part, there are at least two main ideas that are in everyone’s

American Dream; money or success, and the pursuit of happiness. The best example of these two aspects coming together in perfect harmony is in the short story Two Kinds.

Written by Amy Tan, Two Kinds is a story of a woman and her daughter both struggling to explain their ideas to another. The mother wants her daughter to be successful and to become a prepubescent piano prodigy, while the daughter, on the other hand, accepts the fact that she probably will not become a prodigy, and just wants her mother to accept her for who she is and let her be happy. At the end of the story the daughter finally understands where her mother is coming from, and it can be inferred that she realizes how their two kinds of dreams come together perfectly, almost like a song, to create one, full encompassing American Dream.

Much like how the daughter in the story Two Kinds realizes after a few failed attempts that she probably won’t be as successful as she once envisioned, Now-a-days it seems as though our generation has learned that we aren’t going to do well as our parents did and we are accepting that. This viewpoint is displayed perfectly in the article 230

Millennials trying to bank the American Dream written by Nona Willis Aronowitz. The article shows that people are starting to realize that their American Dreams shouldn’t be just about the money. People in this generation are starting to look for jobs that have more substance to them, something a little more meaningful. The article also describes a girl who’s perfectly intertwined making bank with making people happy as she studies at an Ivy League school to become a doctor, instead of just sending her life focusing and caring about the money aspect of life.

The Ivy Leaguer referenced in the last paragraph also had another motive to her dream, and that was the preservation to not let being born into a lower social class hinder her, and to do better than was expected of her because of her social class. She tries to fight the popular idea of not being able to do better than our parents. The same is true in

Still I Rise by Maya Angelou. These two people show that the American Dream is available to anyone, no matter if you were dealt a bad card in the beginning of your life, you still have the opportunity for success if you make it for yourself. In both of the stories it can be shown that there is a chance to “rise” above and become successful, even if it looks like all of the cards are stacked against you.

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E.2 Tiffany’s Great Gatsby Notes

1.15.16 – 2.10.16

Chapters 1-3 Descriptions: The American Dream, for the most part, is made up of two key components; success, and the pursuit of happiness. In this book it seems as though the characters have prioritised success and money above everything else, therefore leaving them unhappy and restless. They think that because they have so much money, they are better than everyone else (especially Tom).

Tom Buchanan- ● “One of the most powerful ends that ever played football at New Haven.” ● “One of those men who reach such an acute limited excellence at twenty one that everything afterwards savors of an anticlimax.” ● “His family were enormously wealthy - even in college his freedom with money was a matter for reproach.” ● “Sturdy, straw haired man of thirty with a rather hard mouth and a supercilious manner.” ● “Two shining, arrogant eyes had established dominance over his face and gave him the appearance of always leaning aggressively forward.” ● “It was a body capable of enormous leverage--a cruel body.” ● “There was a touch of paternal contempt in (his voice), even toward people he liked--” ● He has a “girl” in the city. -I think he is unsatisfied with his current life and is searching for more. Money isn’t everything, yet he believes that it is. He even uses his money to spoil Myrtle and to sort of prove to her how much of a man he is. ______Chapters 4-6

Questions for the Characters:

Tom Buchanan- ● Why are you so restless and unsettled? So discontented? ● Did you ever know about Gatsby and Daisy before this? Daisy Buchanan-

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● Why don’t you leave Tom? Do you really love him, or do you love his money and status? ● While you knew that Tom hasn’t remained faithful, why have you? Jordan Baker- ● Do you really see Nick as being less than you? Wouldn’t it be social suicide to date someone lower than you? ● Why did you agree to help Daisy and Gatsby? Nick Carraway- ● Why did you agree to help Daisy reconnect with Gatsby? ● Why are you dating Jordan if you know that she only associates with people she thinks aren’t as smart as she is? Myrtle Wilson- ● Do you love Tom, or his money? ● Did you ever love George? Is there still any hope? George Wilson- ● Do you regret marrying Myrtle? ● Do you resent living in the field of ashes? ______Chapters 7-9 Weather: ● Tensions rise as the summer gets hotter ● The Tensions are highest when they are all fighting at the Plaza ● “Everything is so hot and confused” ● Much like the how the seasons are stuck on an endless circle, continuing the same pattern every year, so do the Buchanan’s with there relationship and always having to move.

White: ● Daisy and Jordan’s clothes ● The elaborate houses ● Commonly associated with purity and innocence ● Personally I think it all relates back to money. ● Shallowness, very 2 dimensional and boring, just like Daisy. The Green Light: ● Green = Money, importance, power ● Gatsby is chasing the money and the reputation/lifestyle to get to Daisy. ● He looks at the light at the end of her dock, and it’s so close that he feels he can almost touch it, it is just across the bay. What Gatsby doesn’t know, or isn’t 233 willing to accept, is that he will never be able to get the green light and get to Daisy. He will never have enough money or the status that Daisy so craves. Even though it is just across the bay, close enough it seems he could easily just take a boat across to get to her, he never can and never will.

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E,3 Tiffany’s Buber Character Analysis Essay

1.29.16

I think that to track the evolution of Daisy and Tom’s complicated relationship, you have to start at the most obvious place; the reason for their marriage. Why did these two decide to spend the rest of eternity with each other, out of everyone in the world?

First let’s look at it from Daisy’s perspective. Probably the most obvious thing that comes to one’s mind when they think of Daisy Buchanan is her money. But is it really her money? Remember, it was the 20’s and women did not have a very high ranking on the totem pole. Chances are her money was really her father’s money that she loved to spend. Her dad also gave her the status that she so loved. As she was looking to wed she had two options; to marry the man that she really loved and possibly have the judgmental eyes of the community on her, or marry the money that she loved and gain the status she craved too. Daisy loved the money more, which is my theory as to why she married Tom. He had money, and he had status, and he practically showed up in her lap with a nice, shiny, white bow. In this part of their story, from Daisy’s perspective, their marriage was based off of a I-It relationship. She saw Tom as the shining golden ticket to the life that she wanted, and the only thing that she had to do to obtain it was to say “I do”.

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Tom, on the other hand, is more complicated. He already had his money and his status, and he still chose Daisy out of everyone in the world. He didn’t necessarily need anything from Daisy, or gain anything either, other than a constant companion for the rest of time, of course. He still chose Daisy. Because of that, I believe in Tom’s perspective, the relationship could very well have been

I-You.

Here’s where it gets more complicated with how unsettled and restless he is with his life also reflecting in his relationship with his wife. Throughout the book

Tom seems to bounce back and forth from an I-You and I-It relationship with

Daisy. For one, he goes off on “sprees” with other women. This can be seen as I-

It relationship because he is using Daisy more as a status symbol than a wife.

But, like Tom says, he always comes back to her, hinting at an I-You relationship.

Perhaps he realizes his mistake and what he is doing to Daisy and his love for her rekindles.

On the other hand is Daisy. Daisy won’t divorce Tom even though he is cheating because she didn’t really love him to begin with, and she couldn’t risk the blow to her status or the loss of her precious money. She also some-what patronizes Tom on the down low at dinner when Nick is over, proving that she doesn’t really enjoy the company of her husband all that much. Tom, on the other hand, does seem to dabble in the I-It relationship. It seems as though Daisy is rarely ever alone from Tom. They eat dinner together, they go to Gatsby’s party 236 together, the only time that Daisy goes into the city is when Tom goes with her, and even then she had to wait till he decided that he wanted to go. Tom doesn’t seem to like her to go anywhere or have a life, really, without him. Because of that, she kind of treats her like an object that he is in complete control of. Or so he thinks.

Tiffany- you do a nice job discussing throughout. You essay ends a bit abruptly though. Could use a little more wrap up. 9/10

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E.4 Tiffany’s Final Essay 2.10.16

Paragraph Tiffany’s essay sentences Argument Tacit Warrant Type of Trace and location of Comments and (Literary Trace Sentence Warrant/ Local Thematic – borrows idea, topic or Warrant/ content from original event or text Personal Structural – borrows a syntactic or Experience) organizational structure from original text or event Lexical – Borrows a word or word phrase from an originating text or event 1.1 To describe it in the best way that Claim Arguing from Building the I know how, I will compare the personal claim from American Dream to a nice, experience personal frosted cake. experience 1.2 You see, the American Dream is Claim Literary – Thematic/Structural – “What can Tiffany uses made up of two things; the fluffy Appearance be sure is that, for the most part, the idea of cake part, or the success, power Reality there are at least two main ideas the American and money, and the nice icing on that are in everyone’s American dream being top, happiness. Local Dream” (1/14 Timed Writing) more than Lexical – “money or success, and one thing as the pursuit of happiness” a thematic trace to her original definition and then uses the exact wording of a lexical trace. 238

1.3 In my opinion, these two parts are Claim Local - Thematic/Structural Tiffany equally as vital to having a nice Multiple continues to cake, or success in living your Perspectives Lexical - Class discussion on 1/4 use the American Dream, but everyone Tiffany states “if you have a lot of structure or has their own preferences. money people will look up to you – multiple to it creates the appearance of the describe the American dream, they have it all/ I complexity think everyone’s American dream of the is different” American dream 1.4 Some people like a lot of frosting Claim Lexical Explaining on their cakes, and some people the claim like none at all. 1.5 In the same way happiness and Literary- Lexical – 1/14 In-Class Essay success have different levels of Appearance importance to different people. /Reality 1.6 Because of all of this, it is very Claim Local Lexical – “the elusive “American Tiffany hard to clearly define the Dream” cannot be summed up by adapts the American dream, because it one meager definition. The language changes based on the person. American Dream is always from her changing, and always evolving” initial essay (1/14 Essay) from “elusive” to “hard to define” but maintains that the dream is changing 1.7 Mrs. Daisy Buchanan is one of Central Literary – Thematic – “Probably the most Thematic – those people who put little Claim appearance/ obvious thing that comes to one’s Tiffany is 239 importance on the icing on top of reality – cake mind when they think of Daisy tying the the cake, meaning she cares more metaphor Buchanan is her money” (I/IT assignment about status than she does about Essay) of selecting a true happiness, and you can find Local – Tiffany character evidence of this through the is making a Lexical – “Chances are her money (Daisy) to correlation between her and the claim specific was really her father’s money that her definition color white, her relationship with to the local she loved to spend. Her dad also of the Tom, and also her relationship knowledge gave her the status that she so American with Gatsby. produced and loved” (I/IT Essay) dream to discussed provide the during the unit Lexical – “Daisy loved the money content and more, which is my theory as to why structure of she married Tom. He had money, her and he had status, and he practically argument. showed up in her lap with a nice, shiny, white bow.” (I/IT Essay) White – Thematic – From Heather’s peer Comes from feedback on 1/30 – “I like this symbolism description of Tom that you used! for Daisy The reason they married each other originally does seem so fake and way too introduced perfect. When their relationship is by Elise in looked into deeper you can see that different it isn't all rainbows and sunshine. I small group agree with your theory on their than Tiffany marriage.”

Lexical “White:

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• Daisy and Jordan’s clothes • The elaborate houses • Commonly associated with purity and innocence • Personally I think it all relates back to money. • Shallowness, very 2 dimensional and boring, just like Daisy” (From Tiffany’s Notes Chapters 7-9)

Lexical – Class discussion on symbolism - “White” written on whiteboard along with “Seasons” and “Green Light” Transcript from 2/2 Elise – “White symbolizes immaculate and pure beauty… but also symbolizes emptiness and superficiality…she is thought of as clean but the color white is very bland”

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Paragraph Paragraph 2 sentences Argument LW Intertextual Trace and Sentence Throughout the whole book Claim Literary – Thematic - “White: Tiffany Daisy, and Jordan too, is Ubiquity • Daisy and Jordan’s clothes draws associated with the color white. heavily upon • The elaborate houses the class • Commonly associated with purity discussion of and innocence symbolism • Personally I think it all relates (2/2) to back to money. support her • Shallowness, very 2 dimensional argument and boring, just like Daisy that Daisy 2.1 (From Tiffany’s Notes Chapters cares more 7-9) about status Lexical – White and class than

happiness Structure – Jordan and Daisy as and uses the characters that relate to the color white symbol of “white” to make her case.

At first, white might be Evidence Ubiquity Structure – White Tiffany cites interpreted as being a symbol for Appearance/ textual

2.2 innocence and elegance as shown Reality Lexical – Class discussion on evidence of when Nick sees Daisy for the first symbolism - “White” written on the color time in East Egg, he narrates, which comes 242

“They were both in white, their whiteboard along with “Seasons” from the dresses were rippling and and “Green Light” symbolism fluttering as if they had just Transcript from 2/2 class blown back in after a short flight Elise – “White symbolizes discussion on around the house”(Fitzgerald 8). immaculate and pure beauty, but 2/2 also symbolizes emptiness and superficiality…she is thought of as clean but the color white is very bland” Nick is taken by the beauty of There is no Daisy and of her life, and almost record of this enchanted by it. in her writing 2.3 or during class discussions As the story progresses and you Backing Ubiquity Thematic – Symbolism class Tiffany learn more about her, the discussion from 2/2 backs her symbolism of white compared to evidence by Daisy changes. drawing on 2.4 the color white and Daisy’s characterization It goes from being a symbol of Backing Ubiquity Lexical – Transcript from 2/2, This sentence her elegance to a symbol of the Elise – “but the color white is also closely blandness of her personality and very bland and tasteless and it’s just mimics 2.5 her superficiality. boring and simple and it could be Elise’s related to daisy because she herself interpretation isn’t very deep person from the symbolism 243

literature discussion Daisy is a person without any Backing Local Lexical – Transcript from 2/2, Elise Tiffany substance, she is devoid of all – “she is very shallow and very continues 2.6 color and is only concerned with self-centered so eventually in the drawing on one thing, her status. end the color white describes that” Elise’s interpretation Daisy is a very two-dimensional Backing Local Thematic/Lexical – “What can be Tiffany character because of this. sure is that, for the most part, there follows the are at least two main ideas that are structure of in everyone’s American Dream” her initial (Tiffany’s 1/14 Timed Writing) claim she made in her 2.7 “Shallowness, very 2 dimensional In-class and boring, just like Daisy essay from (From Tiffany’s Notes Chapters 7- 1/14 9)

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# Paragraph 3 Her love for her status is also why Claim Local Thematic – “Daisy loved the money Tiffany draws she is married to Tom Buchanan. more, which is my theory as to why on her I/IT she married Tom. He had money, essay to 3.1 and he had status, and he practically explain Daisy showed up in her lap with a nice, and Tom’s shiny, white bow” (I/IT Essay) relationship Even though she describes him as Evidence Paradox Thematic – Character’s actions Tiffany used being a “hulking”, “brute of a discussion 1/20 the social man” (Fitzgerald 13) and even context though she knows that he is Lexical – “Daisy won’t divorce discussion having an affair with Myrtle Tom even though he is cheating from 1/20 to Wilson, she still stays with him. because she didn’t really love him describe 3.2 to begin with, and she couldn’t risk Daisy’s the blow to her status or the loss of actions and her precious money” (I/IT Essay) also uses her own words to describe Tom’s behavior To justify her not leaving Tom, Evidence Context Tiffany used Nick is told that Daisy cannot the social divorce Tom because “She’s a Appearance/ context Catholic” and “They don’t Reality discussion 3.3 believe in divorce” (Fitzgerald from 1/20 to 33), but Nick knows this to be describe untrue. Daisy’s actions

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The real reason as to why Daisy Backing Local Thematic – Character’s Actions Tiffany used can’t leave Tom is not because Discussion 1/20 the social she would be abandoning her context husband, but because she would “On the other hand is Daisy. Daisy discussion be abandoning her American won’t divorce Tom even though he from 1/20 to 3.4 Dream. is cheating because she didn’t really describe love him to begin with, and she Daisy’s couldn’t risk the blow to her status actions or the loss of her precious money” (I/IT Essay) Her dream is to have status and to Backing Local Thematic - “On the other hand is Tiffany’s I/It have money, and getting rid of Daisy. Daisy won’t divorce Tom essay the person providing that to her is even though he is cheating because supports her 3.5 not an option. she didn’t really love him to begin backing to with, and she couldn’t risk the blow local to her status or the loss of her argument precious money” (I/IT Essay) here With her love for money holding Backing Context Thematic – I/IT Essay Tiffany’s I/It her heart, she doesn’t mind that essay Tom is having an affair, because Local Lexical – From I/IT Peer Review supports her at least she still has the money Heather’s Comments – “This also backing as that she so craved, unless the has to do with the fact that Tom well as 3.6 information is made public, in doesn't want to appear weak. So Heather’s which case her reputation would this protectiveness could be looked comments be on the line and they would at from two perspectives. The first have to move again. that he is protective of her and the second that he is using her to boost his reputation.”

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# Paragraph 4 Due to her preoccupation with Claim Local Thematic – 1/14 In-Class Essay Tiffany keeping her status and her money moves to by being in an unhealthy Lexical – “Probably the most describe relationship with a racist, Daisy obvious thing that comes to one’s Daisy’s love 4.1 neglects a key part of my mind when they think of Daisy of money American Dream; happiness. Buchanan is her money.” (I/IT and relies on Essay) her I/IT Essay The first time that she did this Evidence Ubiquity Thematic – “As she was looking to Tiffany does was when she stopped waiting for wed she had two options; to marry not use Gatsby to return from war and Context the man that she really loved and textual marries Tom Buchanan. possibly have the judgmental eyes evidence but 4.2 of the community on her, or marry uses her own the money that she loved and gain writing from the status she craved too.” (I/IT the I/IT Essay) Essay She abandons the love of her life, Backing Context Thematic – “As she was looking to Using the someone who could make her wed she had two options; to marry same essay actually happy, to be with Appearance/ the man that she really loved and she moved someone who could make her Reality possibly have the judgmental eyes toward 4.3 wealthy instead. of the community on her, or marry backing her the money that she loved and gain evidence the status she craved too.” (I/IT Essay) Jay did not have the resources to Backing Local Thematic/ Lexical – “As she was As with the give her the life that she really looking to wed she had two last sentence wanted, being the money and the options; to marry the man that she she moves 4.4 status, and so he could not really loved and possibly have the toward provide her with her American judgmental eyes of the community backing Dream. on her, or marry the money that she 247

loved and gain the status she craved using the I/IT too.” (I/IT Essay) Essay

# Paragraph 5 The most obvious way in which Claim Local Thematic/ Structural/ Lexical – To conclude, Daisy’s American Dream differs “What can be sure is that, for the Tiffany from mine is that she only Personal most part, there are at least two returns to her focusses on half of it. Experience main ideas that are in everyone’s argument 5.1 American Dream; money or claim and its success, and the pursuit of structure happiness.” (1/14 In-Class Essay) from her own writing on 1/14 She sacrifices her happiness to Backing Local Thematic - “As she was looking to To describe focus on obtaining and then wed she had two options; to marry Daisy’s keeping her status, money and to the man that she really loved and actions, she try to make it seem like she is possibly have the judgmental eyes returns to her 5.2 successful. of the community on her, or marry I/IT Essay to the money that she loved and gain make the the status she craved too.” (I/IT argument Essay) situated With the symbolism of white Backing Ubiquity Thematic/Lexical - Symbolism Tiffany being superficial and two- Literature Discussion 2/2 – White summarizes dimensional mostly in correlation Appearance/ her argument to her, and the reason for Reality “As she was looking to wed she had and returns 5.3 abandoning Gatsby to be with two options; to marry the man that to the Tom being money, Fitzgerald Local she really loved and possibly have symbolism conveys the idea in his writing the judgmental eyes of the discussion that Daisy’s American dream is to community on her, or marry the and the I/IT be wealthy, rather than happy. Essay and 248

money that she loved and gain the the 1/14 status she craved too.” (I/IT Essay) Essay to connect her Structural – two parts or two- evidence to dimensional dream (1/14 In-Class the local Essay)

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