'Shoot for the moon!' Students' identities as writers in the context of the classroom

• Published in: British journal of special education Vol. 38; no. 2; pp. 92 - 99
• Main Authors: Wearmouth, Janice, Berryman, Mere, Whittle, Lisa
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford, UK Blackwell Publishing Ltd 01.06.2011; Wiley-Blackwell
• Subjects: Classroom Environment; Classrooms; Elementary School Students; Elementary School Teachers; Foreign Countries; High Achievement; Identity; Learning; learning environment; Literacy; Literacy Education; Low Achievement; Low achievers; New Zealand; Peer Relationship; Process Approach (Writing); process-writing approach; relationships; Self Concept; student writing identities; Teacher Characteristics; Teacher Student Relationship; Teaching Methods; Writing (Composition); New Zealand
• ISSN: 0952-3383; 1467-8578
• DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8578.2011.00502.x

A study of students' identities as writers was carried out in the classroom of a New Zealand primary teacher who had been formally identified by a national body of teachers as having excellent practice in supporting literacy acquisition. The researchers, Professor Janice Wearmouth, from the University of Bedfordshire, Mere Berryman, from the University of Waikato, New Zealand, and Lisa Whittle, from the Department of Conservation, Wellington, New Zealand, aimed to compare high and low literacy achievers' identities as writers within the context of this teacher's pedagogy and the learning environment of her classroom. The researchers concluded that all students, both high and low achievers, were developing very positive writing identities in a context where the teacher's method of supporting her students' writing was very well planned through a process‐writing approach. This teacher had a very high degree of subject and pedagogical content knowledge and an acute awareness of her students' literacy learning needs. Her approach had an immediacy of responsiveness in relation to every student's learning and, above all, had recognition of the overwhelming importance of positive relationships in the classroom, teacher to student and peer to peer.