In the face of the traumas of a global pandemic, it became pertinent for teacher training programmes and educators like me to be intentional about practices that foreground a pedagogy of care with a focus on wellness and healing, courageous conversations and what Price-Dennis and Sealey-Ruiz (2021) has described as critical love. What does it mean…

The more critically one reflects on their teaching, the more conscious they becomes of the whys and hows associated with an experience. However, reflection and critical analysis are no easy feats. The structure provided by reflective frameworks can offer music educators guidance in understanding reflection, evaluating reflective thinking, and…

The purpose of this article is to describe the learnings of primary school teachers in rural Guatemala as a result of an action research experience. This experience took place in the context of the "Basic Education Quality and Transitions" activity, or BEQT, funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and…

This introduction to the second part of our Symposium on Teachers as Leaders examines the role of collaboration and writing as part of teacher leadership. The first part of the symposium described teacher leadership as a stance that values professionalism and the intellectual, political, and collaborative work of teaching. This introduction…

This essay addresses the persistence of monolingual tendencies in composition pedagogy and the critical efforts needed to dissolve them. Approaching language difference from a distinctly pedagogical perspective, this essay draws on the authors' teaching experiences and reflective writing in an effort to theorize the reflective practices key to…

The purpose of this article is to provide a deeper understanding of the natural rhythm of a typical semester, as observed in students' reflections in journals kept during the semester. Our analysis of students' writings rendered a breakdown of the semester into four distinct periods that were independent of the particular semester or section the…

In this article, I demonstrate how the use of reflective writing assignments in first-year composition facilitated students' understanding of their own writing process strategies. I first discuss the theoretical roots from which reflective practice among student writers grows. Next, I employ my students' voices to demonstrate that reflection…

Both writing and math require purposeful teaching. This article describes how one teacher discovered that she could teach math in a way that paralleled how she taught writing by researching what students know and then nudging them ahead to the next level of understanding. Just as effective writers employ creativity, perseverance, and revising,…

As recommended by National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM), the first author regularly relies on her first graders' writing to assess their reasoning about important math concepts. Their writing serves as a culminating activity that allows her to better assess the depth of each student's understanding following class activities and…

This essay presents a model of reflective use of writing technologies, one that provides a means of more fully exploiting the possibilities of these tools for transforming writing activity. Derived from the work of computer designer Douglas Engelbart, the "bootstrapping" model of reflective use extends current arguments in the field…

In this article, the author discusses the importance of incorporating more methods that promote reflection-in-action--or reflecting on the immediate thoughts and reactions that a person has while performing an act, the time "during which one can still make a difference to the situation at hand"--into response situations. Reflection is something…

During summertime, before school ends and the hard physical labor begins, it is best to reflect on the touchups and renovations that need to be done to a teacher's classroom instruction. This article presents two innovative lesson ideas that will inspire teachers to rethink, retool, and recharge as they decide what some of their summer renovations…

Contemporary curriculum theorists conceptualize curriculum, schooling, and the teacher as sites of discursive production and as dwelling places for theory. Drawing on memory work around childhood report cards, this article uses commonplace artifacts to reassemble autoethnographic memory. In sifting through memories and artifacts, the author…

This issue's column focuses on two practices that everyone has learned and utilized but possibly have forgotten. First, Michael offers a look into classroom management and what he needed to learn to be a more effective teacher. Second, Terry asks questions to remind himself and other writing teachers of the importance of helping students…

A case of Jill, an elementary school teacher who takes a reflection practitioner stance on her teaching is described. Three different social practices used by Jill to help her struggling third-grade students learn to write and some of the lasting impressions based on the whole experience are highlighted.