Project Plan

The core of our work will be reading and research.  Our readings will span young adult and other non-canonical literature as well as canonical literature that deals with LGBTQ issues or is written by LGBTQ authors.  Research into biographical material on LGBTQ writers will supplement the literature work.  Our task is to take write an annotated bibliography of literature that will help group members to expand their inclusion of LGBTQ literature in their various courses.  We can then go on to share the bibliography with other teachers.

Two group members will each take a university course addressing LGBTQ literature and/or Queer Theory to bring up to date research and readings back to the group.

At monthly meetings the group will consider the fit of various pieces in different courses.  The group is a powerful tool for this task.  The work of sifting and evaluating is hard to do alone.  Especially when dealing with potentially sensitive topics, it helps to have collaborators as sounding boards.  The monthly meeting schedule allows for reading and reflection between meetings.  Each member will be responsible for reading and writing one bibliography entry for each meeting.  Members will choose texts from the bibliography to pilot in their own classrooms. The group will conduct lesson studies and write reflectively to learn from each other’s experiences with the texts.

A second part of the curricular development work is to establish a website to aid in creating a community of learners on this topic.  At conference presentations many teacher report feeling isolated, as no one else in their school community is interested in including LGBTQ issues.  We all sought the support of the WP study group for similar reasons.  We want to create a simple, independent website to share materials we develop (like the annotated bibliography and lesson plans).  We also want to create a mediated posting section to allow contributions and questions from other teachers.  We will hire a web master to help us design the site and teach us how to post new material, review the online postings for appropriate content, and maintain the site.  These activities will take place summer 2011, after we have had a year to develop and gather material for the site.

One of our aims is to encourage students to write.  We will sponsor a writing contest for Los Angeles area high school students to write about their experiences as LGBTQ teenagers and LGBTQ allies. We will publicize it through GSA sponsors by mailing fliers and using the GSA Network email list; to UCLA WP fellows; and at conferences. We will offer prizes for top entries and host a coffee house open mike night for all contributors.  We will publish a hard copy anthology as well as an online version (linked to our website and the UCLA Writing Project site). It is our belief that using student writing in the English classroom is a great first step for teachers to take to integrate LGBTQ material, so the secondary goal of the contest is to generate high quality student work that teachers can use.  Having it available as printed booklet reaches teachers who may not be online.  We can distribute it at conferences and workshops, in addition to providing it to participating schools.  

Group members will attend the California Teachers of English (CATE) and National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) annual conferences both to learn what others are doing to include LGBTQ literature in the English classroom and to present our work.  Both conferences encourage workshops dealing with LGBTQ issues and members of our group have previously presented at both.

The culminating activity of our inquiry will occur in the summer of 2012.  We will host a one-day workshop to help English teachers plan to integrate lessons on LGBTQ literature into an existing unit of study.  The workshop will contain short presentations on the annotated bibliography, the anthology of student writing, and fears/ challenges of doing this kind of work.  The bulk of the time will be devoted to guiding teachers in curriculum development. We will help teachers work in grade-alike or course-alike groups to brainstorm and rough out plans for their courses.  At the end of the day, teachers will briefly share their plans.  Participants will be encouraged to report on their implementation on the website, thus expanding the materials available there.

Our inquiry is innovative because it draws teachers out of their comfort zone.  Our project works actively against societal fears and pressures to avoid dealing with LGBTQ issues in the secondary classroom.  We will work to expand our curricula and encouraging others to take similar steps.  We will collaborate across schools and develop an online presence that allows others to do so too.

We expect to grow as teachers by sharing best practices.  We come together as a group that strongly believes that real professional development comes from within a team of interested, questioning professionals who see their own classrooms as laboratories for testing new ideas.  We share a commitment to the professional development model espoused by the National Writing Project, that teachers teaching teachers is the most authentic and valuable way to improve practice.

(845)