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This study examines the process of teacher learning in the context of highly responsive, ongoing professional development centered on classroom talk around texts. A classroom teacher and a university researcher met weekly to view, analyze, and discuss videos of reading instruction recorded in the teacher's fifth-grade classroom. The professional development sessions were framed as teacher-driven action research. This article traces the evolution of the intensive professional development activity across one semester and describes the process by which the teacher-researcher appropriated practical and conceptual tools for facilitating class discussions of texts. Results highlight the value of positioning teachers as intellectually capable and honoring their agendas for professional development. Insights are offered regarding a model of professional development that can support teacher agency, address local problems of practice, and simultaneously leverage professional developer expertise to build new practices and new concepts that can be used to solve novel problems.
Notes
1. We use quotation marks around “accountable talk” to signal that only a few components of the approach described by Michaels, O'Connor, and Resnick (2008) were enacted in this study.
2. Although the focus of this article is on the TR's appropriation of practical and conceptual tools and her development of adaptive expertise, we want to make clear that the UR learned a great deal from the opportunity to observe the TR's instruction, to talk about reading with her students, and to reflect on her practice alongside her.