{"id":1857,"date":"2020-12-28T16:27:29","date_gmt":"2020-12-29T00:27:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857"},"modified":"2020-12-28T16:27:29","modified_gmt":"2020-12-29T00:27:29","slug":"coffee-spoons-2020-what-i-worked-on-this-year-and-why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857","title":{"rendered":"Coffee Spoons 2020: What I Worked on This Year and Why"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a title=\"Untitled\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/anterobot\/50772543461\/in\/dateposted\/\" data-flickr-embed=\"true\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/50772543461_95d95ce5a8.jpg\" alt=\"Untitled\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" \/><\/a><br \/>\nIt\u2019s a strange feeling to account for my time in a year that was anything but ordinary. Like everyone, this was a disruptive year and that fact is not represented by my scholarly output this year. Academic work takes <em>a lot<\/em> of time and so my 2020 appears to be business as normal when all of us know that wasn\u2019t the case. That preamble aside, below are the main themes of the work I produced this year. (My roundup of work from previous years can be found here: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1751\">2019<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1702\">2018<\/a>.)<\/p>\n<p>Sprinkled throughout 2020, several books that I co-authored or edited were published. These have the distinction of making me look tremendously productive in a year when all of us were juggling way too many things that were more important than \u201cwork.\u201d Books are multi-year affairs and the brunt of the writing on these books was done pre-pandemic. That being said, I\u2019m proud of the work my colleagues and friends have led:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.upress.state.ms.us\/Books\/W\/With-Great-Power-Comes-Great-Pedagogy\">With Great Power Comes Great Pedagogy:<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.upress.state.ms.us\/Books\/W\/With-Great-Power-Comes-Great-Pedagogy\">\u00a0Teaching, Learning, and Comics<\/a><\/em> (with Susan Kirtley and Peter Carlson)<\/li>\n<li><em><a href=\"https:\/\/brill.com\/view\/title\/39525?language=en\">Playing with Teaching:<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/brill.com\/view\/title\/39525?language=en\"> Considerations for Implementing Gaming Literacies in the Classroom<\/a><\/em>\u00a0and <em><a href=\"https:\/\/brill.com\/view\/title\/57429\">Studying Gaming Literacies:<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/brill.com\/view\/title\/57429\"> Theories to Inform Classroom Practice<\/a><\/em> (both with Jennifer Dail and Shelbie Witte)<\/li>\n<li><em><a href=\"https:\/\/wwnorton.com\/books\/9780393714371\">Everyday Advocacy:\u00a0Teachers Who Change the Literacy Narrative<\/a>\u00a0<\/em>(with Cathy Fleischer)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And out in the early months of 2021 (but the page proofs have been reviewed at this point, so I\u2019m chalking them up here):<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/mitpress.mit.edu\/books\/annotation\"><em>Annotation<\/em><\/a> (with Remi Kalir)<\/li>\n<li><em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.tcpress.com\/compose-our-world-9780807764541\">Compose Our World:<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.tcpress.com\/compose-our-world-9780807764541\"> Project-Based Learning in Secondary English Language Arts<\/a><\/em> (with Alison Boardman, Bridget Dalton, Joseph Polman, and many amazing chapter contributors)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>As lengthy projects, these books represent key areas of my work, particularly focused on English Language Arts and expansive forms of literacies. I am overdue to write up lengthier posts on a couple of these projects and I will be playing catch up in 2021. The other main projects I worked on are below.<\/p>\n<p><strong>(Speculative) Civic Literacy Practices<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>It should come as no surprise that civic literacy practices\u2014for teachers and students\u2014continue to be a central focus of the work that I do. Particularly in work with Nicole Mirra, we have been exploring <em>speculative <\/em>(<a href=\"http:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1797\">ahem<\/a>) dimensions of civic literacies to push our field forward. Recent work in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hepg.org\/HER-Home\/Issues\/Harvard-Educational-Review-Volume-90,-Issue-2\/HER-Article\/I-Hesitate-but-I-Do-Have-Hope%E2%80%9D\"><em>Harvard Educational Review<\/em><\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1177\/0042085920953881\"><em>Urban Education<\/em><\/a>, and other forthcoming pieces illuminate new directions that civics-focused scholarship must explore. Likewise, work analyzing the 2016 Letters to the Next President project <em>still<\/em> continues and I\u2019ve been supporting the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/13504622.2020.1771288\">work<\/a> led by Lynne Zummo and Emma Gargroetzi specifically looking at youth perspectives on climate change and quantitative civic reasoning.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Methods and Definitions<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Slightly less easy to categorize, a couple of the articles I worked on this year focus on challenging base assumptions in critical educational research. Nicole and I spent a bunch of time pre-2020 reading and analyzing classroom-based studies that describe \u201c21<sup>st<\/sup> Century\u201d learning to see what our field actually means by this term, two decades into the period being described. <a href=\"https:\/\/ila.onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1002\/rrq.313\">Our findings<\/a> suggest folks are all over the map when it comes to this label and I encourage researchers, educators, and policy makers to take a step back from a label that doesn\u2019t really mean much.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier this month, an essay based on my 2019 <a href=\"https:\/\/sites.google.com\/site\/janhawkinsaward\/home\">Jan Hawkins<\/a> address was published in <em>Equity and Excellence in Education<\/em>. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/10665684.2020.1782788\">The article<\/a> is a broad argument about how our approaches to critical research can fall short across three different dimensions. I weave together a handful of personal experiences from my work and biographical information about Prince. It was a fun piece to write and I think it feels even more relevant as we look toward 2021 in light of a terrible year. Here&#8217;s an illuminative figure from the article:<strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Untitled\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/anterobot\/50772174038\/in\/dateposted\/\" data-flickr-embed=\"true\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/50772174038_61dc7f46d9.jpg\" alt=\"Untitled\" width=\"500\" height=\"244\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Healing and Care<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>I continue to think about and push for an emphasis on how educators address healing needs in schools and classrooms. With Mandie Dunn, I <a href=\"https:\/\/www.researchgate.net\/profile\/Mandie_Dunn\/publication\/343193678_Grief_Loss_and_Literature_Reading_Texts_as_Social_Artifacts\/links\/5f1b33bf299bf1720d625add\/Grief-Loss-and-Literature-Reading-Texts-as-Social-Artifacts.pdf\">wrote a bit<\/a> about how teachers\u2019 grieving shaped ELA teaching practices. And Aaron Guggenheim, Kristina Stamatis, Bridget Dalton, and I <a href=\"https:\/\/ila.onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1002\/rrq.296\">explored<\/a> how care is tied to everyday, political contexts that are always present in today&#8217;s classrooms.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Digital<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Finally, it is not a surprise that I spent a bunch of time this year pushing on our conceptions of the role of digital technology. Like civics, this is a central aspect of my literacies-focused work and articles like <a href=\"https:\/\/link.springer.com\/chapter\/10.1007\/978-3-030-36119-8_10\">these<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/chrisproctor.net\/media\/publications\/proctor_2019_voice.pdf\">two<\/a> chapters and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/1554480X.2020.1781638\">this<\/a> classroom-focused study continue my exploration of how our assumptions of technology sell short the analog needs and ingenuity of teachers and students.<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>While much of the writing above didn\u2019t shift as a result of Covid-19 or with the upswell in overdue attention toward legacies of anti-blackness in the U.S., the themes of much of my work are well-suited for guiding practice right now. Nicole and I have written a couple OpEds this year with increasingly obvious directions that schools need to move toward:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/education\/2020\/05\/06\/profound-civics-lesson-kids-are-getting-us-governments-response-covid-19-pandemic\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the civic lessons of this present moment demand necessary engagement in classrooms<\/a>; and<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/edsource.org\/2020\/teachers-need-opportunities-to-heal-before-the-school-year-begins\/633287\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">teachers and students have not been given time or support for addressing feelings of loss and grief overtaking the world right now<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I should also note that, just as much of this output began pre-2020, this year has seen substantial pivots in the research I am focusing on. Essentially, my active research pivoted to understanding and supporting teachers, students, and school systems in light of the multiple catastrophes shaping student learning right now. Unsurprisingly, this work will show up in another year\u2019s post. Finally, most of the published work I\u2019ve contributed to this field can be found on <a href=\"https:\/\/scholar.google.com\/citations?user=As2r_F8AAAAJ&amp;hl=en\">Google Scholar<\/a>. If you are ever unable to access something I\u2019ve worked on, please reach out. See you in 2021.<\/p>\n<div class=\"sharedaddy sd-sharing-enabled\"><div class=\"robots-nocontent sd-block sd-social sd-social-icon-text sd-sharing\"><h3 class=\"sd-title\">Tell people this is awesome:<\/h3><div class=\"sd-content\"><ul><li class=\"share-email\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-email sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857&amp;share=email\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to email this to a friend\"><span>Email<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-facebook\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-facebook-1857\" class=\"share-facebook sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857&amp;share=facebook\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Facebook\"><span>Facebook<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-twitter\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-twitter-1857\" class=\"share-twitter sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857&amp;share=twitter\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Twitter\"><span>Twitter<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-print\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-print sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to print\"><span>Print<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-pinterest\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-pinterest-1857\" class=\"share-pinterest sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857&amp;share=pinterest\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Pinterest\"><span>Pinterest<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-tumblr\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-tumblr sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857&amp;share=tumblr\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Tumblr\"><span>Tumblr<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-reddit\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-reddit sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857&amp;share=reddit\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Reddit\"><span>Reddit<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-linkedin\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-linkedin-1857\" class=\"share-linkedin sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857&amp;share=linkedin\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on LinkedIn\"><span>LinkedIn<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-pocket\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-pocket sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857&amp;share=pocket\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Pocket\"><span>Pocket<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-end\"><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s a strange feeling to account for my time in a year that was anything but ordinary. Like everyone, this was a disruptive year and that fact is not represented by my scholarly output this year. Academic work takes a lot of time and so my 2020 appears to be business as normal when all [&hellip;]<\/p>\n<div class=\"sharedaddy sd-sharing-enabled\"><div class=\"robots-nocontent sd-block sd-social sd-social-icon-text sd-sharing\"><h3 class=\"sd-title\">Tell people this is awesome:<\/h3><div class=\"sd-content\"><ul><li class=\"share-email\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-email sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857&amp;share=email\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to email this to a friend\"><span>Email<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-facebook\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-facebook-1857\" class=\"share-facebook sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1857&amp;share=facebook\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Facebook\"><span>Facebook<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-twitter\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" 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