Gevirtz School professor Charles Bazerman led the third meeting of the working group on Lifespan Development of Writing Abilities from January 28 through January 31 at UC Santa Barbara. The group, composed of writing researchers, addresses the lack of a scholarly and research-based understanding of writing development that stretches across the different periods of learning and incorporates multiple disciplinary perspectives. Currently, the group is working on compiling a book encompassing their approach to writing development.
According to Bazerman, research on writing development has been divided by level of schooling or period of life and by theoretical and methodological orientations coming from psychology, sociocultural studies, language studies, curriculum and assessment, and rhetorical studies. The working group was designed to bring together leading writing researchers who work with early childhood, elementary, middle, and secondary schooling, higher education, and adult writing. They also represent a range of disciplinary orientations, including psychology, linguistics and multilingualism, sociocultural studies, special education, curriculum and assessment, and rhetoric.
The initial blue ribbon panel of top scholars in the U.S. consisted of Arthur Applebee (Distinguished Professor in the School of Education, Chair of the Department of Educational Theory & Practice, and Director of the Center on English Learning & Achievement at the University of Albany), Charles Bazerman (Department of Education, UC Santa Barbara), Virginia Berninger (Professor Learning Sciences and Human Development, University of Washington), Deborah Brandt (Professor Emerita in the Department of English at the University of Wisconsin-Madison), Steve Graham (Warner Professor in Teachers College at Arizona State University), Paul Matsuda (Professor of English and Director of Second Language Writing at Arizona State University), Sandra Murphy (Professor Emerita at the University of California, Davis), Deborah W. Rowe (Professor of Early Childhood Education at Peabody College, Vanderbilt University), and Mary Schleppegrell (Professor of Education at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor). After the untimely passing of Arthur Applebee, the group added two scholars who had been working with him, Jill Jeffrey and Kristen Wilcox.
The panel initially formed in fall 2012 and previously met in Santa Barbara in November 2013 and November 2014. Shortly after, the group was funded by the Spencer Foundation. In November 2014, the group drafted their statement of principles for understanding lifespan writing development. A shortened editorial version of this statement is conditionally accepted for a journal, and the full version will appear in the book the group is preparing. The meeting this January was devoted to discussing the separate chapters prepared by members of the group for the volume and to developing some further interactive and overview elements for the book, which will be completed this year.