Principal Investigator(s): Professors
Liane Brouillette in the Department of Education,
Jim McMichael in the Department of English, Jill Robbins
in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese, and Vice
Chancellor of Student Affairs Manuel Gomez. Site program
director Sue Cronmiller, Department of Education
Contact: Sue Cronmiller,
Program Director, sueacron@uci.edu
Site Description:
The Poetry Academy/Writing
Lab serves elementary school children at El Sol Academy
of Arts and Sciences, a dual-language English-Spanish
immersion charter school for at-risk children in
a low-income community in Santa Ana. Using a variety of innovative
lesson plans, the Poetry Academy/Writing Lab engages
these students through interactive activities that
encourage and improve student writing, through revision
and publication of poetry. Both in class and
after school, three days per week, students work
with UC Irvine staff and undergraduates, who provide
direct ongoing feedback on drafts that the students
have written and posted on the Poetry Academy website
and computer database (see http://uclinks.org/PA ).
Undergraduates enrolled in a UC Irvine Education
course on poetry in K-12 education. Recently
the program has been adopted as an integral component
of the whole-school curriculum.
Course: Education 78: Poetry
in K-12
Participants (based on 2005-06
data):
- Approximately 105 K–5th grade students
per academic year*
- 90% Latino, 5% African American, 5% White
- 45% male, 55% female
- 100% English language learners
- Approximately 40 undergraduates per academic
year
Collaborators:
- Departments of Education, English, and Spanish & Portuguese,
the Center for Learning Through the Arts, and the
Faculty-Led Academic Preparation Programs at UC
Irvine
- El Sol Academy of Arts and Sciences charter school,
in the Santa Ana Unified School District, Santa
Ana, CA
Goals:
- Provide safe and healthy places after school
for children to learn and develop a sense of self
as participants in a global world
- Promote academic achievement and encourage low-income
youth to pursue paths to higher learning
- Increase technology literacy
- Improve elementary students’ achievement
in language arts, critical thinking, and public
speaking
- Improve the quality of graduate and undergraduate
education by connecting academic coursework to
practicum field experience
- Encourage undergraduates to explore the possibility
of a teaching career in urban, low-income communities
Activities:
- In class reading, writing, online publishing
workshops in English in which undergraduates respond
to and mentor children’s writing
- Explorations of connection between written and
photographic image making
- Familiarizing children with university students
and culture
Evaluation:
- University of California Student Academic Preparation
and Educational Partnerships (SAPEP) Annual Performance
Report
- UC Links Reading Assessment
- Survey of undergraduate interest in pursuing
graduate or professional school studies
- Assessment of children’s commitment to
learning through participation in the revision
process for poems they have written
- Develop and apply assessment ad evaluation tools
to measure student improvement.
Research Focus:
- Academic benefits of teaching poetry, especially
with respect to vocabulary acquisition
- Student attitudes
and motivations related to reading and writing
poetry
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