Topic: Inservice Through Immersion

10-second review: Teacher learned most when immersed in the topic.

Title: “The High Point of My Professional Development: An NEH Seminar on Africa.” K Pezanowski. English Journal (September 2008), 69-70. A publication of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE).

Summary: It was a three-week summer course, but it concerned itself only with African literature and related history and ideas. What impressed the author was the immersion in African literature.

Comment: I can only reflect on my own experiences with inservice programs—they all were scattershot, piecemeal, diffuse. Maybe if inservice dealt in-depth with one narrowed topic, for a half day, a day or several consecutive inservice programs, teachers might gain considerable information, even practice with that topics, i.e., the relevance of grammar to writing. Maybe that’s already happening, but it was not in my day, from the 1970s to the 1990s. RayS.

The purpose of this blog, English Updates, is to review interesting contemporary (2008-2009) articles from professional English education journals at all levels—elementary, middle school, junior high school, high school and college.