Chapter 11: Literacy Across the Curriculum: Collaborative Initiatives and Practices of a Professional Development School Partnership

Along with an established professional development school (PDS) relationship, examples from two research projects (cases), with a brief history of the PDS and its connection to the nine essentials guiding the partnership, are presented. In the first research case, teachers participated in inquiry-based science methods classroom practices. Results indicated that participants substantially increased their science literacy knowledge and understanding. In the second research case, clinical, professional development-based experiences provided teachers with pragmatic, problem-based learning opportunities. Teachers utilized and practiced the knowledge, application, and analysis garnered from their training and experiences toward the numerous concepts and strategies underlying the diagnosis of reading problems and the formulation of literacy instruction for struggling middle school student readers.