About Thinking and Writing

Writing is a skill so fundamental to student success that we often forget how complex the social and cognitive demands of it really are!

Building upon the work of the Aspiring Thinkers foundational workshop, this masterclass will focus on three tools that can simplify how we approach writing instruction, and in turn, simplify the writing process for our students.

Firstly, we will look at what educational research tells us about how students learn to write and what collaborative reasoning has to offer.

We will then consider how to use Accountable Talk as a concrete means for promoting respectful, engaging and rigorous discussions about writing in the classroom. With some ways of working established, we will drill down into what it means to view academic writing as a process of argumentation and how this shift in understanding can cut across all disciplines to support student success.

Finally, we will take a deep dive into the values of inquiry as a criteria for effective thinking and writing, and the many ways that we can empower students to use this language of feedback to improve their outcomes.

Presenter

Yael Leibovitch specialises in how to generate more critical thinking and collaboration during writing experiences to improve student communication.

She has been facilitating teacher professional development with the UQCTP since 2018 and at Brisbane State High School since 2017. Building on the work of Ellerton (2015), Alexander (2008) and others, her ‘teacher writing tool kit’ has been tested and met with great success by educators across different subjects and year levels.

Yael is an experienced teacher practitioner and former Philosophy and Reason State Panel member. She received her Masters of Teaching from OISE and is a PhD candidate with the UQ School of Education. She works as a Senior Philosophy and Reason teacher and 2IC HoD in the Senior Humanities Department at BSHS.

In 2017 Yael received the BSHS Professional learning/mentoring award for her work leading the Teaching for Thinking Pilot Project. In 2018 she was accepted to the UQ Global Change Scholars program. In 2019 Yael was the recipient of the Carolyn D. Baker Memorial Scholarship, AARE Research Poster Award and second place at the UQ 3MT competition finale. 

Price

ATN members: free.

Non-ATN members: $95 per person. Price includes access to two webinars and to video highlights for 30 days.

Note: This workshop has been provisionally scheduled in agreement with the Queensland Government roadmap for easing the restrictions to gatherings of more than twenty people. Time and location may be subject to revision, should regulations be changed. 

Registered participants are kindly asked not to attend the face-to-face masterclass if they show COVID-19-compatible symptoms. In that circumstance, they will be offered a place in the next available workshop. For refunds, please contact ctp@uq.edu.au.

Venue

UQ Union Complex (Building 21)
The University of Queensland,
St Lucia QLD 4072
Room: 
TBC