As I select presentation topics, create blog posts, and conduct informal, action research, my writing interests become more focused, allowing formal professional articles and essays to take shape. Much of my scholarly writing is directly influenced by the work I do in the classroom alongside my students. I ask questions, listen to answers, and look for patterns in order to support the growth and development of my students and myself.
Journal Publications
Foley, L. H. (2019). Empower adolescent writers with ongoing choice in purpose, audience, topic, and genre. Pennsylvania Reads, 18(1), 34-40. Retrieved from http://digitalcommons.wcupa.edu/eng_stuwork/1
Foley, L. H. (2017). Digitally motivated: Inspire adolescents with the 21st century portfolio. New Jersey English Journal, 6, 18-23. Retrieved from http://digitalcommons.wcupa.edu/eng_stuwork/1
Write.Share.Connect Pennsylvania Writing and Literature Project (PAWLP) Blog
The fourth Wednesday of each month I write a blog that features best practices in the writing-reading workshop.
In spring 2020, I launched the Distance Learning column and am the current editor. The feature runs each Monday to highlight informal action research, student and teacher experiences, and best practices relating to online, remote, and blended learning.
Mentoring new bloggers during the writing process.
CB Distance Learning Highlights, May 4, 2020
“Keeping Kids Connected in Canvas”
Research
Inquiry Project 2020-Present
Lenape Middle School, Central Bucks School District
- Experimenting with how Canvas, our learning management system, and Microsoft Teams can support writing-reading workshop best practices.
- Asking students for feedback through online surveys to help determine how Canvas and Teams are meeting their learning needs
Inquiry Project 2019-Present
Lenape Middle School, Central Bucks School District
- Encouraging students to become leaders in their own class and across all of my classes using our learning management system, Canvas.
- Designing opportunities for students to submit excerpts from their writing pieces and passages from their independent reading books as quick writing inspirations.
- Inviting students to submit their writing pieces and sections of their independent reading books as mentor texts to study during minilessons that we taught together.
- Supporting students book talks.
- Conducting ongoing action research to study student involvement and the impact the leadership roles have on their reading, writing, and learning.
Inquiry Project 2018-2019
Pennsylvania Writing and Literature Project Invitational Institute Demonstration and Holicong Middle School, Central Bucks School District
- Designed end-of-year surveys, asking students to reflect on the self-selected writing they completed in my class.
- Analyzed the work and research of Donald Graves, Donald Murray, Nancie Atwell, Peter Elbow, and Ralph Fletcher to identify choice and its implications in the writing-reading workshop.
- Creating and studying the effects of novel studies that allow for student choice in topic, genre, audience, and purpose.
Professional Development Goal 2015-2016
Holicong Middle School, Central Bucks School District
- Conducted action research in my seventh grade classroom to analyze metacognitive reflections during and at the end of the writing process.
Independent Study 2012-2015
Secondary English Education, The College of New Jersey
- Examined past and current literature by leading researchers in the Teaching of English and Digital Literacy fields, exploring how traditional portfolio making in middle and secondary settings as well as digital portfolio writing at the college level enhances students’ writerly lives and metacognition.
- Developed action research methods in my seventh and eighth grade classrooms to study the social, emotional, and academic effects digital writing portfolios have on middle-grade students.
Academic Writing for Graduate School
The Lacks No Longer Lack Knowledge
