If it’s November, it must be time for the National Writing Project’s (NWP's) Annual Meeting. This week, many Writing Project teachers from across the United States (and some around the world) will be gathering in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania for our annual conference.

In connection with the National Writing Project's Annual Meeting, we invited a few teachers who will be presenting in Philadelphia to join us on this episode. Paul Oh, an associate with the NWP joined us as well. In addition, this same cast of characters will be joining us for a follow-up show after the Annual Meeting on December 2.

This podcast, co-sponsored by the New York City Writing Project and the NWP Technology Liaisons Network, features:

• Robert Rivera-Amezola, Philadelphia Writing Project http://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/nwp_amsession/1584
• Joe Conroy, NWP at Rutgers University Writing Project  http://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/nwp_amsession/1607
• Chuck Jurich, High Desert Writing Project (New Mexico)  http://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/nwp_amsession/1608
• Paul Oh, the coordinator of the technology liaison program for the National Writing Project http://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/nwp_au/1102

As presenters of Annual Meeting sessions that focus on 21st century literacies, these writing project teachers and colleagues shared stories about the exploration of new composing practices, especially podcasting and video-making. Robert and Chuck teach 4th graders and Joe teaches 6th graders. It was and exciting, informative show.

Chief Diigo Ambassador, Maggie Tsai joined us on this Wednesday evening, late in September. About a month before, we had a lively conversation about research and diigo: Teachers Teaching Teachers #165 - 08.26.09 - Meet Lisa Dick and George Haines: Talking about research and diigo.

We wanted to talk to Maggie because some of the teachers who use Youth Voices had begun to use Diigo, and we wanted to get together on this webcast to talk about how it is going, and what our plans with students are with this bookmarking site. Please enjoy, and add a comment about how you build your students’ research muscles, and how you use diigo. And tune in to future episodes of Teachers Teaching Teachers. This thread of I-Search, on-going research, Diigo, social bookmarking, and use of library databases promises to be a rich vein of inquiry for us this year.

Click Read more to see a transcript of a chat that was happening during the webcast.

Teachers whose students post at Youth Voices are pretty excited about the “Mapping Main Street” collaborative project.

“Mapping Main Street is a collaborative documentary media project that creates a new map of the country through stories, photos and videos recorded on actual Main Streets. We invite you to capture the stories and images of the country today. Use our Main Street map to find streets named Main close to your home or along the paths of your own travels. Go out, look around, talk to people, and contribute to this re-mapping of the United States.” 

Mapping Main Street » About

Listen to this podcast, recorded on September 16, to learn more about how we are working “Mapping Main Street" into our curriculum. You will also to learn more about a wonderful youth development program, Radio Rookies and their Short Wave workshop, where producers train students the basics of reporting, interviewing, and script writing, and in 1.5 months they produce a final story for the Radio Rookies web site.” One of our guests for this podcast was Sanda Htyte.

Sanda Htyte is Radio Rookies Associate Producer. She has been with Radio Rookies since interning at the Elmhurst workshop in summer of 2005. She is also a freelance video producer, director, editor and a CUNY Professor. While interning at Radio Rookies, Sanda was completing her MFA in documentary producing. Having studied both video and radio production at her Alma Mata, Brooklyn College, CUNY, she was asked to teach introduction to radio production as Adjunct Professor in Fall of 2006 as well as Spring 2007.

A couple of years ago Woody Woodgate, up in Alaska, helped shape our curriculum toward place-based projects. His work with the students at the Marshall School was an inspiration. He helped amplify the voices of the young people in his classes so that all of us on the Youth Voices network could hear and respond!

Another guest on this podcast was a colleague of Woody’s from Alaska, Diane (Ginger) Crockett. Chris Sloan joined us as well from Salt Lake City Utah. (Check out his students’ work on the Mapping Main Street site.)

We would love to make similar connections with your students this year. Specifically, in the next couple of months, we are looking at braiding some or our “place-based” photography, stories, VoiceThreads, videos, podcasts… with the NPR-connected project, “Mapping Main Street.” It just seems to us like this could be an excellent opportunity for students to show off their home towns, their cultures, their stories — and to see what is similar and different from other youths’ Main Streets.

Interested? Please plan to join us at Youth Voices.

Click Read more to see a transcript of a chat that was happening during the webcast.