Professional Development at Teachers College

SPI uses rigorous, curriculum-based publication projects to motivate and augment students’ academic success. SPI's five-part professional development program offers teachers various support structures to enable students to experience the powerful learning and reward that come from writing for authentic audiences and publishing original work. SPI is especially designed to democratize the publication process, allowing all students––not just the elite writers––to feel the thrill of publishing quality work. Our emphasis is on aligning district, state, and national standards with an exciting professional model of writing. To date, SPI has partnered with public schools all over New York City, publishing the writing of over two thousand student authors.

Major Components of SPI’s Professional Development Program

• On-site professional development of teachers: SPI curriculum consultants work directly with partnering schools, supporting classroom teachers in designing in-depth standards-driven curriculum culminating in publication.
• Teacher preparation at Teachers College: through institutes and special methods courses, both pre-service and in-service teachers receive instruction and support in planning and producing curriculum-based publication projects for schools around the city. SPI’s paradigm of professional development is based in experiential learning models, thus graduate students themselves partake in publishing their own writing as they prepare to teach writing for publication.
• Classroom publishing services: our online system supports layout and production for a range of classroom publishing projects. Interactive design templates reduce costs, facilitate short-run printing of classroom publications, and provide teachers with a single-destination solution to their publication needs.
• Project-based curriculum materials: the “Project Notes” series is the widest dissemination of SPI’s approach to teaching and learning. Here, teachers receive project overviews, explicit objectives, and detailed daily lessons for thematic units that culminate in publication. Units can be adapted and scaled to suit teachers’ needs. Discount pricing is available for district-wide implementation.
• Sample student publications: SPI’s inventory of books is distributed to classroom teachers as a way to give greater meaning to writing and reading practices by locating them in student publications.

Teachers—Get Involved

Principals, Superintendents, and Literacy Coaches