Central West Virginia Writing Project

Spring 2025 Pre-Service Workshops

Spring 2025 Activities

2025 Pre-Service Workshops

Two years ago, the Central West Virginia Writing Project began investigating how to effectively integrate explicit writing instruction—aligned with the principles of the science of reading—with the long-standing practices of process writing and writing workshop models. A book study of The Writing Rope served as the foundation for this exploration and culminated in a series of sessions for preservice teachers in the spring of 2024.

Two guiding questions shaped the development of these workshops:

  1. How can we integrate practices such as writing workshop and process writing—which foster a love of writing—with the need for explicit writing instruction as outlined in The Writing Rope?

  2. How can we meaningfully connect writing, reading, and thinking across diverse content areas and position all educators as teachers of writing?

In Spring 2025, the Central West Virginia Writing Project at Marshall University expanded its collaborative efforts by inviting faculty from the Literacy Education Program, along with Dr. McKenzie Brittain from the Elementary Mathematics Program, to join the Writing Project members in designing and delivering workshops for graduating elementary and secondary preservice teachers. Drawing on data from surveys administered to each group, workshop leaders tailored activities to address participants’ specific areas of interest.

In March, eight workshops were conducted across five institutions—Marshall University, West Virginia State University, the University of Charleston, Glenville State University, and Marietta College—reaching a total of 140 student teachers in 90-minute sessions.

The workshops modeled a framework for explicit writing instruction that operates within the structure of process writing and the writing workshop model.

Grounded in the belief that strong writing is thinking made visible, the sessions engaged participants in strategies and instructional practices designed to activate critical thinking and support writing development across various content areas.

Next Steps

The Central West Virginia Writing Project will invite workshop participants to a series of follow-up sessions, which will be eligible for graduate professional development credit through Marshall University.  

Dr. Brittany McKenzie

The Writing in Mathematics session provides an overview of the importance for integrating writing into mathematics lessons. The session provides types of writing in mathematics as outlined by Urquhart (2009), specifically looking at examples of how the types can be implemented meaningfully to engage all students. Additionally, the session reviews classroom examples at different grade levels as outlined by Gunter (2017) for teachers to consider the comfort level for which their students are able to write mathematically.

Marshall University

Dr. McKenzie Brittain conducted sessions at Marshall in collaboration with Dr. Barbara O’Byrne and Dr. Maggie Luma.

University of Charleston

Dr. Donna Atwood presented a workshop at the University of Charleston on March 18, 2025.

West Virginia State University

Emily Patterson

Glenville State University & Marietta College

Linda Long and Brianne Vandal

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