Pitt-Bradford Professor to Have Two Journal Articles Published This Fall

Dr. Wayne Brinda, assistant professor of education at the University of Pittsburgh at Bradford, will have two articles appearing in education journals this fall.

“Ladder to Literacy” will appear in the fall issue of Middle School Journal, the journal of the National Middle School Association. Brinda will also present the paper at the association’s annual conference in November in Louisville, Ky.

Brinda said that the paper is based on the research he did for his doctoral thesis at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh.

He worked with two groups of reluctant and struggling middle-school-age readers, 10 in an urban area and 10 in a rural area.

Brinda interviewed each of the students and teachers and worked with them over four months to develop a system of introducing information before it is read. The system developed also supports students’ reading during the exploration of a novel in a way that increases comprehension and interest.

He said he was interested in the area because as a middle and high school student, he was himself a struggling reader. Reluctant readers played a role in Brinda’s second publication for this fall as well.

An article titled “Bringing Literature to Life for Urban Adolescents: Artistic, Dramatic Instruction and Live Theatre,” will appear in the Journal of Aesthetic Education. The article is co-authored by Dr. Janine Certo of Michigan State University.

Brinda and Certo conducted a year-long study in two sixth-grade classrooms in a high-poverty, urban, western Pennsylvania middle school. In addition to reading young adult novels, students attended theatrical productions of the novels put on by a semi-professional theater company that produces adaptations of literature and designs instructional support materials to meet literacy challenges.

The study demonstrated the positive impact artistic and dramatic instructional strategies have as pathways to comprehension, engagement and enjoyment.

“These results are essential to urban learners who often receive the worst kinds of instruc­tional activities tied to standardized test scores and lack opportunities with the arts,” Brinda said. “Transformation occurred with a series of activities designed to guide the process of reading and make it enjoyable.

“Artis­tic and dramatic pedagogy supported by live theater has a significant effect on addressing the needs of urban and all reluctant adolescent readers. Our hope is that administrators will see the importance of continuing field trips to theatrical events, teachers will draw on local theaters as resources for building enjoyment and excitement with reading, and theaters will see themselves as literacy resources.”

Brinda also made a presentation on the subject of the Holocaust this spring at the annual meeting of the American-Hungarian Educators’ Association at John Carroll University in Ohio.

His presentation, “Learning about the Holocaust through Interactive Technology,” was based on a project he did with his own students here at Pitt-Bradford.

In spring 2009, students in Brinda’s adolescent literature class, along with members of the public, were able to hold a dialogue via videoconference with Holocaust survivor and author Livia Bitton-Jackson.

Interactive technology is a great way to bring Holocaust survivors, who are now elderly and may have difficulty traveling, to audiences in a way that still allows them to have a real-time dialogue.

Prior to coming to Pitt-Bradford in 2008, Brinda was an assistant professor in the Duquesne University School of Education, taught English and theater at The Oakland School, Sewickley Academy Senior School, and was director of Playhouse Jr. He is currently the Artistic Director and Co-founder of Prime Stage Theatre in Pittsburgh, a company that blends education with theatre for adolescents, teachers and families.