Ethnographic Interviewing for Teacher Preparation and Staff Development

Are you using interviews in your classroom? Carolyn Frank’s new book on interviewing is a powerful tool for teachers and educational researchers. Using an anthropological framework, this book explains techniques for ethnographic interviews and observations in and out of the classroom. Frank shows how teachers in particular can use interviewing to improve their teaching and communicate better with students and parents. This volume can also be used as an excellent guide for teacher researchers inquiring into their own practice and for educational researchers who want to know how they can learn more about classroom life, especially in an elementary school setting. There are specifics on developing rapport, putting the parent or student at ease, constructing questions, and analyzing data.

This book includes:

• Key strategies and guidelines to prepare and conduct interviews.
• Real-life examples drawn from the author’s own experiences as a teacher, educational researcher, and professor.
• Descriptions of home visits and how to prepare for them.
• Assessment tools and instructional plans, and how to choose the best ones for different students.
• And much more!

Carolyn Frank is a professor in the Charter College of Education at California State University, Los Angeles and director of the Los Angeles Writing Project.

“Teachers and teacher educators will find this book a dazzling and transformative contribution to their instructional repertoire."
—Sheridan Blau, Teachers College