Liam Aiello

Dr. Aiello is a postdoctoral scholar for the Teachers as Learners Project. He received his PhD in Literacy, Language, and English Education from Stanford’s Graduate School of Education. His research focuses on text discussions in English language arts classrooms, particularly the affordances and challenges of conducting these discussions in dialogic and inclusive ways. Liam is a former fifth grade teacher, and more recently has taught education courses at Mills College and provided professional development through Stanford’s Center to Support Excellence in Teaching.

Education

PhD Curriculum Studies and Teacher Education, Stanford University

BA Psychology and Elementary Education, Middlebury College

Publications

Aukerman, M., Chambers-Schuldt, L., Aiello, L., & Martin, P. (2017) What meaning making means among us: The intercomprehending of emergent bilinguals in small-group text discussions. Harvard Educational Review, 87(4), 482-511.

Presentations

2019  “I Feel Like You’re Just Summarizing Badly What We’re Saying”: Student Skepticism of Teacher Revoicing in Dialogically-Organized Text Discussions,  Literacy Research Association, Tampa, FL, December 4-7.

2017  Dialogic Engagement as Critical Literacy with Adolescent Readers, National Council of Teachers of English Assembly for Research, San Francisco, CA, February 10-12.

2016  Productive for Whom? English Teachers’ Sensemaking Surrounding Productive Classroom Talk, Literacy Research Association, Nashville, TN, November 30-December 3.

2015  “All I Can Do Is Quiz Them”: The Disconnect Between One Teacher’s Literacy Instruction in “Honors” and “Regular” Classes, w/ Sarah Levine, Literacy Research Association, Carlsbad, CA, December 2-5.

2015  Developing District Instructional Leadership Capacity: Creating the Conditions for Learning to Lead Instructional Improvement, w/ Ann Jaquith, National Center on Scaling Up Effective Schools National Conference, Nashville, TN, October 8-9.

2013  The Collective and Contingent Nature of Idea Building in Dialogically-Organized Discussions, w/ Maren Aukerman, Literacy Research Association, Dallas, TX, December 4-7.

2013  Pathways of Sense-Making in Second-Grade ELL Text Discussions, w/ Maren Aukerman, American Educational Research Association, San Francisco, CA, April 27-May 1.

Teaching Experience 

Mills College

Adolescent Learners and Literacies Across Content Areas
Sociopolitical Foundations of Education

Stanford’s Center to Support Excellence in Teaching

English Language Arts Instructional Coach
Hollyhock Institute English Language Arts Instructor
Letovo School of Moscow Russian Literature and Language Instructor

Stanford’s Graduate School of Education

Supporting Students with Special Needs
Centrality of Literacies in Teaching and Learning
Becoming Literate in Schools
Culture, Learning, and Poverty
Introduction to Teaching and Learning for Undergraduates

Convent of the Sacred Heart Elementary

5th Grade Humanities Teacher

San Francisco Day School

5th Grade Teacher