Critiquing Whole Language and Classroom Inquiry

Critiquing Whole Language and Classroom Inquiry
Author: Sibel Boran
Publisher:
Total Pages: 356
Release: 2001
Genre: Education
ISBN:

This book, part of the Whole Language Umbrella Series, offers a critical reexamination of "inquiry" and "whole language" as tools for rethinking literacy, schooling, and humanistic citizenship in the complexities of today's multicultural world. The essays in the book explore the political implications of literacy theories and practices by asking what kinds of inquiries promote or hinder the acquisition of literacies as tools for envisioning, critically exploring, and reconstructing knowledge and societies that are socially just. After an introduction ("The Inquirers and Their Questions" by the editors), essays in the book are: (1) "What Education as Inquiry Is and Isn't" (Jerome C. Harste); (2) "Curriculum as Inquiry" (Kathy G. Short and Carolyn L. Burke); (3) "The Journey from Pedagogy to Politics: Taking Whole Language Seriously" (Susan M. Church); (4) "What's It Going To Be?" (Patrick Shannon); (5) "Critical Inquiry or Safe Literacies: Who's Allowed To Ask Which Questions?" (Barbara Comber); (6) "Writing for Critical Democracy: Student Voice and Teacher Practice in the Writing Workshop" (Timothy J. Lensmire); (7) "Classrooms in the Community: From Curriculum to Pedagogy" (Timothy Shannon and Patrick Shannon); (8) "'I Knew That Already': How Children's Books Limit Inquiry" (Jennifer O'Brien); (9) "Examining Poverty and Literacy in Our Schools: Janice's Story" (Connie L. White); (10) "Classroom Inquiry into the Incidental Unfolding of Social Justice Issues: Seeking Out Possibilities in the Lives of Learners" (Vivian Vasquez); (11) "Our Kinds of Questions You Wouldn't Find in a Book" (Robyn Jenkin); (12) "Young Researchers in Action" (David Wray, Maureen Lewis, with Carolyn Cox); (13) "Different Cultural Views of Whole Language" (Lee Gunderson); and (14) "Inviting Reflective Global Inquiries: Politicizing Multicultural Literature, Mediated Student Voices, and English Literacies" (Sibel Boran). (RS)

Whole Language Teaching, Whole-hearted Practice

Whole Language Teaching, Whole-hearted Practice
Author: Monica Taylor
Publisher: Peter Lang
Total Pages: 236
Release: 2007
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9780820463100

This seminal collection brings together the multiple perspectives of whole language educators over the course of the past thirty-five years. The essays illustrate the complex ways in which whole language teachers have been and continue to be political activists through their interactions with students; the teachers' beliefs about teaching, learning, and curriculum; their commitment to critical thinking and social justice; their collaborative engagements with other teachers; their role as leaders of change in schools and communities; and, finally, their activism in society. Although many believe that we are living in a climate where the term «whole language» is considered taboo, the contributors to this book demonstrate hopefulness for the future of whole language: as Yetta and Ken Goodman write in the concluding chapter, «whole language is alive and well.»

A Critical Inquiry Framework for K-12 Teachers

A Critical Inquiry Framework for K-12 Teachers
Author: JoBeth Allen
Publisher: Teachers College Press
Total Pages: 209
Release: 2015-04-25
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0807772305

This dynamic book provides powerful ideas to guide pedagogy and a curriculum model for helping students connect with issues in their lives while meeting standards. Vivid portraits of K12 classrooms illustrate how teachers used a human rights framework to engage students in critical inquiry of relevant social issues, such as immigration rights, religious tolerance, racial equality, countering the effects of poverty, and respect for people with disabilities. The book shows how a group of teachers worked together to develop a critical content framework using the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Chapters highlight lively classroom and community action projects.

English-Only Instruction and Immigrant Students in Secondary Schools

English-Only Instruction and Immigrant Students in Secondary Schools
Author: Lee Gunderson
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 299
Release: 2017-09-25
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1351568140

This book is for teachers, teacher educators, school and district administrators, policy makers, and researchers who want to know about literacy, cultural diversity, and students who speak little or no English. It offers a rich picture of the incredible diversity of students who enter secondary school as immigrants—their abilities, their needs, and their aspirations. The studies reported are part of a large longitudinal study of about 25,000 immigrant students in a district in which the policy is English-only instruction. These studies: *provide multiple views of the students’ lives and their success in schools where the language of instruction differs from the languages they speak with their friends and families; *explore the students’ views of teaching and learning; *describe the potential differences between the students views and those of their teachers; *look at issues related to students’ views of their identities as they work, study, and socialize in a new environment; and *examine different reading models designed to facilitate the learning of English as a second language (ESL). Educators and researchers will find the descriptions of students’ simultaneous learning of English and of academic content relevant to their view of whether instruction should be English only or bilingual. For teachers who view multicultural education as an important endeavor, this book may on occasion surprise them and at other times confirm their views. The author does not attempt to develop a particular political viewpoint about which approach works best with immigrant students. Rather, the objective of the studies was to develop a full, rich description of the lives of immigrant high school students enrolled in classes where the medium of instruction is English. The reader is left to evaluate the results.

Inquiry-based English Instruction

Inquiry-based English Instruction
Author: Richard Beach
Publisher: Teachers College Press
Total Pages: 228
Release: 2001-06-08
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9780807741023

This valuable resource offers an alternative framework for middle and secondary school English instruction. The authors provide concrete strategies for engaging students in critical inquiry projects about the social worlds they inhabit or about those portrayed in literature and the media, their peer, school, family, romance, community, workplace, and virtual worlds. You will find numerous examples of middle and high school students using various literacy tools (language, genres, narratives, signs, multimedia, and drama) to study, represent, critique, and transform these worlds. Rather than simply studying about literacy practices, this new framework shows how students learn best through active participation driven by a need to critically examine and promote changes in their social worlds.

ESL (ELL) Literacy Instruction

ESL (ELL) Literacy Instruction
Author: Lee Gunderson
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 400
Release: 2008-08-01
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1135857237

This comprehensive text applies research to practice, providing both ESL and mainstream teachers with the background and expertise necessary to plan and implement reading programs that match the particular needs and abilities of their students from kindergarten through adult levels.

Moving Critical Literacies Forward

Moving Critical Literacies Forward
Author: Jessica Pandya
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 379
Release: 2013-11-26
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1134074069

Taking the pulse of current efforts to do—and, in some cases, undo—critical literacy, this volume explores and critiques its implementation in learning contexts around the globe. An impressive set of international authors offer examples of productive critical literacy practices in and out of schools, address the tensions and gaps between these practices and educational policies, and attempt to forecast the future for critical literacy as a movement in the changing global educational policy landscape. This collection is unique in presenting the recent work of luminaries such as Allan Luke and Hilary Janks alongside relative newcomers who use innovative approaches and arguments to reinvigorate and redefine critical practice. It is time for this cutting-edge inquiry into the state of critical literacy—not only because is it a complex and ever-evolving field, but perhaps more important, because it offers a reaction to, and powerful reworking of, standardization and high-stakes accountability measures in educational contexts around the globe.

Teachers and Teaching Post-COVID

Teachers and Teaching Post-COVID
Author: Katy Marsh-Davies
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 274
Release: 2023-11-23
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1003802141

Featuring a broad swathe of academic research and perspectives from international contributors, this book will capture and share important lessons from the pandemic experience for teaching practice and teacher learning more broadly. Looking at core teaching values such as the facilitation of learning, the promotion of fairness and equality, and community building, the book centres the records of teachers’ experiences from diverse educational phases and locations that illuminate how the complexity of teaching work is entangled in the emotional, relational, and embodied nature of teachers’ everyday lives. Through rich, qualitative data and first-hand experience, the book informs the decisions of teachers and those who train, support, and manage them, promoting sustainable, positive transformation within education for the benefit of educators and learners alike. This book will be of use to scholars, practitioners, and researchers involved with teachers and teacher education, the sociology of education, and teaching and learning more broadly. Policy makers working in school leadership, management, and administration may also benefit from the volume.

Reflections on Qualitative Research in Language and Literacy Education

Reflections on Qualitative Research in Language and Literacy Education
Author: Seyyed-Abdolhamid Mirhosseini
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 191
Release: 2017-01-11
Genre: Education
ISBN: 3319491407

This book discusses aspects of the theory and practice of qualitative research in the specific context of language and literacy education. It addresses epistemological perspectives, methodological problems, and practical considerations related to research involvements in areas of language education and literacy studies rather than generic issues of other fields of social sciences. The volume starts with Theoretical Considerations in the first part and raises some epistemological and theoretical concerns that are rarely debated in the specific context of research on language and literacy teaching. The second part, Methodological Approaches explores issues of the design and implementation of language and literacy education research within the framework of some of the major established qualitative research traditions. Finally, the part on Research in Action discusses practical aspects of a few actual instances of qualitative research on language and literacy education in different contexts.

Reclaiming Reading

Reclaiming Reading
Author: Richard J. Meyer
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 331
Release: 2012-03-22
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1136837906

Inviting teachers back to the role of reflective advocates for thoughtful reading instruction, this book presents theory and pedagogical possibilities to reclaim and build upon the knowledge base that was growing when government mandates, scripted commercial programs, and high stakes tests took over as the dominant agenda for reading instruction in U.S. public schools. Focusing on literacy learners’ and their teachers’ lives as literate souls, it examines how the teaching of reading can be reclaimed via an intensive reconsideration of five pillars as central to the teaching and learning of reading: learning, teaching, curriculum, language, and sociocultural contexts. Reclaiming Reading articulates the knowledge base that was marginalized or disrupted by legislated and policy intrusions into classrooms and provides practical examples for taking good reading instruction out of the cracks and moving it back to the center of the classroom. Explaining what happens in readers’ minds as they read and how teachers can design practices to support that process, this book encourages teachers to initiate pedagogy that will help them begin or return to the stance of reflective, knowledgeable, professional decision-makers.