Teaching Literacy in Urban Schools

Teaching Literacy in Urban Schools
Author: Barbara Purdum-Cassidy
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 137
Release: 2018
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9781475839333

This book seeks to provide some practical insights guided by conceptual and contextual knowledge by understanding how to teach urban African American and Hispanic/Latino(a) students by discussing culturally appropriate instructional strategies that have demonstrated success among African American and Hispanic/Latino(a) students.

Culturally Affirming Literacy Practices for Urban Elementary Students

Culturally Affirming Literacy Practices for Urban Elementary Students
Author: Lakia M. Scott
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 212
Release: 2016-08-17
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1475826443

The nation’s demographic of public schools are more ethnically, racially, and linguistically diverse than ever before (Strauss, 2014). However, there are still educational policies and practices that call to question whether traditionally marginalized students receive an equitable education. This is demonstrated in national achievement trends, which highlight disproportionality ratings among minoritized student groups. Also when examining school discipline policies, expulsion ratings, special education services, and school choice movements, all seem to handicap educational opportunity for low-income Black and Brown students. As American schools become more and more diverse, it is imperative that the literacy practices used to teach young students of color reflect the nation’s changing demographic. This book provides practical insights guided by conceptual and contextual knowledge in understanding how to teach urban African American and Hispanic/Latino(a) students by discussing issues associated with critical pedagogies, literacy, and culturally appropriate instructional strategies that have demonstrated success for traditionally marginalized student populations. This book examines culturally affirming literacy practices from three main components: (1) scholarship, (2) the field of practice, and (3) teacher education models. Each of these three are significant in understanding how to teach minoritized populations. As such, chapters have been organized into three main sections that address scholarship and research, trends in the field, and implications for teacher education models – all in order to advance the literacy achievement of African American and Hispanic/Latino(a) students.

Critical Literacy and Urban Youth

Critical Literacy and Urban Youth
Author: Ernest Morrell
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 273
Release: 2015-07-22
Genre: Education
ISBN: 113559984X

Critical Literacy and Urban Youth offers an interrogation of critical theory developed from the author’s work with young people in classrooms, neighborhoods, and institutions of power. Through cases, an articulated process, and a theory of literacy education and social change, Morrell extends the conversation among literacy educators about what constitutes critical literacy while also examining implications for practice in secondary and postsecondary American educational contexts. This book is distinguished by its weaving together of theory and practice. Morrell begins by arguing for a broader definition of the "critical" in critical literacy – one that encapsulates the entire Western philosophical tradition as well as several important "Othered" traditions ranging from postcolonialism to the African-American tradition. Next, he looks at four cases of critical literacy pedagogy with urban youth: teaching popular culture in a high school English classroom; conducting community-based critical research; engaging in cyber-activism; and doing critical media literacy education. Lastly, he returns to theory, first considering two areas of critical literacy pedagogy that are still relatively unexplored: the importance of critical reading and writing in constituting and reconstituting the self, and critical writing that is not just about coming to a critical understanding of the world but that plays an explicit and self-referential role in changing the world. Morrell concludes by outlining a grounded theory of critical literacy pedagogy and considering its implications for literacy research, teacher education, classroom practice, and advocacy work for social change.

Teaching Literacy in Urban Schools

Teaching Literacy in Urban Schools
Author: Barbara Purdum-Cassidy
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 151
Release: 2018-03-02
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1475839340

Today’s public schools represent greater student diversity than ever before in the history of the United States, yet pedagogical approaches as mandated by state education agencies and school districts superimpose mainstream curricula and instructional practices which ultimately disadvantage the academic outcomes of the majority minority: African American and Hispanic/Latino(a) students. Unfortunately, national report findings also heighten the educational crisis that exists for Black and Brown children with regard to reading and writing achievement. As a result, there is need to deeply explore the relationship between Black and Brown student literacy achievement and educational policy, teacher education program, curriculum, and assessment. This book seeks to provide some practical insights guided by conceptual and contextual knowledge by understanding how to teach urban African American and Hispanic/Latino(a) students by discussing culturally appropriate instructional strategies that have demonstrated success among African American and Hispanic/Latino(a) students. This book will showcase successful models for teaching literacy to urban student through a discussion of topics that include: (1) increasing literacy achievement and motivation, (2) multicultural literacy practices, and (3) early and elementary literacy instruction.

More Mirrors in the Classroom

More Mirrors in the Classroom
Author: Jane Fleming
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 253
Release: 2016-06-08
Genre: Education
ISBN: 147580217X

Nearly 30% of all public school children attend school in large or mid-size cities, totaling more than 16 million students in 22,000 schools. For schools serving culturally and linguistically diverse populations and large numbers of children living in poverty, a significant achievement gap persists. Proponents of multicultural education often advocate for instruction with culturally relevant texts to promote inclusion, compassion, and understanding of our increasingly diverse society. Less discussion has focused on the significant body of research that suggests that culturally relevant texts have important effects on language and literacy development. By “connecting the dots” of existing research, More Mirrors in the Classroom raises awareness about the critical role that urban children's literature can play in helping children learn to read and write. In addition, it provides practical step-by-step advice for increasing the cultural relevance of school curricula in order to accelerate literacy learning.

Service-Learning in Literacy Education

Service-Learning in Literacy Education
Author: Valerie Kinloch
Publisher: IAP
Total Pages: 274
Release: 2014-03-01
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1623965012

This edited collection will stand as the first volume that specifically describes service-learning programs and courses designed as part of teacher education programs in the fields of literacy education, secondary English education, elementary language arts education, and related fields. The contributing authors describe the programs they have developed at their universities and/or in their local communities, providing information about the rationale for their initiative, the design of the course, the outcomes of the experience, and other matters that will help literacy educators develop similar courses and experiences of their own. Additionally, this edited collection will fill a great gap in the field’s knowledge of alternative forms of teacher education. It will provide descriptions of service-learning initiatives that have been field-tested with demonstrable results. Thus far the field has produced widely scattered articles in journals covering a variety of disciplines, but no definitive collection of papers in which service-learning designed to promote literacy instruction is housed in a single volume edited for cross-referencing and thematic categorization. The two editors have developed courses and received grants to support service-learning initiatives at their universities and believe that others might develop similar programs if they had better understandings of their value and design. Their intention with this volume is to promote service-learning more broadly among literacy educators.

What They Don't Learn in School

What They Don't Learn in School
Author: Jabari Mahiri
Publisher: Peter Lang
Total Pages: 306
Release: 2004
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9780820450360

Contributors to this book have illuminated the practices of literacy and learning in the lives of urban youth. Their descriptions and assessments of these practices are anchored in perspectives of «New Literacy Studies». The ten studies explore a number of urban scenes in order to engage, understand, and present multiple youth identities, attitudes, activities, representations, and stories connected to a range of situated, adaptive, and voluntary uses of literacy. The authors use a variety of conceptual and methodological approaches to explicate the various skills, the distinct methods of production or composition, the subjective and collective meanings, the mutable and variegated texts, and the dynamic contexts that urban youth utilize for expression, affirmation, and pleasure. There is a response to each chapter by a major scholar in its area of focus. Together, these studies and responses contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of the pedagogies, politics, and possibilities of literacy and learning in and out of school.

Culturally Sustaining Pedagogies

Culturally Sustaining Pedagogies
Author: Django Paris
Publisher: Teachers College Press
Total Pages: 305
Release: 2017
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0807775703

Culturally Sustaining Pedagogies raises fundamental questions about the purpose of schooling in changing societies. Bringing together an intergenerational group of prominent educators and researchers, this volume engages and extends the concept of culturally sustaining pedagogy (CSP)—teaching that perpetuates and fosters linguistic, literate, and cultural pluralism as part of schooling for positive social transformation. The authors propose that schooling should be a site for sustaining the cultural practices of communities of color, rather than eradicating them. Chapters present theoretically grounded examples of how educators and scholars can support Black, Indigenous, Latinx, Asian/Pacific Islander, South African, and immigrant students as part of a collective movement towards educational justice in a changing world. Book Features: A definitive resource on culturally sustaining pedagogies, including what they look like in the classroom and how they differ from deficit-model approaches.Examples of teaching that sustain the languages, literacies, and cultural practices of students and communities of color.Contributions from the founders of such lasting educational frameworks as culturally relevant pedagogy, funds of knowledge, cultural modeling, and third space. Contributors: H. Samy Alim, Mary Bucholtz, Dolores Inés Casillas, Michael Domínguez, Nelson Flores, Norma Gonzalez, Kris D. Gutiérrez, Adam Haupt, Amanda Holmes, Jason G. Irizarry, Patrick Johnson, Valerie Kinloch, Gloria Ladson-Billings, Carol D. Lee, Stacey J. Lee, Tiffany S. Lee, Jin Sook Lee, Teresa L. McCarty, Django Paris, Courtney Peña, Jonathan Rosa, Timothy J. San Pedro, Daniel Walsh, Casey Wong “All teachers committed to justice and equity in our schools and society will cherish this book.” —Sonia Nieto, professor emerita, University of Massachusetts, Amherst “This book is for educators who are unafraid of using education to make a difference in the lives of the most vulnerable.” —Pedro Noguera, University of California, Los Angeles “This book calls for deep, effective practices and understanding that centers on our youths’ assets.” —Prudence L. Carter, dean, Graduate School of Education, UC Berkeley

English in Urban Classrooms

English in Urban Classrooms
Author: Gunther R. Kress
Publisher: Psychology Press
Total Pages: 206
Release: 2005
Genre: English language
ISBN: 9780415331692

This ground-breaking text spans a range of issues central to school English. It extends not only to the spoken and written language of classrooms, but also to other important modes of representation and communication.

Promoting Racial Literacy in Schools

Promoting Racial Literacy in Schools
Author: Jr. Stevenson
Publisher: Teachers College Press
Total Pages: 241
Release: 2014-01-03
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0807755044

Based on extensive research, this provocative volume explores how schools are places where racial conflicts often remain hidden at the expense of a healthy school climate and the well-being of other students of colour. Most schools fail to act on racial microaggressions because the stress of negotiating such conflicts is extremely high due to fears of incompetence, public exposure, and accusation. Instead of facing these conflicts head on, schools perpetuate a set of avoidance or coping strategies. The author of this much-needed book uncovers how racial stress undermines student achievement. Students, educators, and social service support staff will find workable strategies to improve their racial literacy skills to read, recast, and resolve racially stressful encounters when they happen. This book features: a model that applies culturally relevant behavioural stress management strategies to problem-solve racial stress in schools; examples demonstrating workable solutions relevant within predominantly White schools for students, parents, teachers, and adminsitrators; measurable outcomes and strategies for developing racial literacy skills that can be integrated into the K - 12 curriculum and teacher professional development; and teaching and leadership skills that will create a more tolerant and supportive school environment for all students.