{"title":"“My life’s blueprint”: publishing critical youth narratives in community-based organizations","authors":"C. Lee, Nina R. Schoonover","doi":"10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0069","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0069","url":null,"abstract":"This paper aims to explore how currently underserved young adults engaged in a community-based organization (CBO), Bull City YouthBuild, wrote and published a book together, and how this work impacted them and their communities. Through a critical literacy framework, the research asked: How do students in a community-based writing project demonstrate self-empowerment and agency through narrative writing?,This qualitative case study examined the students’ published narratives. The researchers used ethnographic methods in data collection, and the qualitative data analysis approaches were developed through a critical conceptual framework.,The students’ narratives expressed self-empowerment and agency in the ways the young adults wrote against a dominant discourse; they wrote about repositioning their lives and redesigning their futures to reveal how they wanted to be externally perceived and to be leaders in their communities. The students expressed how the CBO offered them freedom to write their stories as they found new ways of using their historical and cultural backgrounds to collectively pursue success.,This work offers implications of how CBOs can meet the needs of currently underserved young adults through centering their voices. The authors see the writing process as crucial for student engagement in finding agency and self-empowerment with their words.,Critical literacy foregrounds the voices of young adults as they push back against dominant narratives and stereotypes. This research hopes to reveal the intersections between CBOs and the communities they serve to develop literacies that are relevant and meaningful to young adults’ lives.","PeriodicalId":45885,"journal":{"name":"English Teaching-Practice and Critique","volume":"10 1","pages":"107-120"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2019-12-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"87881570","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Community cultural wealth and literacy capital in Latin American communities","authors":"Lina Trigos-Carrillo","doi":"10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0071","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0071","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000Purpose\u0000The purpose of this paper is to investigate the literacy practices of the families and communities of first-generation college students in Latin America, and how community and family literacies can inform the understanding of first-generation college students’ identity and cultural values.\u0000\u0000\u0000Design/methodology/approach\u0000This transnational ethnography was conducted in local communities around three public universities in Mexico, Colombia and Costa Rica. Participants included nine fist-generation college students and more than 50 people in their families and communities (i.e. relatives, parents and friends). Data gathering occurred at the university outside the formal space of the classroom, at home, and in the community. Data were interpreted through the lens of the community cultural wealth framework.\u0000\u0000\u0000Findings\u0000The author found that first-generation college students and their families and communities engaged in rich literacy practices that have been overlooked in policy, research, and media. It is argued that the concept literacy capital is necessary to acknowledge the critical literacy practices communities engage in. Literacy capital was manifested in these communities to preserve cultural traditions, to sponsor literacy practices and to question and resist unjust sociopolitical circumstances.\u0000\u0000\u0000Practical implications\u0000The findings of this study should inform a culturally sustaining pedagogy of academic literacies in higher education. Beyond asset-based approaches to academic literacies in Latin America, critical perspectives to academic literacies teaching and learning are needed that acknowledge the Latin American complexities.\u0000\u0000\u0000Originality/value\u0000These findings are significant because they unveiled how people in local communities were informed about the sociopolitical dynamics at the national and international scale that affected or even threatened their local culture, and how they used their literacy capital to react critically to those situations.\u0000","PeriodicalId":45885,"journal":{"name":"English Teaching-Practice and Critique","volume":"3 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2019-12-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"87602886","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Monological practices, authoritative discourses and the missing “C” in digital classroom communities","authors":"Vicki A. Hosek, Lara J. Handsfield","doi":"10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0067","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0067","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000Purpose\u0000The purpose of this study was to examine teacher decisions surrounding opportunities for student voice, experiences and beliefs in digital classroom communities. The teachers’ decisions reflect monologic rather than dialogic teacher pedagogies which prompted the authors to ask the following question: What led to these teacher-centered practices in digital environments?\u0000\u0000\u0000Design/methodology/approach\u0000Authoritative discourses in school policies and a missing connection between critical pedagogies and teachers’ technology practices are examined in light of teachers’ decisions to engage in monologic and/or dialogic teaching practices. The authors propose professional development and research that emphasize pedagogy that supports student voice as foundational to practices involving digital literacies.\u0000\u0000\u0000Findings\u0000Examination of the teachers’ decisions showed monologic practices void of student opportunities to critically engage in digital environments. Dominant discourses imposed through protectionist and digital citizenship policies of schools as well as lack of opportunity through professional development to connect critical pedagogy to technology impacted the teachers’ decisions.\u0000\u0000\u0000Originality/value\u0000Current research surrounding teachers’ digital literacies uses the TPACK framework to examine technology integration practices. Missing is a critical component that addresses and works to dismantle the dominant discourses and power structures in digital communities (Author, 2018). The authors build on research in critical digital literacies to argue for adding the critical missing “C” into the TPACK framework (C-TPACK) to move researchers and educators to consider pedagogies that examine ideologies at work in digital communities to provide opportunities for student voice.\u0000","PeriodicalId":45885,"journal":{"name":"English Teaching-Practice and Critique","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2019-12-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"87605144","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"“These kids are rebelling”: a student-led transformation of community and critical literacy","authors":"S. Shelton, Kelsey H. Guy, April M. Jones","doi":"10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0072","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0072","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000Purpose\u0000This paper aims to consider the ways that students are shaped by and shape community and critical literacy, along with the ways that community affords student empowerment in an English class during a US high school summer enrichment program.\u0000\u0000\u0000Design/methodology/approach\u0000The qualitative methodological approach is a narrative-based descriptive case study. To provide a detailed and narrative-based discussion, the authors incorporate ethnographic observation narratives and conversational interview excerpts, and analyze the data through inductive coding.\u0000\u0000\u0000Findings\u0000Organizing the findings into two sections, “These kids are rebelling”, and “We’re trusting him to teach and do better now”, we first examine the ways that student-led rebellion reshaped the classroom community and then the ways that the teacher's response redefined critical literacy approaches and his interactions with the students.\u0000\u0000\u0000Research limitations/implications\u0000As this is a qualitative case study that is set during a summer enrichment program, its implications are not wholly generalizable to secondary English education. However, this research does suggest the importance of student agency in considerations of community and critical literacy.\u0000\u0000\u0000Practical implications\u0000This research emphasizes the importance of acknowledging and exploring ways that students' everyday interactions and agency shape educational spaces. Additionally, this research suggests the importance of community and critical literacy to all teachers, no matter their levels of experience or success.\u0000\u0000\u0000Social implications\u0000Students have tremendous potential to not only shape and define learning environments, but to transform pedagogy and teacher relationships. This research emphasizes the importance of acknowledging and exploring these implications specifically to transform community and critical literacy in a summer high school English classroom.\u0000\u0000\u0000Originality/value\u0000First, this paper examines student community as an agentive and rebellious influence within the everyday constructs of schooling, and the authors assert that critical literacy pedagogies may be student-driven as part of community-based activism. Second, this paper seeks to explore both “community” and “critical literacy” as key concepts in positioning students as influential and empowered stakeholders with capacities to reshape education.\u0000","PeriodicalId":45885,"journal":{"name":"English Teaching-Practice and Critique","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2019-11-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"88852153","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Opening spaces of restoration for youth through community-engaged critical literacy practices","authors":"H. Hadley, K. Burke, W. Wright","doi":"10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0068","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0068","url":null,"abstract":"The purpose of this paper is to explore how critical literacy practices within a community youth program opened spaces for restoration for youth. In turn, youth created civic conversations about race, juvenile justice and school discipline inequities to enact change within their community.,This qualitative study used ethnographic methods such as interviews and observation to collect data from youth, community members and adults who run the youth center. Data were analyzed using constant comparative analysis.,Youth created spaces of restoration by reclaiming historicized narratives about themselves, their families and their community. Youth engaged critical literacy practices to explore their own identity, critique inequality in their community and work as community organizers to lead adults in conversations for change.,This paper explores how critical literacy practices have restorative value when youth use them in authentic ways to research community problems and work for change.","PeriodicalId":45885,"journal":{"name":"English Teaching-Practice and Critique","volume":"8 1","pages":"95-106"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2019-11-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"75650373","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Critical literacies on the university campus","authors":"A. Boyd, J. Darragh","doi":"10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0066","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0066","url":null,"abstract":"The purpose of this paper is to explore how preservice teachers conceive of and implement social actions on their college campuses related to a chosen social problem developed in a young adult novel and to examine how social action projects develop teacher candidates’ critical literacies.,This qualitative exploratory multiple case study (Stake, 2005) investigated 70 pre-service teachers on two college campuses over two semesters as they engaged in social action projects. The researchers engaged in layers of open and thematic coding through the theoretical lens of critical literacies.,Preservice teachers engaged in a range of direct and indirect action and, as a result, experienced varying levels of self-efficacy and impact. While most felt their endeavors were successful, those who conducted awareness campaigns noted an inability to measure the effects they had on their communities. Their development of critical literacies through social action was evidenced in the partnerships across campus they established as well as their levels of engagement with peers and local officials.,While the results of conducting social action with youth in secondary classrooms are well established in the literature, lesser well known are ways to engage preservice teachers in such endeavors. This study illustrates not only how teacher candidates can engage in social action as aligned with young adult literature but also offers insights gained from those processes.","PeriodicalId":45885,"journal":{"name":"English Teaching-Practice and Critique","volume":"7 2 1","pages":"49-63"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2019-11-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"90815534","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Prescriptivism, linguicism and pedagogical coercion in primary school UK curriculum policy","authors":"I. Cushing","doi":"10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0063","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0063","url":null,"abstract":"This paper is a critical reflection on the linguistic conservatism as found within current curriculum policies and assessment regimes in the UK, arguing that they represents a form of linguicism which serves to entrench linguistic social injustices. This paper aims to trace the “trajectory” of policy across different levels, discourses and settings, with a particular focus on how linguicism is conceptualised, defended and resisted by teachers. The author draws connections between language ideologies within policy discourse, language tests and teacher interviews.,This study adopts a critical approach to examining educational language policies and assessments. It begins with the assumption that policies and tests are powerful political and ideological tools, which can steer teachers into making certain decisions in the classroom, some of which they may not believe in or agree with. Data are drawn from policy documents, test questions and teacher interviews, with a focus on how teachers talk about language and pedagogies in their classrooms. In total, 22 teachers were interviewed, with this data being transcribed and thematically indexed.,The findings reveal how linguicism is embedded within UK education policy, and how this comes to be replicated within teachers’ discourse and practice. There are three main findings: that teachers can come to operate under a form of “pedagogical coercion”, whereby language policies and tests have a powerful hold on their practice; that teachers see current policy as championing standard English at the expense of non-standardised varieties, and that teachers often see and talk about language as a proxy for other social factors such as education and employability.,This study provides a critical perspective on language education policies in the UK, arguing for greater awareness about the nature and dangers of linguicism across all levels of policy. Data generated from classroom interaction would be a useful avenue for future work.,This paper offers an original, discursively critical examination of language education policy in the UK, with a particular focus on the current curriculum and using original data generated from teacher interviews and associated policy documents.","PeriodicalId":45885,"journal":{"name":"English Teaching-Practice and Critique","volume":"4 1","pages":"35-47"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2019-11-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"72672544","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Centering Black mothers’ stories for critical literacies","authors":"Elaine B. Richardson","doi":"10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0078","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/etpc-05-2019-0078","url":null,"abstract":"The purpose of this paper is to mine Black mothers’ stories to highlight the critical literacy work they do for themselves and their daughters, to change stereotypic views of them, and to illuminate how they negotiate intersectional structures such as gender, sexuality, race and class practice, to sustain and uplift them.,To generate a mother’s narrative, the author asked the following research question: What do you think Black girls need in an afterschool club or in education, or in general?,The author found that the mother’s narrative could be productively contextualized within a reproductive justice framework which gave insights into the mother’s experiences of multiple and simultaneous oppressions which aligned with her social identities with regard to race, class, gender and sexuality. These experiences in turn informed her critical literacies of Black motherhood and girlhood. The author found the system of white heteropatriarchal capitalism, through the privatization of public goods and the lack of adequate social services penalizes Black working mothers and obstructs their ability to mother their children adequately.,Critical literacies of Black motherhood and girlhood should be harnessed for holistic approaches to the literacy education of Black girls, with a focus on improving their life outcomes, enhancing potential for them to realize their gifts, and ending the many forms of violence against them.,Centering the voices of Black mothers as critical literacy education has the potential to thwart oppressive reproductive politics and practices and promote social justice.","PeriodicalId":45885,"journal":{"name":"English Teaching-Practice and Critique","volume":"3 1","pages":"21-33"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2019-11-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"76643585","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Like a conductor: whole-class discussion in English classrooms","authors":"Todd Reynolds","doi":"10.1108/etpc-04-2019-0053","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/etpc-04-2019-0053","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000Purpose\u0000After interviewing teachers about their beliefs on discussion, the author observed four English teachers as they led class discussions. The purpose of this study is to see what kinds of discussion were happening, and what teachers were doing to facilitate those discussions.\u0000\u0000\u0000Design/methodology/approach\u0000The author observed six English class sessions with discussion as a technique and transcribed each. To analyze the discussion events (DEs), the author focused on the addressivity of the teachers’ comments, and plotted the DEs on a four-quadrant system of analysis. The quadrants helped to move beyond the value-laden dichotomy between monologic and dialogic discussion, and to better understand what teachers are doing.\u0000\u0000\u0000Findings\u0000The majority of class sessions were classified as convergent-active but teachers used a variety of discussions. In particular, teachers were concerned about control, so they used three techniques to keep procedural control as follows: taking over the discussion, creating specific procedures and using the Initiation-Response-Evaluation format in different ways.\u0000\u0000\u0000Originality/value\u0000Instead of focusing on a dichotomy this method of analysis opens up the possibility for labeling different kinds of dialogic instruction, like the teacher-as-conductor form of convergent-active discussions. This can help teachers understand that addressivity and purpose matter as they create their discussions but also that various forms of discussion are necessary in the classroom. Incorporating dialogic instruction has been difficult for teachers; this method can help describe what they are doing while not devaluing the kinds of discussion that are taking place.\u0000","PeriodicalId":45885,"journal":{"name":"English Teaching-Practice and Critique","volume":"22 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2019-11-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"90355854","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The language of teacher agency in an eighth grade ELA classroom","authors":"Adam J. Loretto","doi":"10.1108/etpc-12-2018-0122","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/etpc-12-2018-0122","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000Purpose\u0000This paper aims to apply ecological models of agency to understand factors influencing how an eighth grade English language arts (ELA) teacher enacted agency in four moments in the classroom. It focuses on how his language in relation to his instructional choices reflected messaging to his students regarding the learning he intended from his ELA instruction.\u0000\u0000\u0000Design/methodology/approach\u0000The paper applies an existing framework (Biesta et al., 2015, 2017), adding Bakhtin (1981) understandings of language, to classroom discourse supplemented by teacher interviews and other data sources. In looking across these data sources, the paper traces the influence of past factors (i.e. the teacher’s personal and professional history) and future orientations (i.e. goals established in standards and the teacher’s goals for his students) on present instructional decisions. The teacher’s language in the classroom becomes a primary focus for this study, as it reveals the ways in which he drew on specific resources in the messages in his instruction.\u0000\u0000\u0000Findings\u0000In each moment, the teacher’s language could be shown to have motivation in a variety of factors. While influenced by external factors such as the common core standards and standardized assessments, the teacher often enacted agency out of his personal beliefs about making learning personally meaningful for students as grounded in his personal and professional history. Exceptions to this pattern, especially regarding preparing students for writing tests on state assessments, less frequently relied on the language of finding meaning in the learning.\u0000\u0000\u0000Originality/value\u0000This paper builds on studies of ELA teacher agency through the development of methodology related to an ecological model of agency and Bakhtinian concepts of language focused on the discourse of the classroom. It contributes to understanding the factors at study in an ELA teacher’s instructional agency, which can help teachers and researchers further develop frameworks for describing and assessing the practice of agency in the profession.\u0000","PeriodicalId":45885,"journal":{"name":"English Teaching-Practice and Critique","volume":"20 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2019-11-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78520833","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}