Communities have their own set of cultural values that make their way into their classrooms and serve as criteria for the labeling of "insider" or "outsider." This article describes how critical empathy can allow the barriers between these constructs to be broken down as students are given the chance not only to listen but to…

The quality of Arabic language teaching and learning can be improved through the implementation of engaging programs and innovative approaches. In an effort to revitalize a stodgy curriculum, a number of schools have piloted a literature-integrated approach to the teaching of Arabic language and have anecdotally reported successes in student…

Our study documents how a Spanish-English bilingual elementary teacher learned computational thinking while working to incorporate it into mathematics and language arts lessons in a bilingual classroom. We classified the elements of the teacher's process into two practices: intentional and unintentional use of computational thinking. Intentional…

Student-centered classrooms, where the focus is on the way students learn concepts and skills rather than the way a teacher delivers the lessons, is a popular theme in current classrooms at all levels. A clear distinction must be made between student-centered teaching as a philosophy and student-centered teaching as a specific set of instructional…

This paper presents research that examined teacher talk about moderation of English, mathematics and science assessment across Years 4, 6 and 8 as part of a broader inquiry into the use of scaled exemplars to support consistency of teacher judgement. The paper draws on Dorothy E Smith's sociological work, including the process of mapping textual…

Knowledge development, application, and refinement are essential parts of students' reading. One way to observe how students use their knowledge as they read is through talk. Studies routinely indicate that though reading is a social endeavor, teachers spend most of the allotted instructional time talking or using discourse patterns that do not…

Augmented reality (AR) technology has opened up new possibilities for interactive and immersive learning experiences, where students can visualize abstract concepts and engage with digital objects in real-time. In this study, a real-time AR-based system is developed and, unlike other studies, incorporates sound effects that will play when the…

This brief is one in a series aimed at providing K-12 education decision makers and advocates with an evidence base to ground discussions about how to best serve students during and following the novel coronavirus pandemic. It addresses one central question: How can system leaders improve reading comprehension for students in kindergarten to grade…

Dialogic educators have designed strategies to facilitate dialogic teaching, such as establishing ground rules, employing talk moves, and structuring discussions. Though productive, such strategies rarely open dialogic space, in which shared meaning is created through an interaction that blurs the boundaries between participating voices. Dialogic…

This systematic literature review presents a review of the effects of integrated language arts, science and technology (ILS&T) instruction, with an inquiry- or design-based pedagogy, in elementary schools on student achievement. To this end, an overview of the characteristics of the 19 included studies and their interventions is first…

The purpose of this qualitative descriptive study was to explore how teachers who teach 6th, 7th, or 8th grade English language arts in a virtual charter school environment describe the gamification process to support student engagement in the classroom. The overarching research question was: How do teachers who teach 6th, 7th, or 8th grade…

The purpose of this study was to investigate teachers' perceptions of using instructional technology in the English language arts classroom. The study focused on kindergarten to eighth- grade general education settings. Teachers' perceptions of innovation, or new practice, impact the implementation of that practice. The study's goal is to better…

The purpose of this quantitative methods study was to determine a relationship between instructional reading strategies and standardized test performance for third-grade students in Phoenix, Arizona, and counties in Arizona school districts. The passage of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) and the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) of 2015…

The author's eighth-grade ELA curriculum is rich with opportunities for students to bear witness to a variety of experiences. Besides the Holocaust unit, they read "Ghost Boys" by Jewell Parker Rhodes (2018) while exploring police brutality and segregation; "The Giver" by Lois Lowry (1993) while investigating government…

Becoming critical thinkers and collaborative learners is important for today's students as they develop the skills needed for success in the 21st century (National Research Council, 2012; Partnership for 21st Century Learning, 2019). One instructional strategy used to develop critical-thinking skills through collaboration is Socratic seminar. A…