There is a large body of research regarding the affective and cathartic benefits of literature, both generalized and related to educational contexts. Anecdotal data carry special profundity and pertinence when considering issues of mortality. This article reviews current literature regarding the practices of reading and writing about death.…

Poet and essayist Gary Soto considers the senses while reading and the purpose of maintaining a reading life. According to the author, it's the pleasure of a story, and the intimacy of getting to know the characters well enough to exercise tenderness (or dislike) toward them. It's to weigh but not judge the behavior of characters, who are like…

The 2018 "English Journal" young adult honor list selections are an amazing mix of truth and fiction, fact and fantasy. The protagonists, five females and one male, all demonstrate what it means to follow your heart and speak your truth. Consideration of young adult books for inclusion in the 2018 Honor List begins in January and…

Overall, the author wanted to teach using culturally responsive approaches. The ELA teacher can fuel social justice teaching. In this article, the author discusses how their personal biases affected their classroom instruction and how they shifted their educational philosophy to consider the needs and interests of their students. In US education,…

In this article, the author describes three strategies they have used to bolster interest and make use of popular culture to enhance readers' interactions with texts: pop culture pairings, musical connections, and multimodal projects. The author addresses the cultivation of pop culture awareness, the importance of multimodal pedagogy, the…

The author pushes two desks together in the front of the class and pile supplies on them: markers, drawing paper, rulers, and pencils. As the students enter a combined English language arts (ELA) and English as a New Language (ENL) tenth-grade classroom, they select what they need and settle in to their work. As an ELA educator who is also a…

Learning occurs when students engage in discursive processes that include actively considering the comments and perspectives of others, allowing for interpretation and explanation of the topics being discussed (Gillies). Teachers should "resist the urge to turn close reading into an independent activity. The point of close reading is to…

This article explores how choral reading can be used as a drama tool in a classroom setting to engage students with nonfiction rhetoric while adhering to the Common Core State Standards.

Texts that challenge the narrative status quo -- from introducing new ways of authoring to showcasing historically overlooked experiences - have garnered increasing notoriety, specifically through literary prizing. Altogether, these books not only diversified the form of the awards' histories but also the characters, content, and authors. As…

AP Literature students participated in a series of real-time online discussions to complement the in-class conversations they were having about "The Autobiography of Malcolm X." Thus, the front channel was comprised of the students who were discussing the class text aloud, and the backchannel was the online conversation the rest of the…

Young adult literature (YAL) provides readers with a multivoiced palette that embraces cultures, genders, ages, sexualities, and experiences. Within this array are stories that feature characterswho deny elements of their identities or experiences that they find challenging or difficult. Multivoiced literature's treatment of these attempts takes…

Examining largely unknown revisions of the New Criticisms reading pedagogy, the author argues that these revisions should serve as a model of how the Common Core ELA Standards might be revised to reconnect readers to the process of reading.

This article presents ways to incorporate the works of artist Edward Hopper in the ELA secondary classroom. Students analyze Hopper's paintings as a text and create their own responses in the form of poetry, short story, photography, and other visual media.

By exploring the uses of plain, middle, and grand styles, the author examines how theories of classical rhetoricians can be applied to Atticus Finch's speeches in "To Kill a Mockingbird." In the high school English classrooms the author has encountered, "rhetoric" has not been a focus or even a passing discussion. It forms the…

Because we live in an increasingly globalized world, teachers are tasked with cultivating social and cultural competencies in their students to prepare them to act as responsible global citizens. This article explores how including diverse global literary narratives in the English language arts (ELA) classroom is an important step toward preparing…