The theme for the 58th annual conference of the Association of Literacy Educators and Researchers (ALER) was Bridging Cultures Through Literacy. In the first section of the Yearbook, Parker Fawson's presidential address captures the unique nature of ALER and its role in his professional development, and then moved beyond to capture the changing…

This paper is the introduction to a workshop session demonstrating how English and language-arts teachers can teach critical thinking and writing simultaneously to students in grades 4 through 14. It describes how to transform specific skills into frames for critical thinking and writing such as: (1) explaining; (2) categorizing; (3) comparing and…