The purpose of this action research project report was to increase engagement during independent reading for 32 fourth-grade students and 26 seventh-grade science students. At Site A, data was collected from August 27, 2012 through December 14, 2012. At Site B, data was collected from September 24, 2012 through December 14, 2012. Students'…

In 2006, a secondary English and feminist studies teacher created a course and designed a study around a reading exchange for eighth-grade girls from two vastly different communities. Girls from a school in a northeastern state read young adult novels and wrote about their reading and related topics with girls from Washington, DC on a wikispace…

A secondary English teacher tells how he and his students confronted the question, How do we reclaim the joy of reading? After admitting that they didn't read very much for his assignments, the students were invited to help figure out where the joy of reading goes as students grow older. As the teacher and students discussed their experiences as…

We are made up of stories: the stories we hear, the stories we tell. Intertextual connections form through repeatedly hearing stories, many of which stem back to childhood. This paper foregrounds a teachers-as-readers literature circle in which a group of Indigenous teachers in Canada discussed, among other titles, Rafe Martin's "The Rough…

Matching learners with the right level of graded readers is necessary when graded readers are exploited as both simplified reading materials in extensive reading programs and major instruments in the experiments. A lack of controlling ability level can prevent learners from succeeding in developing reading in an extensive reading program. It would…

Increasing numbers of English-language learners and the challenge of supporting their learning in social studies and science brought together a group of urban literacy coaches and university faculty. This article describes the development and refinement of a partner reading routine, Partner Reading and Content, Too (PRC2). Partners with similar…

In the last twenty years, the teaching of reading in Britain has moved away from an interest in how children take delight in, and make meaning of, their literature to a preoccupation with a mechanistic approach to literacy which breaks down texts into bite-sized chunks and fragments reading into a series of isolated skills. Although an expensive,…

In this qualitative study, the author explores how young readers build literary understanding through performative responses in picturebook read-alouds. Performative responses allow children to create and express meaning in ways that go beyond talk and that engage their creativity and imagination. They include a variety of modalities, such as…

The objective of this paper is to use psychoanalytic theory to examine how attempts at critical teaching in two English as a Second Language (ESL) classrooms related to changes in student subjectivity. The research critiques critical pedagogical assumptions regarding transformation and empowerment through a Lacanian perspective. More specifically,…

Instructors in academic settings may be naturally inclined to view their students from the outside, their style of communication, their level of competence and engagement, or their punctuality with attendance and assignments. Consequently, they risk missing the rewards afforded by the view from the inside. Autobiography can be an important means…

Storyboards deliver a narrative through discrete visual representations. The purpose of the storyboards was always to "scaffold" the final product and students were free to add, delete, or adapt those images that were most helpful to their project. The storyboards served as a brainstorming activity, much like a prewriting exercise for a written…

With the development of the WWW and Internet, hyperreading has become an issue for discussion in the educational field and more specifically in the field of English as a second or foreign language. Yet, very little is known about its nature concerning the reading process. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to examine whether…

Secondary-level students from culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) backgrounds who struggle with reading need strategies for aligning new information with their previous knowledge as well as for obtaining and retaining essential information from the text. Important components of all secondary literacy support must include instruction in…

The impact of hypertext presentation formats on learner control and cognitive load was examined in this study using Campbell and Stanley's (1963) Posttest Only Control Group design. One hundred eighty-six undergraduate students were randomly assigned to read a web-based text with no annotations, online glossary annotations, embedded annotations,…

As a teacher with more than 30 years experience at the middle school, secondary, and college level, primarily in English studies, Patterson (the first author) decided a few years ago to reexamine his practices and instructional methods. He wondered what would be the effects on him and his students when he would begin to utilize ideas emanating…