Argues that the purpose of teaching students to read includes challenging children to take up books that contain "dangerous truths." Discusses two such books: "Forged by Fire" by Sharon Draper and "The Watsons Go to Birmingham--1963" by Christopher Paul Curtis. Includes children's statements regarding why they insist on being able to read good…

Presents a study that followed a group of 12 individuals over a three-year period as they first participated in a preservice teacher education program leading to K-8 teacher certification and a Masters in Teaching, and for the first two years of their teaching careers. Finds that teachers' funds of knowledge interact in complex ways to affect…

Reviews the rationale and research that supports the development of literacy in children's first language. Discusses challenges educators face in using literature to support literacy development for Spanish speakers; discusses resources for teaching using children's literature in Spanish; and offers guidelines for teachers and librarians in…

Describes how two teachers in a fourth-grade classroom adapted the idea of literature study to a format that nurtured first- and second-language learning for all their students. Shows how choice of reading materials and choice of language to discuss what was read provided opportunities for students to raise their levels of both fluency and…

Offers a brief historical perspective on Latino folk literature. Discusses 26 recently published books for children and adolescents in both English and Spanish, organized into origin tales, tales based on historical facts, trickster tales, and cumulative tales. Describes activities to use with these books to foster literacy and make powerful…

Looks at how "scientifically based" literacy research promoting the direct, explicit, and systematic use of phonics and related word skills in beginning reading instruction is having a massive effect on policy and practice. Examines what this research claims to have found and what it actually shows. Discusses how it harms research,…

Explores the different responses to a whole-language curriculum of two average third-grade students. Describes the teacher and the curriculum, and the contrasting literacy behaviors of the students. Discusses how this year-long observation challenged the author's beliefs about children's need for whole-language instruction. (SR)

Discusses three areas in which English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) students are assets to middle school teachers. They provide (1) teachers with the opportunity to become a student of the English language again; (2) teachers with unique information around which thematic units can be designed; and (3) other students with the confidence that their…

This ethnographic study examined school literacy experiences of 10 young students with Down syndrome over two years. Two broad definitions of literacy were identified. When reading was a hierarchy of psychologically deduced subskills, children with Down syndrome were usually excluded, but when literacy was the construction of shared meaning in…

An evaluation of Schoolwide Early Language and Literacy (SWELL) was undertaken in New South Wales, Australia, using a sample of 366 disadvantaged kindergarten students. Participants outperformed controls on pseudo-word decoding and reading connected text at the end of kindergarten, and on invented spelling and reading measures midway through first…

Presents description of classroom interaction that typically takes place in Japanese first-language arts classes in elementary schools throughout Japan. Using excerpts from data describing storytelling reading classes observed, shows that customary interaction was not necessarily text-based, had relatively weak teacher control, and revealed a…

Summarizes how current scholarship is redefining and extending literacy understanding, materials, and instruction to encompass more than reading/writing print texts. Demonstrates principles for applying these conceptions. Offers three lesson plans and an account of their recent use to show how educators may apply changing literacy ideas to their…

Explores literature on educational change and examines two literacy innovations gone "bad": process writing and literature-based reading. Argues that growth occurs from the interaction of "bad" things with good ideas (which are never perfect ideas), thereby reshaping, reforming, and strengthening them. Examines how this affects educational policy,…

Reports on a nationwide survey of instructional beliefs and practices of elementary public school teachers. Finds that teachers generally do not assume a polar, either/or approach to phonics and whole language, but instead provide children a balanced eclectic program involving both reading skill instruction and immersion in enriched literacy…

Argues that middle schools must help students maintain and increase their abilities in reading. Describes a range of approaches and opportunities to emphasize reading in middle schools, including teams of teachers, tools for teachers, media specialists, public libraries, business partnerships, summertime reading programs, and thematic units. (SR)