What does it mean to be a reader? Identity and positioning in two high school literacy intervention classes

Studies of high school literacy intervention classes have measured reading gains through standardized assessments, but few have considered the impact on students’ identities. In this embedded case study, I used theories of identity and positioning to answer two research questions: How did institutional and interpersonal acts of positioning in two literacy intervention classrooms build on, change, or challenge students’ personal histories and identities as readers? How did these acts shape students’ understandings of themselves as readers over time? I collected and analyzed interviews, field notes, and artifacts. Analyses revealed that ongoing positioning in one classroom thickened one student’s identity as a poor reader. Positioning in the second classroom reinforced the other student’s identity as a good student but had little impact on her identity as a reader. These findings highlight the need to better understand how instructional contexts privilege particular ways of reading and understandings of what it means to be a reader.Accepted manuscrip

The intersection of reading and identity in high school literacy intervention classes

Please note that there is an open-access version of this article available through the National Council of Teachers of English website: http://www.ncte.org/library/NCTEFiles/Resources/Journals/RTE/0511-aug2016/RTE0511Intersectionpword.pdfIt is common practice to enroll adolescents in classes designed to improve their reading. Previous studies of literacy intervention classes focus on students’ acquisition of reading skills and strategies, but few studies consider how reading identities may contribute to literacy learning. To address this gap, I used theories of positioning and identity to answer the question: How do students’ understandings of literacy and their own reading identities interact with the figured worlds of their literacy intervention classrooms? I analyzed interviews, field notes, and artifacts for two students and teachers in different classrooms, focusing on students’ acts of agency. Analyses revealed that the students’ identities as good readers conflicted with the figured worlds of their classrooms, but they responded differently. One challenged the norms of his classroom in a manner contrary to his teacher’s expectations and was unable to disrupt his positioning as struggling reader. The other acquiesced to the norms of her classroom in ways her teacher recognized as characteristic of a capable reader, ultimately upsetting her struggling reader subject position. The findings reveal that students’ acts of agency and teachers’ interpretations of those acts are informed by students’ perceptions of themselves as readers and teachers’ understandings of literacy and learning in intervention classrooms. The findings also problematize the practice of placing students in classes that position them as deficient. Additional research that attends to sociocultural factors in classrooms is necessary to understand the academic, social, and personal implications of particular approaches to literacy instruction and intervention for individual students.Accepted manuscrip

Oral reading: practices and purposes in secondary classrooms

PURPOSE This paper aims to investigate teacher-initiated whole-group oral reading practices in two ninth-grade reading intervention classrooms and how teachers understood the purposes of those practices. DESIGN/METHODOLOGY/APPROACH In this qualitative cross-case analysis, a literacy-as-social-practice perspective is used to collaboratively analyze ethnographic data (fieldnotes, audio recordings, interviews, artifacts) across two classrooms. FINDINGS Oral reading was a routine instructional reading event in both classrooms. However, the literacy practices that characterized oral reading and teachers’ purposes for using oral reading varied depending on teachers’ pedagogical philosophies, instructional goals and contextual constraints. During oral reading, students’ opportunities to engage in independent meaning making with texts were either absent or secondary to other purposes or goals. PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS Findings emphasize the significance of understanding both how and why oral reading happens in secondary classrooms. Specifically, they point to the importance of collaborating with teachers to (a) examine their own ideas about the power of oral reading and the institutional factors that shape their existing oral reading practices; (b) investigate the intended and actual outcomes of oral reading for their students and (c) develop other instructional approaches to support students to individually and collaboratively make meaning from texts. ORIGINALITY/VALUE This study falls at the intersection of three under-researched areas of study: the nature of everyday instruction in secondary literacy intervention settings, the persistence of oral reading in secondary school and teachers’ purposes for using oral reading in their instruction. Consequently, it contributes new knowledge that can support educators in creating more equitable instructional environments.Accepted manuscrip

Why the "Struggling Reader" label Is harmful (and what educators can do about it)

The authors featured in this department column share instructional practices that support transformative literacy teaching and disrupt “struggling reader” and “struggling writer” labels.Accepted manuscrip

Collaborating with youths as coteachers in literacy learning

The authors featured in this department column share instructional practices that support transformative literacy teaching and disrupt “struggling reader” and “struggling writer” labels.This work was supported by a Boston University Consortium grant and a Boston University School of Education Faculty Research Award. (Boston University Consortium; Boston University School of Education Faculty Research Award)Accepted manuscrip

Positioning adolescents in literacy teaching and learning

Secondary literacy instruction often happens to adolescents rather than with them. To disrupt this trend, we collaborated with 12th-grade “literacy mentors” to reimagine literacy teaching and learning with 10th-grade mentees in a public high school classroom. We used positioning theory as an analytic tool to (a) understand how mentors positioned themselves and how we positioned them and (b) examine the literacy practices that enabled and constrained the mentor position. We found that our positioning of mentors as collaborators was taken up in different and sometimes unexpected ways as a result of the multiple positions available to them and institutional-level factors that shaped what literacy practices were and were not negotiable. We argue that future collaborations with youth must account for the rights and duties of all members of a classroom community, including how those rights and duties intersect, merge, or come into conflict within and across practices.The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was supported by a Faculty Research Award from the School of Education at Boston University. (Faculty Research Award from the School of Education at Boston University)Accepted manuscrip

Struggling readers? Using theory to complicate understandings of what it means to be literate in school

Theories guide many aspects of literacy research. In this article we describe four theoretical approaches that we have used in qualitative research with students who are perceived to struggle with reading in school, including: New Literacy Studies, Disability Studies in Education, Bioecological Systems Theory, and Cultural Historical Activity Theory. We provide a brief overview of each of the theories and then explain how we have used them to gain insights about students with whom we have worked in the context of our research. Although grounded in distinct perspectives, we argue that each of the theories are lenses through which we were better able to understand the complexities of students’ struggles with reading. We further argue that the theories are united in their ability to broaden the perspectives of researchers and teachers to better account for the social, cultural, and institutional factors that shape literacy teaching and learning in schools. We conclude by questioning the use of the term “struggling reader” and highlighting the implications of our individual theoretical frames and analyses for both research and practice.Accepted manuscrip

Appendices — A meta-synthesis of qualitative research on reading intervention classes in secondary schools

Appendices for the article “A Meta-Synthesis of Qualitative Research on Reading Intervention Classes in Secondary Schools”. Note: Appendix B is an Appraisal Tool adapted and included here with author permission from: "Berry, R., & Thunder, K. (2012). The promise of qualitative metasynthesis: Mathematics experiences of Black learners. Journal of Mathematics Education at Teachers College, 3, 43-55.

Predicting participation in group parenting education in an Australian sample: The role of attitudes, norms, and control factors

We examined the theory of planned behavior (TPB) in predicting intentions to participate in group parenting education. One hundred and seventy-six parents (138 mothers and 38 fathers) with a child under 12 years completed TPB items assessing attitude, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control (PBC), and two additional social influence variables (self-identity and group norm). Regression analyses supported the TPB predictors of participation intentions with self-identity and group norm also significantly predicting intentions. These findings offer preliminary support for the TPB, along with additional sources of social influence, as a useful predictive model of participation in parenting education

Psychology and aggression

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/68264/2/10.1177_002200275900300301.pd