Complicating "achievement" in adolescent literacy: Exploring patterns among and differences between higher and lower achieving adolescent readers

In a time when learning is defined in terms of achievement, and adolescent literacy is framed as “in crisis,” many scholars of adolescent literacy learning are expanding the discussion by exploring both what it means to achieve literacy In this paper, we present a study of literacy achievement and identity among adolescents from one Midwestern urban area using multiple data sources..

Toward a Multifaceted Heuristic of Digital Reading to Inform Assessment, Research, Practice, and Policy

In this commentary, the author explores the tension between almost 30 years of work that has embraced increasingly complex conceptions of digital reading and recent studies that risk oversimplifying digital reading as a singular entity analogous with reading text on a screen. The author begins by tracing a line of theoretical and empirical work that both informs and complicates our understanding of digital literacy and, more specifically, digital reading. Then, a heuristic is proposed to systematically organize, label, and define a multifaceted set of increasingly complex terms, concepts, and practices that characterize the spectrum of digital reading experiences. Research that informs this heuristic is used to illustrate how more precision in defining digital reading can promote greater clarity across research methods and advance a more systematic study of promising digital reading practices. Finally, the author discusses implications for assessment, research, practice, and policy

Second language reading acquisition

Literacy is a lifelong, context-bound set of practices that can vary with time, place, and an individual's needs. One can thus speak of multiple literacies and the importance of language policies that foster cultural diversity. Research has also shown the functional literacy practices via which individuals are socialized into various institutions to vary widely. Functional literacy involves not only the ability to read and write but also the ability to cope with everyday life literacy situations. Functional literacy thus encompasses both literacy conventions and cultural knowledge, which are interrelated. Literacy conventions refer to—among other things—the types of documents that are used in societal institutions such as forms, letters, legal texts, political tracts, religious texts, novels, and poems. The reading of a particular type of document often requires specialized knowledge of that type of document format. Different types of documents, moreover, may call upon different types of cultural background knowledge as well as different values and beliefs

Intersections of Literacy and Teaching With the Disciplines and Professions: We Asked Some Experts

© 2019 International Literacy Association A project to invite experts in various disciplines to converse with literacy professors and teachers with over 30 participants resulted in several insights about disciplinary literacy and student learning in the disciplines and professions. The authors suggest that such conversations or partnerships strengthen student learning for college, career, and civic life. The authors differentiate between professions and disciplines, highlighting how informed citizenship is an important outcome of teaching the literacies of the disciplines. The authors explore the purposes of communication within and between the disciplines. Insights and recommendations are presented