Employing culturally responsive pedagogy to foster literacy learning in schools

 In recent years it has become increasingly obvious that, to enable students in schools from an increasingly diverse range of cultural backgrounds to acquire literacy to a standard that will support them to achieve academically, it is important to adopt pedagogy that is responsive to, and respectful of, them as culturally situated. What largely has been omitted from the literature, however, is discussion of a relevant model of learning to underpin this approach. For this reason this paper adopts a socio-cultural lens (Vygotsky, 1978) through which to view such pedagogy and refers to a number of seminal texts to justify of its relevance. Use of this lens is seen as having a particular rationale. It forces a focus on the agency of the teacher as a mediator of learning who needs to acknowledge the learner’s cultural situatedness (Kozulin, 2003) if school literacy learning for all students is to be as successful as it might be. It also focuses attention on the predominant value systems and social practices that characterize the school settings in which students’ literacy learning is acquired. The paper discusses implications for policy and practice at whole-school, classroom and individual student levels of culturally-responsive pedagogy that is based on a socio-cultural model of learning. In doing so it draws on illustrations from the work of a number of researchers, including that of the author

The Depth and Dynamics of Context: Tracing the Sources and Channels of Engagement and Disengagement in Students' Response to Literature

In this article, we analyze one coauthor's 12th-grade English class, focusing on a small group of students who interpreted the character of Gertrude in Hamlet through a body biography, a life-sized human outline that students filled with words and images that represented their understanding of the character. We analyze the body biography production as a function of the social context of activity and then analyze the processes of composition involved in their production. Analysis of the data reveals that (a) the students exhibited different degrees of commitment to and involvement in the group task, (b) the degree of equity in productivity and social relations varied within the group in accordance with these different degrees of engagement, and (c) the inequity in social relations and contributions to the group product belied the degree to which the final interpretive product met the teacher's assessment criteria. We conclude with a reconsideration of the notion of engagement that includes attention to both the immediate social relations within the classroom and the histories of engagement that students bring to class.Yeshttps://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/manuscript-submission-guideline

Early respiratory viral infections in infants with cystic fibrosis

This article is made available for unrestricted research re-use and secondary analysis in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for the duration of the World Health Organization (WHO) declaration of COVID-19 as a global pandemic.Background Viral infections contribute to morbidity in cystic fibrosis (CF), but the impact of respiratory viruses on the development of airway disease is poorly understood. Methods Infants with CF identified by newborn screening were enrolled prior to 4 months of age to participate in a prospective observational study at 4 centers. Clinical data were collected at clinic visits and weekly phone calls. Multiplex PCR assays were performed on nasopharyngeal swabs to detect respiratory viruses during routine visits and when symptomatic. Participants underwent bronchoscopy with bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) and a subset underwent pulmonary function testing. We present findings through 8.5 months of life. Results Seventy infants were enrolled, mean age 3.1 ± 0.8 months. Rhinovirus was the most prevalent virus (66%), followed by parainfluenza (19%), and coronavirus (16%). Participants had a median of 1.5 viral positive swabs (range 0–10). Past viral infection was associated with elevated neutrophil concentrations and bacterial isolates in BAL fluid, including recovery of classic CF bacterial pathogens. When antibiotics were prescribed for respiratory-related indications, viruses were identified in 52% of those instances. Conclusions Early viral infections were associated with greater neutrophilic inflammation and bacterial pathogens. Early viral infections appear to contribute to initiation of lower airway inflammation in infants with CF. Antibiotics were commonly prescribed in the setting of a viral infection. Future investigations examining longitudinal relationships between viral infections, airway microbiome, and antibiotic use will allow us to elucidate the interplay between these factors in young children with CF

Never the twain shall meet: a critical appraisal of the combination of discourse and psychoanalytic theory in studies of men and masculinity

In recent years there has been a number of attempts by different researchers to study men and masculinity using a combination of discourse theory and psychoanalysis. The main reason for this development is the sense that, on its own, discourse theory provides an incomplete account of masculine subjectivity. Psychoanalysis is thought to be able to fill those gaps. In this paper I want to begin by reviewing these arguments. I will provide an outline of the alleged deficiencies in discursive approaches to men and masculinity before going on to examine some of the work that has attempted the above synthesis. What I aim to show is that, for a number of reasons, such attempts are bound to fail. Instead, I will argue that better progress can be made in studies of masculinity by remaining within the theoretical boundaries of Discursive Psychology

A “Learning Revolution”? Investigating Pedagogic Practices around Interactive Whiteboards in British Primary Classrooms

Interactive whiteboards have been rapidly introduced into all primary schools under UK Government initiatives. These large, touch-sensitive screens, which control a computer connected to a digital projector, seem to be the first type of educational technology particularly suited for whole-class teaching and learning. Strong claims are made for their value by manufacturers and policy makers, but there has been little research on how, if at all, they influence established pedagogic practices, communicative processes and educational goals. This study has been designed to examine this issue, using observations in primary (elementary) school classrooms. It is funded by the UK Economic and Social Research Council and builds on the authors’ previous research on ICT in educational dialogues and collaborative activities

Identity and integration of Russian speakers in the Baltic states: a framework for analysis

Following a review of current scholarship on identity and integration patterns of Russian speakers in the Baltic states, this article proposes an analytical framework to help understand current trends. Rogers Brubaker's widely employed triadic nexus is expanded to demonstrate why a form of Russian-speaking identity has been emerging, but has failed to become fully consolidated, and why significant integration has occurred structurally but not identificationally. By enumerating the subfields of political, economic, and cultural ‘stances’ and ‘representations’ the model helps to understand the complicated integration processes of minority groups that possess complex relationships with ‘external homelands’, ‘nationalizing states’ and ‘international organizations’. Ultimately, it is argued that socio-economic factors largely reduce the capacity for a consolidated identity; political factors have a moderate tendency to reduce this capacity, whereas cultural factors generally increase the potential for a consolidated group identity

Children, play and computers in pre-school education

The paper reports a study designed to inform the development of an information and communication technology strategy for the pre-school years of education. The main methods of collecting evidence were observations at seven pre-school settings and interviews with at least two practitioners and a number of children at each site. Practitioners generally referred to children “playing with the computer”. We describe some of the problems to be found in the emphasis on free play in nurseries and play groups when this means children are using computers as complete novices. There were few examples of peer support; adults rarely intervened or offered guidance and the most common form of intervention was reactive supervision. Interaction with a computer was therefore a limited experience for most children, but we provide examples of guided interaction that suggest a way forward for professional development

The Reader, the text, the Context: An Exploration of a Choreographed Response to Literature

Much current theory about response to literature stresses the reader's active role in constructing meaning, with reader, text, and context affecting the responses of individual readers (Beach, 1993). Response to literature, like most classroom interaction, tends to take a linguistic form. In a supportive classroom environment, however, a range of response media can potentially mediate students' transactions with literature. The present exploratory study used stimulated recall to elicit a retrospective account from two alternative school students who choreographed a dance to depict their understanding of the relationship between the two central characters in a short story. In their account they indicate that in composing their text they (a) initiated their interpretation by empathizing with the characters, (b) represented the characters' relationship through spatial images and configurations, and (c) used the psychological tool of dance to both represent and develop their thinking about the story. Their thought and activity were further mediated by the social context of learning, including the communication genres of the classroom, their own interaction, their teacher's intervention, and the stimulated recall interview itself. Their account illustrates the way in which reader, text, and context participate in a complex transaction when readers construct meaning for literature. Their experience also illustrates the ways in which the values of an instructional setting influence the extent to which learners may take advantage of the psychological tools available to them for growth.Yeshttps://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/manuscript-submission-guideline

Analyzing learning during Peer Instruction dialogues:A resource activation framework

Peer Instruction (PI) is an evidence based pedagogy commonly used in undergraduate physics instruction. When asked questions designed to test conceptual understanding, it has been observed that the proportion of students choosing the correct answer increases following peer discussion; however, relatively little is known about what takes place during these discussions or how they are beneficial to the processes of learning physics [M. C. James and S. Willoughby, Am. J. Phys. 79, 123 (2011)]. In this paper a framework for analyzing PI discussions developed through the lens of the “resources model” [D. Hammer, Am. J. Phys. 64, 1316 (1996); D. Hammer et al., Information Age Publishing (2005)] is proposed. A central hypothesis for this framework is that the dialogue with peers plays a crucial role in activating appropriate cognitive resources, enabling the students to see the problem differently, and therefore to answer the questions correctly. This framework is used to gain greater insights into the PI discussions of first year undergraduate physics students at the University of Edinburgh, UK, which were recorded using Livescribe Smartpens. Analysis of the dialogues revealed three different types of resource activation corresponding to increasing cognitive grain size. These were activation of knowledge elements, activation of linkages between knowledge elements, and activation of control structures (epistemic games and epistemological frames). Three case studies are examined to illustrate the role that peer dialogue plays in the activation of these cognitive resources in a PI session. The implications for pedagogical practice are discussed