The authors consider how preservice teachers and teacher educators might broaden their operating notions of experience and practicality to help one another access a wider range of sources of knowledge for their teaching.

Discussions of urban fiction and multicultural literature hold great potential for transforming the practice of beginning English teachers in diverse school settings. In this article, the authors, both teacher educators of color, present two case studies of preparing middle- and secondary-level English educators from a diversities perspective.…

In this article, we argue that preservice teachers have limited experience reading and writing poetry, and that if they are to teach poetry in meaningful ways to their future students, they need to have compelling experiences with poetry in teacher education--ones that take into account their former experiences and incoming dispositions and that…

This critical ethnographic study explores how two teacher candidates in English education used specific and varied literacy practices to enact their social justice priorities at a troubled high school in a high-need district. Data include interviews before and after the student teaching experience; observations of teaching, blogs, journals, and…

This article presents the author's keynote address from the 2011 CEE Summer Conference at Fordham University in which he challenges educators to rethink what they do and how they do it. He talks about English teacher education as literacy teacher education. He tries to sketch a picture of the status quo and its limits, and an alternative picture…

This article explores how secondary English preservice teachers reason about their future students and the consequences these systems of reasoning have for their thinking about pedagogy and their roles as teachers. By examining these systems of reasoning, this article helps to denaturalize normalized discourses about adolescence--discourses that…

This article reports a study of a university supervisor and a preservice English language arts teacher as they worked collaboratively within two different field experience sites to develop a conceptual understanding of instructional scaffolding. An analysis of classroom observations and mentoring conversations was conducted to examine how the…

This article argues that ELA teacher candidates and inservice ELA teachers need historical perspectives in their coursework and their practice. Using the life and career of Lou LaBrant, the author examines the value of placing current practice in the context of practice throughout the history of the field of teaching ELA. Patterns examined in…

The 19 individuals who gathered at Elmhurst College in the summer of 2009 to work on moving social justice theory into policy in English education had a singular goal--to codify a working framework for social justice in English education that could disrupt inequitable educational practices and empower all students to reach their potential…

Delane Bender-Slack takes on the important subject of teaching for social justice. Her article's strength is in its uncompromising look at complex, often misinterpreted teaching challenges. This article focuses on actual teachers working for social justice in their classrooms. Working from a strong theoretical framework, she pushes us in new…

This study examined the complexities of mentoring discourse and agentive teacher preparation. I argue that such an examination is necessary to better prepare student teachers to engage agentively with the powerful status quo in schools. I begin by discussing the intersections of current thinking about mentoring and dialogue, and I describe how…

This article explores one element of collaborative practice: the integration of English language learner-focused instruction and discussion in a secondary English methods course. Drawing on the authors' expertise, they examine revisions made to a secondary English methods course to better address the academic and individual needs of diverse…

This article considers the benefits and challenges of using English teacher candidates' videotaped discussions of literature as tools to facilitate authentic and engaging discussions of literature. More specifically, this article examines the use of teacher candidates' videotaped discussions in a secondary English methods course to expand…

Teacher candidates can benefit from teacher preparation programs that couple learned classroom experiences with the use of hypermedia, yet challenges can arise when such technologies are integrated into university classrooms. Hypermedia in the context of teacher candidate learning can aid educators in meeting the needs of this population. This…

This article describes the results of an inquiry/multigenre project undertaken by students in a literacy foundations course. The project's initial pedagogical goal was to provide pre- and in-service teachers with multiple and engaging opportunities to read and write in areas of their interests. That goal expanded to encompass the critical literacy…