Discusses the importance of keeping adolescents' interests and needs foremost in mind when designing literacy instruction at the middle and high school level. Argues that effective adolescent literacy instruction must address issues of self-efficacy and student engagement with a variety of texts in diverse settings. Contends it must also attend to…

Describes a study in which collaborative writing among 40 mothers and their second grade children was observed, and maternal beliefs on spelling were extracted from interviews. Finds low socioeconomic status children had more spelling errors and discussed spelling with their mothers more frequently than high socioeconomic status children. Finds…

Presents an interpretive text which functions as a report of the author's personal engagements with literary fiction and with philosophical, theoretical, and historical writings. Provides a theoretical and historical overview of literary anthropology as a research method. Concludes with a discussion of what literacy anthropological methods might…

Describes the features of the first grade texts included in basal readers used for beginning reading instruction in Texas in 2000. Investigates the general features of student texts with respect to the instructional design of the text, the accessibility of the text for beginning readers, and the engaging qualities of the text. Suggests that policy…

Notes that many phonological terms are found in contemporary literature on reading, and some inconsistencies are apparent in how they are used and understood. Presents definitions of many of these important words and several dozen related terms (for a total of 51 terms). Emphasizes the historical and conceptual links between similar terms, because…

Reflects on how the social practice model of literacy, which defines reading and writing as situated, social practices, under-theorizes certain aspects of literacy. Proposes a set of analytical constructs that treat literacy not solely as an outcome or accomplishment of local practices, but also as a participant in them. (PM)

Outlines how nine content-area textbooks dealt with reading and writing instruction. Explains that the texts were read to be coded and to identify categories of literacy messages. Notes that content-area textbooks contain negative discussions about traditional teaching methods, and that the authors seem to care about content-area literacy but do…

Examines the performance and construction of subjectivities of four early adolescent, sixth-grade girls as they read and discussed a novel about two adolescent Mexican children seeking a new life in America. Suggests they engaged in ongoing construction of their subjectivities as they interacted with the text and each other. Notes the girls…

Finds in year 1, children showed effects of neighborhood size in high frequency words read in stories and in low frequency words read in lists and stories; in year 2, rimes from large neighborhoods were read more accurately than rimes from other neighborhoods; and by year 3, effects on low-frequency words continued, but not for high-frequency…

Describes two at-risk readers' perceptions of in-school and out-of-school reading-related activities; their conceptions of reading, learning to read, and themselves as readers; and their responses to their teachers' learner-centered, meaning-based reading instruction. Illustrates the instructional significance of children's conceptions about…

Notes the high-school students in the experimental group were given approximately 18 sessions of individual tutoring in which they practiced associations between letter patterns and pronunciations for pronounceable parts of words. Finds these students showed greater improvements on all measures than did students in a control condition when the…

Uses "dialogic responsiveness" to provide a holistic framework for synthesizing, researching, and describing the complexities of responsive dialogue in literacy classroom contexts. Reveals how teachers were able to be responsive to the cultural, cognitive, emotional, motivational, and physical needs of young literacy learners. Discusses…

Tests validity of the Literary Response Questionnaire (LRQ) and assesses its relationships with Dutch junior-high-school student, home-background, and school-related variables. Confirms the seven first-order factors of the LRQ identified in a previous study. Finds grade, gender, type of education, vocabulary size, reading behavior, and cultural…

Follows four female language-minority students through their last semester in high school and first semester in college. Focuses on these students' perceptions of reading and writing they encountered across the curriculum. Finds that what they found more challenging in college was not necessarily predicted from a developmental perspective but…

Focuses on the experience of a Black woman who returned to school for her General Education Diploma (GED) certificate. Sees the way she changes her social network of friends and herself over time. Reveals the themes of improved literacy skills, heightened confidence, community activism, and youth leadership, as she circulates in her community and…