A teacher study group explores issues of home and community literacies with a goal of utilizing out-of-school literacies to support in-school literacy learning. The result was the beginning of a new mindfulness that allowed them to begin to recognize the existence and legitimacy of home and community literacies. They explored how their own biases…

In recent years, scholars and other educators have encouraged language arts teachers to include LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) issues and texts in their classrooms. Despite these efforts, scholars have pointed out that LGBT perspectives are seldom included in language arts pedagogy. Studies of teacher attitudes toward addressing LGBT…

This article follows one teacher's quest for integrating technology in the classroom. It also investigates the shift of classroom pedagogy due to personal experiences. (Contains 4 figures.)

How did elementary language arts teachers of yore respond to policy issues in their own day? A review of the first two volumes of Language Arts, then called The Elementary English Review (1924-1925), suggests the journal served as a dynamic and productive space for language arts teachers and scholars to share their work and debate its merit. Much…

This article examines how five teachers, who participated in a national program, supported and sustained collaborative teacher inquiry as a means for addressing inequities in their classrooms and schools. Their efforts illustrate both the possibilities and challenges that emerge as teachers interact, analyze data together, and write about…

The controversial and complicated nature of the "N" word is examined in a multicultural classroom project. Utilizing both old and new literature, pop culture, historical lenses, and contemporary interpretations, the word proves extremely relevant in today's language arts classroom. By examining students' perceptions and experiences as well as the…

Writing assessment is a contested site where competing discourses overlap and invoke conflicting expectations, creating dilemmas for teachers who want to do what they believe is best for children and fulfill their school's writing targets. A critical look at assessment quandaries reveals surface dilemmas as clashes between overlapping discourses,…

Family and community members often look at children's writing from a deficit point of view--seeing only what's "wrong" with it, what needs "fixing." Teachers can take a proactive role as family and community member educators, communicating to them how writing develops in young children and how they can play a positive role in this development.…

Narrated by a "researcher"-teacher, drawing from an interactional ethnographic and sociolinguistics perspective, he re-examines his previous teaching practices as a teacher-researcher in order to build a conceptual model for communities-based learning. This article reveals the discursive ways that linguistically and culturally diverse second and…

Working from the assumption that policies are a form of social practice instead of simply a mandate that is uniformly delivered and passively received, the authors describe a theory and practice of policy research from a six-month collective qualitative study of curricular change and high-stakes testing that raise questions about the relationships…

The word "attitude" has different meanings. While some educators wish their students had less attitude, others are looking for ways to help students develop the kind of questioning, critical attitude that will allow them to interrogate and rethink what they already know or take for granted. This article describes a teacher education program that…

This paper identifies some of the resources the author has found and used to help future teachers become fully inclusive teachers, particularly of early elementary students. Through sharing these resources--children's literature, a children's literature textbook, edited books for teacher educators and pre- and inservice teachers, and a video--the…

This article investigates the attitudes and feelings of United States public school teachers about those they often see as "others"--people unlike themselves. What does research tell us might be the consequences of teachers' attitudes and feelings towards students and their families? What can we learn about diversifying the teacher pool from…

No Child Left Behind has become a permanent fixture in the world of education. This paper seeks to use the construct of figured worlds as described by Holland, Skinner, Lachicotte, & Cain, (1998) to examine the ways policy makers and teachers navigate the world of literacy education. Viewing policy makers and teachers as participants in discrete…

Teachers rely on their vision of literacy and literacy education to guide their teaching and influence the ways they view their students' literacy learning. This article describes what happens when a career teacher senses that her vision is limiting her teaching and her students' opportunities for learning. Kid watching and careful study of…