This article examines how a teacher drew on her urban students' outside-school literacies to inform teaching and learning in a reading/language arts classroom. The following findings are discussed: curricular invitations the teacher offered to students; the teacher's curriculum development process; the relationships between the genres of students'…

This research documents and analyzes the nature and content of the knowledge that enables professors to foster learning for Black students. Specifically, it suggests that knowledge of the discourses of a students' community of origin, discourses often based on collective experience, are a valuable resource to professors in their efforts to promote…

Classroom management continues to be a serious concern for teachers and especially in urban and diverse learning environments. The authors present the culturally responsive classroom management practices of two teachers from an urban and diverse middle school to extend the construct, culturally responsive classroom management. The principles that…

A wide range of research has examined trust building within corporations, businesses, and schools, and between and within organizations, but little research has been conducted that examines trust formation between university researchers and classroom-based teachers. Using a qualitative methodological approach, the authors examined the development…

According to the research literature, there are three reasons that draw teachers into teaching: (1) gender-related reasons, (2) altruistic reasons, and (3) monetary rewards and job flexibility. Based on data from three teacher preparation programs, this article argues that teachers who were trained at elite colleges and who chose teaching in urban…

Educational attainment is often linked to upward mobility in the United States. As a result, current research has focused on the educational attainment of various racial groups, including Black Americans. However, few studies have examined the various ethnic and immigrant groups that comprise the Black population. To address this gap, the current…

This study focuses on student discipline as related to the perceptions, work, and backgrounds of effective Black and White teachers. The article expands current knowledge by reporting findings from a case study of 4 teachers (2 African Americans and 2 Whites) employed in an urban, predominately African American middle school. Interviews, field…

This is a case study of an elementary teacher's decision to add multicultural children's books to her curriculum and an analysis of how her ideologies about race shaped the classroom discourse. Although the teacher's stated purpose was to teach the pitfalls of racial stereotypes by encouraging conversations about prejudice, often the classroom…

Research suggests that community-referenced pedagogy initiatives foster academic inclusion for minority students. However, we know little about such engagements' benefits for teachers. This study provides insights into teachers' dispositions toward school-based parent involvement in education based on ethnographic data collected through…

Spike Lee's documentary, "When the Levees Broke," provides an informative, enduring, and alternative presentation surrounding the human and man-made debacle associated with Hurricane Katrina. Levees centers the voices of survivors and others involved in the weeks during and after the hurricane, historicizes residents' understandings and reactions,…

This study employed interviews with 10 bilingual Latino preservice teachers to explore their experiences with schooling and their observations while student teaching in suburban and urban schools. Findings reveal that participants' life experiences and unique responses to cultural conflicts influenced their ability to relate to Latino students and…

This article reports on a multiple case study that explored teachers' and families' collaboration in two urban and four rural state elementary schools in Cyprus. The analysis of the data shows that teachers' approaches to their collaboration with families may be traced not only to differences among teachers but also to the ideological approach of…

Teachers are natural problem solvers, and they should be using this quality to their advantage when it comes to solving the systemic issues that plague Philadelphia's education system. Many of the articles in this issue have already gone into great detail about what is happening in Philadelphia. Torch Lytle has provided a summary of the…

In this article, the author shares her personal reflections on praxis and social justice through her work in a teacher education program in Los Angeles. She also shares her thoughts of why she became a teacher, why she became an education professor, and of those who inspired her to work in education. She describes the joy in educational work and…

The purpose of this study was to explore the response patterns of African American students to the state certification questions. More specifically, the participants' explanations of their responses and their perceptions of the source of knowledge they used to answer the questions were discussed. To achieve this purpose, three research questions…