This case study is an examination of one pre-service teacher's experience in a reading methods course, entitled Reading Models and Methods, and corresponding urban reading practicum. Jennifer (a pseudonym) participated in a program aimed to address varying dilemmas that persist in the field, including: pre-service teachers' discomfort with diversity and urban contexts, the underuse of expository texts, and a literal comprehension focus influenced by didactic practices. The program is intended to prepare pre-service teachers for the urban teaching context and culturally relevant literacy teaching. By design, the field experience provides exposure to diverse learners in an urban context and to exemplary teachers of balanced literacy methodology, a paradigm encouraged in the university coursework. Pre-service teachers in the program are required to design two lesson plans during the course. The first is a narrative lesson, in which pre-service teachers devise strategies and prompting for students' deep meaning of events in a narrative text. Pre-service teachers additionally design an expository lesson, in which they use companion expository text materials and orchestrate factual linkages with fictional accounts outlined in the narrative text. The programmatic learning goals are intended to facilitate narrative and expository comprehension outlined in the state standards. This case study will explore the mentorship of a teacher educator and cooperating teacher that influenced Jennifer's enactment of innovative narrative and expository lessons. Her use of Cognitive Strategy Instruction (CSI) and varying participation discourses are examined, and consequently her willingness to improvise and facilitate discussion of difficult topics with her students. This study fills the gaps in the literature surrounding teacher educator and cooperating teacher mentoring roles to cultivate pre-service teachers toward culturally relevant pedagogy. (Contains 1 figure.)