Mental health challenges are on the rise among today's youth. Recent reports have noted an acute and significant need for school-based mental health education and supportive interventions for children and adolescents. Among these approaches, a growing focus has centered on improving students' mental health literacy (MHL) as a foundational…

Drawing on the experiences of teaching Beloved in an elite, college preparatory context, the following research paper works towards alternative approaches to teaching trauma and difficult histories. After exploring some of the limitations and applications of the education as séance approach, this paper constructs a framework for teaching difficult…

In this discussion, we argue for those who are literacy educators to reframe gossip as a dialogic, feminist act in their teaching and interpretation of gossip as framed in the literature they teach in secondary English language arts (ELA) classrooms. Reframing gossip as a feminist act invites meaning-makers to view those conversations and…

In this paper, I explore the transitional spaces of teaching and writing by restorying an anomalous event in my teaching of Canadian literature in a grade seven classroom and my efforts to decolonise that teaching. Thinking with Elizabeth Ellsworth's concept of pedagogy as it relates to knowledge in the making and the learning self, I take…

A high school teacher advocates for the use of the CARE method in the selection and teaching of fiction about disability in the English language arts classroom, considering the centrality, agency, and respect afforded disabled characters, as well as the expertise of the author.

This study focuses on languaging about nationality in an LGBTQ+-themed literature classroom in a queer-friendly high school in the midwestern region of the United States. It was a blend of ethnography and teacher research in which I constructed and analyzed data that included daily field notes, audio and video recordings of class meetings, audio…

English education stakeholders need ways of envisioning and advocating for transformative approaches to literacy teaching. In this inquiry, we consider the dynamic field of literary studies -- one of the scholarly fields most directly linked to English education. We conducted a content analysis of 404 articles recently published in literary…

Purpose: Research on disciplinary literacy in English has struggled with how to represent large-scale disciplinary communities and consider issues of justice and power. The purpose of this study is to offer insights into the disciplinary practice of a community of literary scholars. Design/methodology/approach: Using statistical topic modeling…

This article details a unit of study bringing together shared reading, place-based pedagogies, and climate-centered texts to engage students in youth participatory community action (YPAR). The authors envision an English classroom where youth read, write, and argue for change as activists as they encounter climate justice literature through YPAR…

Despite the proliferation and use of literary lenses in English Language Arts classrooms, one lens still seems to be missing from theorization, formulation, and thus practical implementation: religion. This absence is well-noted in the field, as positive depictions of Christian themes in books are rare and religion is rarely discussed as an…

This study explores the use of a metacognitive tool in the preparation of secondary English teachers. This multi-faceted qualitative study presents the findings from a phenomenological research approach that focuses on how literacy quadrants depict pre-service teachers' (PSTs') understandings of, or beliefs about, mental illness and the teaching…

Although authors often create literary texts in order to comment on issues of personhood and human relationships, reading and writing about literary texts in schools is often focused on close analysis of literary elements or exploration of one's own experience with the text. Thus, students' written arguments about literature typically do little…

In this paper, we highlight how restorying with preservice secondary English language arts teachers can encourage them to explore what is possible with mandated texts, like those found in the canon, for diverse world building centered in empathy, self-exploration, and justice. Findings highlight the critical reflective process preservice teachers…

Grounded in solid theory with new field-tested classroom activities, the fourth edition of "Critical Encounters in Secondary English" continues to help teachers integrate the lenses of contemporary literary theory into practices that have always defined good pedagogy. The most significant change for this edition is the addition of a full…

Grounded in ethnography and teacher research, "Moving across Differences" examines how an LGBTQ+-themed literature course enabled high school students to negotiate their differences and engage in ethical encounters. Drawing on the work of queer theorists, Mollie V. Blackburn conceptualizes these encounters as forms of movement across…