Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore teacher candidates' response to young adult literature (prose and comics) featuring fat identified protagonists. The paper considers the textual and embodied resources readers use and reject when imagining and interpreting a character's body. This paper explores how readers' meaning making was…

This article presents findings from a qualitative content analysis of 531 Little Golden Books that contain early childhood marginalia--any physical alteration of a book, resulting from an exercise of reader agency by a child from birth through eight years old. The primary goals of the present study were to expand the reach of this methodology by…

This qualitative study examined the written responses of 58 undergraduate, preservice teachers in three online children's literature courses to the graphic novel, When stars are scattered by Victoria Jamieson and Omar Mohamed. Findings from a summative content analysis of participants' written responses showed five response themes: Connections…

The protection and regulation of religious expression present complex challenges. Blasphemy laws, which criminalize acts deemed disrespectful to religious beliefs, have been abolished in England, allowing for broader freedom of expression. However, concerns and discussions about blasphemy persist. The Home Secretary, Suella Braverman (2023), has…

The aim of this research is to examine the impact of reading storybooks and the presence of different characters such as humans, animals, and fantasy characters in storybooks on children's costly sharing behaviour. A total of 235 children participated in the study. The children were presented with 20 stickers and were asked to choose their 10…

Poetry spaces provide a place where young people can express themselves and develop skills like critical thinking, empathy, and creativity. They empower young people, particularly those at the margins of society. I organized an extracurricular poetry club, Yo Misma, with Latina adolescents in which we read the work of ten Latin American women…

In this paper, we draw upon Rosenblatt's transactional theory of reading to frame six readings of a picture book. The picture book, "There's a Ghost in This House" by Oliver Jeffers, was selected for a children's literature reading group which brought together literacy researchers and teacher educators to share their encounters with the…

We extend research on social annotation in education by implementing a new annotation technique in the literature classroom. Over the course of one year, we invited students to socially annotate literary texts using emojis that reflected their affective responses to those texts. This approach was inspired by new functions of social annotation…

In this paper, we analyse a group of 6 and 7 year olds' interactions during a literacy event. We explore the complexities of their meaning-making following a read aloud of Where the Wild Things Are (Sendak 1963). Our focus is on discourses of gender/sex/uality, a term that acknowledges the complex relationship between gender, sex and sexuality,…

In a rapidly changing information landscape, science communicators need to find new ways to engage audiences, make their information memorable and increase attitudes towards scientists. Evidence suggests that stories could be an effective tool for these goals, but few studies tested experimentally whether they are advantageous to non-stories in…

Purpose: Using a discourse analytic approach, the purpose of this paper is to examine how genre impacts white readers when reading about historic acts of racial violence. Specifically, this study explores one white high school student's stance-taking as she read an informational text and an eyewitness narrative about the Tulsa Race Massacre.…

This study investigated the impact of mild shifts in affective tone (i.e., pleasant vs. unpleasant) and arousal (i.e., high vs. low) on three creative processes. Undergraduates read short stories designed to induce affective shifts and then were asked to generate solutions to a complex business problem. Shifts in affective tone and arousal…

This research memorandum highlights the collaborative efforts of the literacy panel for the ETS Return on Investment (ROI) Study, Phase 1, comprising Jean-François Rouet, M. Anne Britt, and Tobias Richter, in developing their research memorandum, "Literacy Skills at and around Level 2 of the PIAAC Cycle 2 Proficiency Scale." This…

Originally designed for first language classrooms, literature circles have been adapted for second language (L2) contexts to enhance reading proficiency and discourse skills. While traditional practice in L2 settings involves assigning roles to students for engaging with texts, critiques have highlighted potential constraints on participation and…

Objective: To assess the efficacy of utilizing dining hall napkins as a novel health messaging strategy to promote mindfulness. Participants: Undergraduate students at a large Midwestern university. Methods: Utilizing a place-based promotional strategy, mindfulness messages were printed on over 8-million napkins at dining halls. Surveys (N = 573)…