Amongst academics working with postgraduate students, there has recently been increasing interest in ways of supporting advanced academic literacy (AAL). This is a concern for us at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, where we teach a diverse group of postgraduate students, most of whom are subject practitioners in…

In this review essay, Jeanne Connell examines the influence of pragmatic philosophy on the scholarly works of twentieth-century literary theorist and English educator Louise Rosenblatt through the lens of a recent collection of her essays originally published between 1936 and 1999. Rosenblatt grounded her transactional theory of literature in…

This article explores the emergence of multimodality as intrinsic to the learning, teaching and assessment of English in the Twenty-First Century. With subject traditions tied to the study of language, literature and media, multimodal texts and new technologies are now accorded overdue recognition in English curriculum documents in several…

The purpose of this study was to describe the qualities of preservice early childhood teacher response to a multicultural children's literature project, and to evaluate the project as a means for developing culturally responsive teaching practices in preservice early childhood teachers. Surveys and reflection papers on the project from two reading…

Today, it is a challenge for teachers to convince resistant readers that literature holds secrets, adventures, and revelations worthy of their time and attention. When teachers demonstrate how to explore literature and guide students in doing so, teachers help break down barriers that are common among middle school students. Unfortunately, when…

Students in an eighth-grade, urban, low-achieving reading class were introduced to critical literacy through engagement in Image Theatre. Developed by liberatory dramatist Augusto Boal, Image Theatre gives participants the opportunity to examine texts in the triple role of interpreter, artist, and sculptor (i.e., image creator). The researchers…

Preschool is a complex place, and some preschool educators come to their classrooms without formal training in language and literacy pedagogy. As a result, they need practical guidance and support to ensure that they are facilitating literacy success. An area ripe for targeted language and literacy instruction is shared storybook reading. We have…

In the past five years, at least a half dozen major reports have focused on adolescent literacy and providing adolescents with age-appropriate instruction. What is age-appropriate instruction for middle school students? As recent reports on adolescent literacy, such as those of the Carnegie Corporation and the ACT make clear, age-appropriate…

Children develop literacy skills in environments that encourage their engagement with language, print, and books. The way children learn to read is affected by the level of support adults provide when children interact with books. The authors discuss books as natural supports for literacy learning and embedding such learning in typical early…

In "The Name of the Rose," Umberto Eco essentially presents an educative vision of some basic semiotic principles that infuse the textual form of a popular fictional genre--the detective story. In effect, it characterizes the postmodernization of the traditional "whodunnit" moving the genre from the realm of "the real" or the plausible into the…

With faculty changing instructional practices to take advantage of customizable, focused content (and digital delivery of that content), many people assume that digital distribution is the answer to bringing the costs of course content delivery in line. But the picture just isn't that simple. A wide continuum of options is available to faculty and…

This exploratory study describes the instructional strategies and related activities a Grade 1 teacher and I used to promote engagements with informational texts in one rural Jamaican primary school. Some of the instructional strategies and activities were bridging connections from the known to the unknown, reading aloud to increase content…

At a recent professional development program, the authors asked teachers to recall the ways in which they learned about history in the course of their own schooling. The teachers at this professional development gathering not only identified some of the key challenges facing elementary teachers charged with teaching social studies curricula, they…

Sybil Wilson is a composite representation of an English teacher that typifies much of what most preservice English teachers have seen and experienced in U.S. classrooms. The authors' aim is to articulate textual frameworks often competing and unnamed in English curriculum (and evident in Sybil's classroom) and to argue for a particular reframing…

In many literacy classrooms, teachers provide instruction in comprehension by helping students to practice explicit comprehension strategy use when they encounter difficult texts. In many of those same literacy classrooms, students are placed in peer-led groups to discuss literary texts as a way to increase their engagement with difficult reading.…