US public education faces concerted attack by those bent on corporate control, privatization, regimented reading instruction, and high-stakes testing. One democratic, humanistic, and research-based alternative can be found in the theory and practice of whole language, which empowered teachers and students alike through the 1980s and 1990s -- until…

Generation 1.5 students, foreign-born children of first-generation immigrants, complete some or most of their K-12 education in the United States. Their oral communicative competence may be advanced, but their academic language proficiency may still be underdeveloped when they enter college. In 2013, SB1720 made placement testing optional for most…

In this paper, we report on teachers' use of curricula and other instructional resources to address Common Core State Standards (CCSS), as well as how use of instructional materials is related to instructional practice. We draw on data from the American Teacher Panel, a nationally representative sample of teachers who periodically provide…

In an attempt to enhance learners' autonomy and create awareness of their own learning process, keeping a vocabulary notebook can be regarded as one of the most commonly used cognitive strategies. A jargon book, a kind of vocabulary notebook, consists of specialized terms that are used for conveying hidden meanings accepted and understood in a…

This article reflects on the values and practices of a revolutionary A level (senior secondary) course that achieved a high degree of validity and reliability in assessing the study of English literature. John Hodgson and Bill Greenwell were involved in its teaching and assessment from an early stage, and Greenwell's comments on an early draft of…

The global neoliberal context and the emergence of new forms of 'governance by numbers' is now recognized as a ubiquitous educational phenomenon. In this context, large-scale assessments such as are used to justify marketised ideals of education that rely on comparison by numbers. In Australia, one of the key arguments for large scale standardised…

This report presents the findings from an efficacy trial and process evaluation of the Parent Engagement Programme (PEP). The PEP was a school-level intervention designed to improve pupil outcomes by engaging parents in their children's learning. The programme was developed collaboratively by research teams from the University of Bristol and…

Current writing research emphasizes the teaching of disciplinary literacy, attending to the privileged ways of writing in each subject area. However, as the traditional space for generic literacy instruction, the ELA classroom has not assimilated this shift. This study used qualitative content analysis to examine feedback on writing about…

The flipped classroom method, particularly when used with digital video, has recently attracted many supporters within the education field. Now more than ever, language arts educators can benefit tremendously from incorporating flipped classroom techniques into their curriculum. "Applying the Flipped Classroom Model to English Language Arts…

The multimodal world learners inhabit demands visual literacy among other literacies if learners are to effectively navigate its terrain. In this study, we sought to understand the extent to which five Grade 4 English textbooks currently used in some schools in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa facilitated the development of visual…

This essay explores the complexity of imposing texts that are considered part of the English literary canon on students from multicultural backgrounds. It considers the rhetoric of the coalition government, in the recent drive to emphasize the importance of the literary heritage and return to English culture and how its impact has been felt in the…

Drawing on a strand of findings from the Cambridge Poetry Teaching Project, a small-scale research study co-ordinated through the Faculty of Education at the University of Cambridge, this article examines contemporary understandings of poetry performance in teaching contexts. Positioning these understandings in relation to past practices, we…

Mary Mobley teaches English and Michael Chambers teaches world history at Manor New Technology High School, a STEM school, in Manor, Texas. In this article, they talk about how they used "The Hunger Games" by Suzanne Collins to teach their students about forms of government between World War I and World War II, and "Edutopia"…

In the conceptual triumvirate of "language," "literacy" and "literature" that have been central to thinking about English curriculum--indeed, are the overarching organisers for the "Australian Curriculum: English"--that which received possibly the least attention from Garth Boomer was literature. This paper…

In order to adequately prepare students for the summative requirements of Year 12, tertiary education and life beyond school, it is essential that all students are equipped with the literary skills necessary for discerning ideas, evaluating perspectives and appreciating texts within their world (Queensland Studies Authority, 2010, p. 29). Such…