Literacy

Harnessing scholarship focused on literacy and poverty, in this article we aim to complicate the common understanding of the digital divide. First, we argue that the dominant literature on the digital divide misses broader connections between technological exclusion and broader forms of economic and social exclusion. Accordingly, and following recent qualitative research on the digital divide, we believe future scholarship must examine the complicated relationships between poverty, inequality, and the digital divide and we look to poverty scholarship to understand the complicated and shifting nature of poverty. Finally, we make the case that scholars and practitioners focused on digital literacy programs should pay attention to historical and critical scholarship on education and its role in mediating poverty and fostering social mobility, as it serves digital divide and broadband adoption scholars to understand the ways education processes can either reproduce or set the stage to alter entrenched social realities

A diversidade de propostas de trabalho pedagógico com línguas, letramentos e linguagens em contexto de tecnologias digitais me parece ser a grande contribuição da obra. Nos capítulos, encontramos menções às eventuais dificuldades enfrentadas, mas também ao potencial pedagógico oferecido por recursos (ferramentas, dispositivos, aplicativos), quando acionados em uma perspectiva de novos multiletramentos. Será uma leitura valiosa para pesquisadores e educadores envolvidos com línguas e linguagens na escola. (Márcia Mendonça)

With the advent of “Response to Intervention” there has been emphasis on preventing reading disabilities. This study examined the effectiveness of a classroom teacher Tier II intervention for struggling readers in kindergarten and first grade called the Targeted Reading Intervention. Three rural schools were randomly assigned to experimental and control conditions, with 8 experimental and 12 control classrooms. Five struggling and five non-struggling readers were randomly selected from each classroom. With the support of biweekly coaching, experimental teachers instructed struggling readers in one-on-one sessions in the classroom. Intent-to-treat analyses revealed significant kindergarten gains for initial word identification but no significant gains in first grade. Discussion focuses on the use of classroom teachers to prevent reading disabilities.

The main goal of science education is to produce a scientifically literate community. Science teachers are the key to achieving scientifically literate citizenry because of their essential role in education at all levels. It is for this reason that science teachers themselves must be scientifically literate to be able to prepare students adequately. This study examined the levels of scientific literacy (SL) of randomly selected public elementary and high school science teachers of Cagayan de Oro City (n=92 and n=88 respectively), using a descriptive survey. A standardized test was utilized to determine the scientific literacy (SL) in areas like Nature of Science (NOS), Science, Technology, and Society (STS), Physical Science (PS), Earth and Space Science (ESS), Life Science (LS), and Health Science (HS). Analysis of results indicated that the respondents possess a satisfactory SL, with the highest score in Earth and Space Science (ESS) component while lowest in Physical Sciences (PS). Differences in SL levels were also noted between elementary and high school science teachers. It is recommended that in the design of both science teacher education curriculum and professional development training for in-service teachers, least mastered concepts in science must be given attention. Similarly, ample opportunities should also be given to preservice and in-service teachers to develop high levels of scientific literacy.

Literacy without love is just words on a page, but educators can create real, actionable, and sustainable classroom practices rooted in love, in a time when we need it the most. O ur purpose in this commentary is to describe how school communities work together to build relationships and develop inquiry teams through loveful practices. Through this examination, possibilities for shaping literacy culture through love-ful pedagogies within and across schools are elevated. This commentary is a dialogue between the two of us to explain how loveful pedagogy is deeply connected to learners' motivation in school and, especially, learners' love of literacy. Our ideational partner, Cornelius Minor, is included in the dialogue, particularly when we describe our work with adolescents in school spaces. In the first section, Kass explains the emotive work that underscores becoming literate, beginning with developmental learning stages. She delineates how the relational trust that adolescents both crave and need begins during early childhood and is often compromised as they experience more schooling. Marcus identifies that the work of building relational trust starts with self-assessment of both youth and their educators, capitalizing on an adapted form of Chapman's (2010) love languages. Marcus interrogates the idea of imperfect love, calling on educators to present a more vulnerable version of themselves to their learners. Kass then connects the inner work to the outer, posing a framework for intraschool collegial discourse that she and her partner, Cornelius, model in schools, while also providing a critical "shapes of love" relational continuum for educators to more critically examine interactions that take place between teachers and students within a school. Kass: Developmental Consideration Becoming literate is emotional work. From the time human beings are born, they engage in multiple literacies, constructing new knowledge and powerful ideas that, together, bridge new understandings. With those new understandings, humans are constantly being challenged and provoked with new information. Imagine a baby. The sound of the door opening, she had learned, means that her grown-up has arrived home! Whoops, it's the grocery delivery person. Disappointment ensues. Anger and sadness build, the baby's fists clench, tears well up, and crying commences. There's no need to worry, though, because another grown-up, different from the one expected than the delivery person, comforts the baby, reassuring her with "Shhhh" sounds and telling her that the caregiver she expected will be home before too long. Then, the baby begins to relax, because even though she doesn't understand the caregiver's words, this person is soothing, smiling, and the baby can feel a vibe, something that she will later know to be called love. The International Literacy Association (n.d.) defines literacies as the distinct written and oral language practices evident across varying social circumstances, domains, and classes. As such, literacies are plural, with multiple manifestations, that cover various aspects of human life and social organization (e.g., school literacy, workplace literacy, science literacy).

At institutions with significant populations of international and English Language Learning (ELL) students, writing centers are one of the best, if only, campus services that help with composition and language learning. However, institutions do not often provide adequate academic support for ELL students, who are frequently, but not always, international students (Nowacki, 2012). And there is rarely a sufficient support apparatus for these students to learn language (Nowacki, 2012). Given the high-stakes pressure for ELL students to demonstrate proficiency in English (Thonus, 1993), ELL students often use writing center services disproportionately in comparison to their native English-speaking peers. Despite the fact that ELL students use writing center resources in high numbers, there has been no correspondingly expansive body of writing center literature focused on this population (Nowacki, 2012). In order to not reinvent the wheel, it can be productive for writing centers to look to other fields for guidance on ELL students. For our purposes here, we found the field of research on teacher education to be useful and generative, as scholars in that space have, for decades now, considered the ways to best attend to the needs of ELL students in teaching and learning. In that field, a body of work termed linguistically responsive pedagogy (LRP; e.g. Aguilera et al., 2020; Lucas, 2010; Lucas et al., 2008) seemed particularly promising as a frame for enriching the work of writing centers with ELL students. Across our findings in this chapter, we understand there to be substantial overlaps between the work of writing center consultants and linguistically responsive educators. Our goal is to think about what LRP scholarship might offer writing center tutors working to better serve multilingual students. Because of the overlap we find between LRP literature and writing center research, we argue that writing centers can look to work on linguistically responsive pedagogies for constructing new writing center approaches for ELL students. We begin by examining the relationship between writing centers and ELL students in order to bring attention to the overlap between LRP and writing centers. We then provide an overview of linguistically responsive pedagogy. Lastly, we offer recommendations for how writing centers can translate LRP principles into writing center theory and practice.

Volume 8 Number 1 is a special issue consisting of ten articles focusing on theme of Current Perspectives on Teaching English to Refugee-background Students. Topics include: reading pedagogy for young adults - multiple literacies - digital storytelling - encountering and accommodating diversity - assessing linguistic and cultural resources - social positioning