Young children read wordless books as an important early literacy learning activity. This study explores oral narrative construction and image reading of a wordless book by six K-2 children. Through a cross-case analysis, the results indicate growth of coherence and cohesion building in the verbal narratives across grade levels, as well as a…

This article explores the potential for engaging 7 and 8-year-old school pupils in performative literature interpretation through process drama. Inspired by new materialism and affect theory, we focus on how literature interpretations come into being in dramatic fiction, and on how these becoming interpretations merge with the classroom. The study…

Picturebooks are defined by the interaction of words and pictures to convey narrative (Bader, 1976; Kiefer, 1995; Sipe, 2011), referred to in this study as the word-picture relationship. This dissertation study extends on the work of others who investigated young children's responses to picturebooks (e.g., Arizpe & Styles, 2016; Sipe, 2008a;…

The purpose of the present study was to explore the beliefs and practices of teachers who implement independent reading in their classrooms. Results showed that teachers who implemented independent reading believed in the importance of both the quantity and quality of student reading. The teachers' practices of independent reading showed students…

This document presents the proceedings of the 25th Annual Research Forum held June 30, 2021, at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Included are the following eighteen action research papers: (1) Using Modern Events to Teach United States History (Charles Ahern); (2) "We Are All ESL Teachers": Culturally and…

This qualitative research study explored second graders' use of visual information to understand characters in picturebooks. Students participated in whole class read-alouds of three picturebooks. Immediately following each read-aloud, students were individually interviewed and invited to talk about the visual text in pre-selected illustrations.…

The purpose of this study was to examine how the social practices of African American families--with children in grades K-2--changed as a result of participating in a family literacy program utilizing African American children's literature. The families were exposed, through a series of workshops, to an abundance of children's literature…

The basic features of digital reading devices (such as the Amazon Kindle) are described in this article. The author also considers how such devices can advance e-book readership among primary students by offering new avenues for accessing and interacting with a wide array of texts. Rooted in the transactional theory of reader response and a new…

This article is centrally focused on teaching biography to second grade children in new and intriguing ways. In this article, the authors discuss the use of a multimodal integrated visual art and literacy curriculum in student investigations, interpretations, and writing of biography. Section one describes the wider project of conceptualizing an…

Our society is increasingly bombarded with visual imagery; therefore, it is important for educators to be knowledgeable about the elements of art and to use our knowledge to help students deepen their reading understanding. Arizpe & Styles (2003) noted that students must be prepared to work with imagery in the future at high levels of…

This research study investigated the effectiveness of an early reading intervention for self-efficacy (E-RISE) on struggling readers' efficacy and reading achievement in an at-risk elementary school setting. A total of 117 first, second, and third graders participated. The intervention group contained 39 students, and the comparison group…

As part of its proposal to the U.S. Department of Education, the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) committed to developing Kindergarten through Grade 2 Model Content Frameworks for English language arts (ELA)/literacy (K-2 Model Content Frameworks) to serve as a bridge between the Common Core State Standards…

In this qualitative study, the author explores how young readers build literary understanding through performative responses in picturebook read-alouds. Performative responses allow children to create and express meaning in ways that go beyond talk and that engage their creativity and imagination. They include a variety of modalities, such as…

This article reports on a study of the responses of a second-grade class to the page breaks in contemporary picturebooks. In a picturebook, the text and accompanying illustrations are divided into a series of facing pages called openings, and the divisions between the openings are called page breaks or turns. Unlike a novel, in which the page…

An increase in the Mexican American population within the predominantly African American community and school was the basis of this qualitative study. The purpose of the study was to introduce African American second grade students to authentic Mexican and Mexican American children's literature. Interactive read-alouds of nonfiction and realistic…