Moral development in gifted education is an issue of imperative importance due to the potential of gifted students to change the world. In consideration of this issue and the lack of research on the topic, this study examined the extent to which moral development was present within the senior secondary English curricula at an academically…

This article serves as an invitation to see the way the teaching of biography-driven writing has been increasingly pushed out of the secondary English Language Arts (ELA) curriculum in favor of highly structured, formulaic, and impersonal writing, and how this is a setback for students in their preparation for college and career writing. The…

English departments are roundly praised for their emphasis on skills rather than content. In the authors' classes, students read (skill), write (skill), think (skill), speak (skill), and listen (skill). Theoretically, the books being taught are interchangeable and simply a means to skill acquisition. But that's not always what happens in the…

A significant body of research points to the challenges faced by English teachers in balancing creative pedagogy with the demands of high-stakes testing. However, few studies have examined teachers' conceptions of the importance of creativity in the context of end-of-school examinations. This study addresses this critical gap by exploring the…

This paper reports findings from a study investigating trends in character, historical setting, authorship and themes across Victorian Certificate of Education (VCE) text selection lists between 2010 and 2019. We address the fictionalisation and imagining of Australian history through narratives about Indigeneity and settler-colonisation. While we…

Today, "Night" is probably the most commonly taught work of Holocaust literature in the United States, read by middle school and high school students alike, even though US adolescents were not the author's intended audience. This article offers suggestions for teaching "Night" in ways that engage students, challenge them to…

Creativity is integral to the inquiry process. Inquiry-based work highlights students' understanding of the ways that literature and language mediate lived experiences and social relationships. Within the secondary English classroom, students and teachers can engage in collaborative and imaginative activities to read texts, ask questions, and…

This paper explores the continued cultural consecration of narrow forms of knowledge and literate practice in senior Australian English curricula. Despite the prevalence of Personal Growth approaches to English throughout Australia in the latter decades of the Twentieth century, the analysis of curricula reveals a contradiction between stated…

This article draws on Donna Haraway's call for feminist speculative fabulation as an approach to qualitative research methodologies and writing praxis in schools. The first section of the article outlines how I conceptualize speculative thought, through different philosophers and theorists, and provides a brief literature review of speculative…

A lack of horizontal and vertical alignment of the English language arts (ELA) curriculum exists at Lakeside High School (LHS) (pseudonym). This problem was revealed by the diverse interpretations of the ELA state standards by teachers, driven by the wide-range of teachers' beliefs about ELA instruction. Failure to establish an effective culture…

This practitioner inquiry study investigates learning from the stories of emergent bilingual students as they complete project based learning units. This method of instruction created the space to have one-on-one conversations, listen in culturally responsive ways, and develop asset-based literacy curriculum. I argue that relationships formed…

This article focuses on Mr. Kurt, a white, first-year English teacher in an all-white context who has chosen to teach his students about whiteness, white supremacy, white privilege, and the many ways institutionalized racism is enacted in daily life. I center this article on classroom scenarios that highlight the challenges embedded in dealing…

As part of an ethnographic study of a secondary English Language Arts classroom, one teacher took a critical translingual approach to curriculum and instruction, encouraging students to engage in translanguaging and to explore the intersections of language with power and identity. The larger study's central question was, what does participation in…

This article explores findings from an investigation into the publishing experiences of Australian authors of inclusive Young Adult (YA) fiction. A total of seven authors, each publicly identifying as part of a marginalised community in Australia, were interviewed. This paper concentrates on the findings of semi-structured interviews with two…

ELA Guidebooks is an English language arts curriculum for core instruction. Made by teachers for teachers, the guidebook units ensure all students can read, understand, and express their understanding of complex, grade-level texts, ensuring their readiness for college or a career. Each text collection has a shared idea and contains authentic texts…