Draws on research in a fourth-grade classroom to show that teachers can teach composing strategies that encourage a variety of ways of interacting socially while writing. Shares various views of social interaction and student choice in writing classrooms as a way of establishing support for exploration of the social interactions that occurred in…

Describes a discussion format called Collaborative Reasoning, part of a literature-based reading program in which students discuss a central question about a story they have read. Discusses the background of Collaborative Reasoning, its discussion framework, and instructional moves that support the development of reasoning. Notes the high rate of…

Uses literature discussion as a vehicle for encouraging fourth-grade students to reflect critically on injustice in their own lives. Notes that reflection is a basic skill and an important reading strategy all too often ignored or unacknowledged. Suggests that reflection is the very core of learning rather than an extra or supplementary reading…

Describes how in the examination of a sixth-grade girl's participation in the language arts classroom that is driven by high-stakes testing and by a regimented classroom culture, the authors came to view students' approaches to literacy events as "stances" and their negotiation of their subjectivities in response to literacy events as…

Suggests that good fourth-grade teaching is an expert activity--a complex activity that is not amenable to scripted materials, standardized lessons, or any one-size-fits-all plan for the organization of instruction. Shows that the 30 exemplary teachers discussed produce superior educational gains as measured on standardized achievement tests--not…

Presents a case study of a fourth-grade boy who was an active, intelligent boy who was not coping well with reading and writing in school. Discusses observations of, and conversations with, the boy and his parents in their home. Demonstrates the importance of educators' having a family perspective on students' language and literacy development.…

Offers a critical reading of a text used in Ontario, Canada, in a province-wide sixth-grade testing program, finding it representative of a genre called "Boutique multiculturalism," which fails as literature and fails as an inclusive text because it is emptied of all specific social, cultural, and historical content. (SR)

Follows the development, from fifth grade through eighth grade, of a student poet, who can teach educators what it means to "feel expressed." Offers new ways to think about who children are, what they need to say, and what they need to be taught. Discusses the possibilities of poetry for gaining access to children's deepest capacities for…

Finds that the 35 middle-school language-arts teachers studied agreed that Self Selected Reading (SSR) is an important way to improve students' reading attitudes and achievement, but that their schools rarely provided funds for buying student-preferred materials, and that finding time for SSR was difficult because of the pressure to prepare for…

Reports on a study of grade 6 reluctant readers, identifying factors that served as barriers to the students' voluntary reading habits, finding them varied and complex. Points to several areas in which schools can promote voluntary reading, including choices in instructional reading, opportunities to read for enjoyment, and access to high-interest…

Uses observations of three students' and two teachers' use of metaphors in process writing instruction to shed light on the role of talk in writing development. Finds that metaphors can be complex, interesting, and thought-provoking; and all students developed a shared understanding with teachers despite differences in background. (SR)

Uses the metaphor of the "literacy club" to illustrate the re-making of three fifth-grade readers. Describes three children in jeopardy of being excluded from the literacy club and the steps that they and their teachers took. Looks at how their teachers started where the students were, used a variety of assessment measures, and offered supportive…

Examines the discrepancies in engagement that arose when the teachers' instructional and the students' personal stances (regarding the intents and purposes of literacy) are misaligned during literacy events. Discusses the ways in which instructional and personal stances encourage and/or discourage engagement. Considers the opportunity to construct…

Examines the ways in which the boys and girls in three fourth-grade classrooms used writing to perform gender roles. Notes that the characters in girls' narrative writing demonstrated more emotion and more prosocial behaviors (helping, sharing, empathizing), whereas characters in boys' narrative writing exhibited more aggressive behavior and…