Standardized literacy assessments that place emphasis on testing and attainment of results have caused many students, particularly in middle years schooling to be disenfranchised by literacy teaching and learning practices. This study employed an action research methodology to investigate whether an outdoor learning experience in a Year 7/8…

This article argues that in order to encourage English graduates to expand their horizons, educators should diversify the range of assessments and offer greater opportunities for public engagement. Through a detailed analysis of the final-year elective, "Literature & Medicine," the authors explore the ways in which the design and…

This phenomenological case study explores the persistence of high school readers labeled as struggling as they described their responses to recurring, consistent, externally originating challenges to positive reading identities growing from their experiences in a Young Adult Literature (YAL) course. Through application of Weinreich's identity…

A high school education should ensure students are eligible for their chosen pathway of what comes next: college and careers, as well as civic life. To understand the extent to which diploma requirements denote eligibility for a student's chosen postsecondary pathway of choice, this report analyzes state high school graduation requirements for a…

It is imperative that in conversations about literacy instruction teachers incorporate curriculum dedicated to youth empowerment, especially for emergent bilingual and LGBTQ youth, as recognizing and honoring students' linguistic and epistemic privileges entails taking their claims about the world seriously. In this article, the author discusses…

In this article, I consider the literacy practices that emerged in an in-school elective course centered in the literacy tradition of African American women. Drawing from spatial perspectives (Leander& Sheehy, 2004), I explore what it means to consider this course an "Other space" (Foucault,1986), as a space created without the constraints of a…

This ethnographic case study investigates the literacy practices one teacher and his students engaged in during a full year digital video composing English elective. The research site is an English course offered at a diverse, first-ring suburban high school. The course, Mass Media and Video Productions, is a full year English elective open to…

This article examines the salience of collective "memory" and "remembering" among a group of students in Hip-Hop Lit, a hip-hop centered English literature course that I co-taught at "Howard High School," an urban high school in the Northeastern United States. Specifically, this article examines the memory work that occurred within Hip-Hop Lit in…

This study investigates an elective English class, in which students in grades 10-12 collectively read and collaboratively wrote fantasy fiction in four groups. The purpose of the class was to have students consider the choices fantasy and science fictions writers, directors, and video game designers make when creating a fictional world. The…

Describes a high school senior elective course on children's literature. (DD)

Describes two elective courses for juniors and seniors. (DD)

Discusses a 10-week elective course designed to give students some basis for . . . positive action and creative decision" by carefully studying several literary characters. (Author/SW)