Through a collaboration between a university in the US Southeast and a university in Puerto Rico, the researchers explored the use of primary sources to challenge mainstream assumptions and views of Puerto Rico and support application of content and pedagogic approaches into early childhood and elementary classrooms among preservice teachers…

A conversation between scholars demonstrates how two experts found common ground and made classroom recommendations while wrestling through an underlying question: Who cares about "The Grapes of Wrath?"

This article shares processes and practices which foster students' critical consciousness. Critical consciousness, the core of social justice teaching, is a heightened awareness of the world and the power structures that shape it. Teachers can become forces for equity and change by: challenging students to reflect critically on their beliefs and…

Popular culture texts, such as texts based on movies, television, sports, and video games are widely desired by elementary students. However, these texts are not always available for students due to limited funding, lack of teacher appreciation for such texts, and sparse quantities of popular culture texts found in classroom and school libraries.…

Children's literature plays an essential role in the literacy development of children. This department column focuses on the teaching and use of children's literature and provides educators with information about a wide range of books across multiple genres that are representative of the diverse world in which we live. A strong emphasis is placed…

Although the literature on picture books is extensive, very little work focuses on how they are integrated into teacher education curricula. We contend that effective use of these resources requires an understanding of the relationship between preservice teachers' conceptions of children and of picture books. Second-year South African…

Leveled reading, in which students select "just right" books based on their assessed reading level, has become a significant part of elementary reading instruction. However, libraries remain places where students can select books to read outside their reading levels. Based on observations of 1st-grade students, the author describes how…

This paper focuses on teachers' and students' use of textual resources offline and online in two Grade 6 classrooms. Using analysis of video recordings, the paper presents the ways in which the textual resources are used, and what critical approaches emerge within the teachers' and students' repertoires of teaching and learning. We then…

Research suggests that readers learn about word meanings from the various contexts of words in texts. Therefore, context clue instruction is often recommended as a way of boosting students' word learning skills. Ideally, such instruction should focus on context clue types that are common in authentic texts. We examined the prevalence of context…

Administrators, librarians, parents, teachers, and teacher educators need to be familiar with quality multicultural children's literature as a means of helping children develop an understanding of others as well as affirming their own diverse backgrounds. In this study, 31 fictional picture books identified as containing representations of ethnic…

Primary teachers often struggle to find high quality literature for use with their first-grade students. Therefore, a list of award winning books was evaluated for characteristics that lend themselves to teaching reading comprehension strategies and literary elements. The Golden Kite Award, an annual award which provides a grant to the winning…

The editors of "Science and Children" invite readers to explore the 2016 list of Outstanding Science Trade Books. The list builds upon a 44-year history of identifying the very best science books for children. In the award-winning titles provided in this article, readers will find traditional science content as well as engineering and…

Many professionals, including members of the International Literacy Association, are concerned with the lack of reading materials in classrooms across the world. In this paper, the authors present the creation of high-quality, locally produced, complementary reading materials in Malawi, where there are very few children's books and few…

This paper uses an assignment given to the authors' preservice teachers to address and push back against common arguments used to uphold canonical text selection in secondary ELA classrooms. Using the metaphor of canon defense as empire building first made by Toni Morrison in the canon debates of the 1980s, the authors examine the weaknesses in…

Purpose: This tutorial discusses what it means to be a culturally responsive speech-language pathologist (SLP) and then grounds this discussion in strategies that SLPs can engage in to diversify the books and other materials that they use in clinical practice. Method: We motivate the tutorial by reviewing policy statements and theoretical…