Language Arts Teachers Research Articles

Integrating Mindset Interventions with Language Arts Instruction: An Exploratory Study with Seventh Grade Students

Researchers engaged in a collaborative, yearlong study with a seventh-grade language arts teacher who integrated activities to enhance students’ understanding of mindsets with content instruction. Lessons emphasized four aspects of mindsets: belief that learning abilities can grow with the investment of effort, willingness to address challenging tasks and persevere, development of stronger learning strategies, and ability to articulate connections between effort and accomplishment. During the school year, the team observed lessons, gathered work samples, and conducted interviews with 12 students. Work samples showed that most students articulated a general understanding of the concepts related to mindset emphasized during instruction. Case studies documented patterns and differences in ways students articulated connections among concepts. Although limited by sample size, results suggested that seventh graders can understand the construct of mindsets, especially when offered guidance and support.

How Korean Language Arts Teachers Adopt and Adapt Open Educational Resources: A Study of Teachers’ and Students’ Perspectives

<p class="3">Since 2005, open educational resources (OER) have played a key role in K-12 education in South Korea; so far, however, there has been little discussion about OER efficacy in South Korean K-12 education. In the meantime, South Korean education has been attracting a lot of interest around the world. Former U.S. President Obama’s comments about South Korean education might also be caused by South Korean students’ academic performance evaluated by international large-scale assessments such as the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA). This article uses an ethnographic perspective to explore the experiences of teachers and students in the Korean context. The analysis of the findings shows how teachers adopt and adapt OER for their 12<sup>th</sup> grade (the final year of secondary school) Korean language arts classes. Through classroom observations, interviews, and questionnaires, this exploration revealed that nearly 92% of the students perceived OER as beneficial to their studies and that teachers were spurred on to orchestrate differentiated instructional plans by OER. We argue that there is significant value to using OER in the formal educational curriculum, but that a lack of knowledge of how to adapt OER restricts how their potential is realized in practice. We identify implications for maximizing OER adaptation and successful usage of OER in K-12 education.</p>

Learning to Support Adolescent Literacy: Teacher Educator Pedagogy and Novice Teacher Take Up in Secondary English Language Arts Teacher Preparation

Disciplinary literacy scholars promote text-based instruction in the service of disciplinary inquiry, and scholars of teacher education promote practice-based preparation for teachers. This study brings these scholarly communities into conversation by investigating how practice orientations in teacher education influence novice teachers’ literacy teaching. We conducted video analyses of teacher education coursework and novice teachers’ classroom instruction in secondary English language arts. Data were collected during a summer institute for novice teachers designed through a partnership between a university and an alternative teacher education program. Analyses revealed that when learning targets for novice teacher participants were explicitly connected to teaching practice through the use of representations, decompositions, and approximations, those targets were more frequently observed in novices’ subsequent classroom instruction.

Strategy Instruction Shifts Teacher and Student Interactions During Text‐Based Discussions

AbstractThis study examined how teacher and student interactions were influenced by a multistrategy reading model, Collaborative Strategic Reading (CSR), where students learn to apply before‐, during‐, and after‐reading strategies in small cooperative learning groups. Five middle school English language arts teachers and their students (N = 184) participated as part of a two‐year efficacy trial ofCSR. Discourse analysis was used to compare the differences in teacher–student talk when the teacher and the text remained the same across typical instruction andCSRlessons. Results indicated that strategy‐based collaborative practices offered opportunities for discourse patterns that were not observed in typical lessons. Overall, a higher proportion of talk inCSRlessons focused on discussing the text when compared with lessons withoutCSR. Features of student–teacher interactions during strategy‐based instruction included more student and teacher academic talk turns, a higher ratio of student talk to teacher talk, longer sequences of student–student exploratory talk, less teacher talk focused on giving information, and the use of reading strategies to facilitate discussion about text content. Findings suggest that strategy instruction models can increase the dialogic nature of classrooms by resituating the location of knowledge as distributed among students, with talk and strategies as tools to improve comprehension.

How English Language Arts Teachers Are Prepared for Twenty-First-Century Classrooms: Results of a National Study

A national study of English teacher preparation in U.S. colleges and universities revealed that faculty address changes in content and context salient to English education, particularly curricular, demographic, political, and technological changes, through initiatives at both the program and methods course levels. Programs require many hours of field placements and high numbers of credit hours in the subject area and in subject-specific methods, and also distribute the responsibility for addressing institutional and pedagogical change across courses. Methods courses raise awareness of focal issues and allow opportunities for preservice teachers to discuss these issues. However, opportunities are scarcer for applying knowledge by putting it into practice. This article discusses tensions in English education as they relate to conceptual coherence at the program and course levels, as well as tensions between what we call awareness versus application.

More Than Content: The Persistent Cross-Subject Effects of English Language Arts Teachers’ Instruction

Evidence that teachers’ short-term instructional effects persist over time and predict substantial long-run impacts on students’ lives provides much of the impetus for a wide range of educational reforms focused on identifying and responding to differences in teachers’ value-added to student learning. However, relatively little research has examined how the particular types of knowledge or skills that teachers impart to students contribute to their longer-term success. In this article, we investigate the persistence of teachers’ value-added effects on student learning over multiple school years and across subject areas. We find that, in comparison with math teachers, English language arts (ELA) teachers’ impacts on same-subject standardized achievement scores are smaller in the year of instruction, but that teacher-induced gains to ELA achievement appear to reflect more broadly applicable skills that persist in supporting student learning in the long run across disciplines. Our results highlight important variation in the quality of teacher-induced learning for long-run success, distinct from the variation across teachers in more typically measured short-term learning effects.

Using Text Sets to Facilitate Critical Thinking in Sixth Graders

ABSTRACTThis case study examines features and processes of a sixth grade teacher (Jane) utilizing text sets as a tool for facilitating critical thinking. Jane’s strong vision and student-centered beliefs informed her use of various texts to teach language arts as she worked to address demands of the Common Core State Standards. Text sets promoted multiple perspectives and fit with her beliefs about student empowerment. Despite contextual constraints, Jane used professional judgment to apply her learning from professional development to design and implement instruction. Findings support the idea that teachers need autonomy when choosing multiple texts across genres as well as effective strategies to engender critical thinking. Results can help guide further inquiry into types of teaching and classroom environments that facilitate or impede critical thinking.

The role of empathy in the knowledge building of eighth grade girls as they reflect on their experiences with literature

This study focused on the role that empathy played in the knowledge building of 7 eighth grade readers. Participants met for twenty sessions over the course of a school year to reflect on their experiences empathizing with characters in their favorite works of literature. These reflections led to the generation of social themes. The girls worked to advance these themes by extending, contesting, and evaluating ideas presented.In this community, the girls’ attempts to empathize with characters were foundational for analyzing actions and intentions of people. Empathy was also used as a tool in their talk as the girls imagined perspectives very different from their own. This resulted in new self knowledge because hearing different perspectives led them to expand their thinking. Results suggest a role for the sociocognitive benefits of engaging in literature and developing students’ capacity for empathy in Language Arts instruction.

Community responsive literacies: the development of the Ethnic Studies Praxis Story Plot

PurposeMomentum around the institutionalization of Ethnic Studies in US K-12 classrooms is increasing. Opponents have argued that Ethnic Studies does not challenge students academically and prepare them for high stakes testing (Planas, 2012; Sanchez, 2007). Conversely, research continues to show ways Ethnic Studies contribute to students’ academic achievement, especially for students from marginalized and vulnerable communities (Cabrera et al., 2014; Halagao, 2010; Tintiangco-Cubales et al., 2015). This study aims to demonstrate the possibilities and potential of Ethnic Studies-framed tools for English and Language arts teachers. This moment concerning Ethnic Studies in schools illuminates an important opportunity to demonstrate how Ethnic Studies-framed tools positively affect learning mainstream school content, namely, English and Language Arts. The authors consider the following point: To what extent can Ethnic Studies-framed tools affect approaches for learning English, writing and reading while simultaneously being responsive to a community’s needs? The authors maintain the importance of such tools that exist in how they support the development of community responsive literacies (CRLs).Design/methodology/approachThis paper examines CRLs through the Ethnic Studies Praxis Story Plot (ESPSP). The authors begin by exploring the development of the ESPSP, first used in Pin@y Educational Partnerships (PEP), an innovative K-college Ethnic Studies teaching pipeline. Next, the authors examine each coordinate of the ESPSP, examining their purpose, theoretical underpinnings and ways the ESPSP offers nuanced approaches for learning literacies.FindingsThe authors then discuss how CRLs emerged to support PEP teachers and students’ reading and writing skills using the ESPSP.Originality/valueFinally, the authors learn from students’ experiences with the ESPSP and offer implications for English and Language Arts teachers in the pursuit of teaching and serving students in more socially just and community responsive ways.

Apology Education in the National Curriculum of Korean Language Arts Education and Textbooks

Apology Education in the National Curriculum of Korean Language Arts Education and Textbooks

Summer learning that sticks

A new RAND Corporation study shows that voluntary summer programs can benefit children from low-income families, particularly those with high attendance. Programs studied in five school districts had several elements in common: a mix of academics and enrichment activities, certified teachers, small class sizes, full-day programming provided five days a week for five to six weeks, at least three hours of instruction in math and English language arts daily, no fee for participation, and free transportation and meals. High attenders outperformed control group students on tests in both math and English language arts after the second summer of participation. RAND offers practical recommendations to districts as they implement summer learning programs.

The Promise of Anonymity: An Investigation of the Practices of ELA Teachers Facilitating Discourse about LGBTq Topics

Background/Context As states and districts have begun adopting texts inclusive of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people, debates about how LGBTQ issues should be represented in the curricular canon have emerged. While existing research investigates curricular questions that are arising as a result of LGBTQ curricular inclusion, scholarship has been slow to address the instructional questions presented by the introduction of inclusive curricula. Purpose This study explored how seven secondary English Language Arts teachers facilitated student engagement with LGBTQ-related topics. Analysis of data on teachers’ instructional practice and related decision-making sought to (a) determine what instructional dilemmas arose for teachers as they taught LGBTQ-inclusive content and (b) analyze the instructional decisions that teachers made to address these dilemmas. Participants Participants in this study were seven secondary English Language Arts teachers who (a) held strong reputations in their professional communities for supporting LGBTQ students and (b) had strong intentions to support LGBTQ students through LGBTQ curricular inclusion, reducing student prejudice, and advocating for and with LGBTQ students. Research Design This comparative case study was embedded in a larger qualitative study that investigated the instructional practice of LGBTQ-supportive teachers. This article reports on findings from an analysis of all data from this project that pertained to how teachers engaged students when teaching LGBTQ content. Data was collected over a six-month period and includes 22 teacher interviews, 28 observations of classroom instruction, 70 teacher log entries, and 25 teacher questionnaires. Findings/Results Analysis showed that participants felt a tension between a desire to make LGBTQ identity visible and a desire to offer LGBTQ students privacy. Participants employed two different approaches to navigating the visibility–privacy tension. Some created parallel engagement strategies for students, some public and some private, while others simultaneously allowed for privacy and visibility through the use of anonymity. Conclusions/Recommendations As conceptions of diversity expand to include sexual diversity, this study has implications for teacher preparation and professional development aimed at supporting teachers to attend to the unique needs of LGBTQ students within instructional practice.

Slam Poetry: An Artistic Resistance Toward Identity, Agency, and Activism

ABSTRACTIn this essay, the authors present experiences as writers (poets), thinkers, and activists to explicate the literary genre of slam poetry and its affordances as an artistic resistance toward the end of identity, agency, and activism. These areas of development are critical for youth because they are beginning to be navigated and established during adolescence. As youth engage in individual identity formation and define their values in relation to the world around them, slam has the potential to act as a vehicle for that exploration. Through the sharing of a dialogic exchange about slam poetry, the authors discuss the purpose and power of language and provide considerations for ways in which this out-of-school literacy act can be transferred into classroom spaces with youth. This work is timely; the need for youth to make sense of their worlds is an urgent compulsion and English language arts instruction needs a major shift to focus on criticality as much as schools currently focus on skills and proficiencies.

Exploring the Way of Korean Language Arts Education for NCS-Based Career Communication Competency Development

Exploring the Way of Korean Language Arts Education for NCS-Based Career Communication Competency Development

The Effect of an LGBTQ Themed Literary Instructional Unit on Adolescents’ Homophobia

Numerous scholarly works extol the use of LGBTQ themed literature as part of English language arts instruction with the implication that its use may improve the school climate for LGBTQ students; however, there is a dearth of research that empirically examines whether or not this type of instruction measurably impacts adolescents’ homophobia. To address this paucity, this study examined the ability of a dialogically organized, reader response–based instructional unit of the young adult novel Geography Club to reduce adolescents’ homophobia. A quasi-experimental design was used with eighth grade students in seven English language arts classes. Homophobia was measured using a researcher-created scale. Analysis of pretests revealed that girls had lower levels of homophobia than boys and that Black students had higher levels of homophobia than Hispanic students. Posttest results indicated that the intervention was successful in lowering homophobia. Exploratory factor analysis revealed a three factor solution: Interpersonal Homophobia, Attitudes toward Homophobia, and Sexuality as a Choice. Post-hoc tests revealed differing effect sizes for the aforementioned factors as well as showing that there was no backlash to treatment in participants with high pretest homophobia. This paper argues that schools and teacher education programs should make a serious effort to incorporate LGBTQ themed texts into curricula as part of a concerted effort to reduce the culture of homophobic violence that has become institutionalized in many schools.

It Sounds More Like a Gangbanger: Using Collaborative Translation to Understand Literary Concepts

The authors present and discuss an instructional strategy—collaborative translation—that builds upon the cultural and linguistic strengths that many bilingual and emerging bilingual students bring to school. Collaborative translation involves six steps: choosing appropriate texts, connecting students to texts, independent reading, sharing the main idea, requesting a translation, and sharing/critiquing those translations. We discuss and explore aspects of collaborative translation to help language arts teachers enact this instructional strategy in the classroom. We view collaborative translation as an important way for teachers to simultaneously teach literacy concepts and support the development of bilingual students.—

Disciplinary Literacy in English Language Arts: Exploring the Social and Problem‐Based Nature of Literary Reading and Reasoning

AbstractDespite many calls for K–12 disciplinary literacy instruction—instruction that teaches students the specialized ways of reading, writing, and reasoning of the academic disciplines—there are questions about what disciplinary literacy instruction means for the prominent school domain of English language arts. This article investigates the disciplinary literacy practices and teaching approaches of 10 university‐based literary scholars who participated in semistructured interviews and verbal protocols with literary fiction. Findings point to the fundamentally social and problem‐based nature of academic work with literature and to a set of six shared literary literacy practices that scholars use in their work with literature. These findings were generated as part of a larger study that compared literacy practices and teaching approaches of 10 university‐based scholars and 12 high school English language arts teachers (Rainey, 2015).

“I write to show how beautiful my languages are”: Translingual Writing Instruction in English-Dominant Classrooms

This is a generative time in the study of language, literacy, and education as scholars theorize and examine the possibilities of leveraging students’ linguistic repertoires as pedagogical resources. In this cross-case analysis, we share how three elementary language arts teachers in different regions of the United States developed translingual contexts for writing and how those practices served English learners’ composing practices. Findings suggest that community languages and literacies, teacher modeling, and the use and study of linguistically diverse texts are integral to building translingual writing contexts for bilingual learners, including those in English-dominant classrooms.

What Teachers Want: A Statewide Survey of Reading and English Language Arts Teachers’ Instructional Materials, Preferences, and Practices

ABSTRACTThis study reports the results of a survey of a representative sample of 1,206 elementary reading and English Language Arts teachers in Oregon to learn (1) what materials are currently being used, (2) what materials teachers would prefer, and (3) what instructional practices teachers use. Qualitative data included 365 comments and 34 interviews with participants. Results indicated that in grades K–6 core reading programs were the predominant material, but that these teachers also preferred to use trade books. The majority of grade 7–12 teachers reported mainly using trade books. Teachers reported using promising literacy practices, but data indicated that packaged programs are associated with reduced opportunities for students to engage in these practices. Teachers wanted to use their professional judgment to make decisions about materials.

Teaching Quality Across School Settings

ABSTRACTDistricts are increasingly making personnel decisions based on teachers’ impact on student-achievement gains and classroom observations. In some schools, however, a teacher’s practices and their students’ achievement may reflect not just individual but collaborative efforts. In other settings, teachers’ instruction benefits less from the insights and support of their colleagues. This article analyzes multiple measures of teacher and teaching quality for 24 language arts teachers in New York City who teach in different types of school environments. Teachers in different value-added quartiles were observed and scored using two protocols, PLATO and CLASS. Schools were categorized as more and less functional using Department of Education environment grades. To compare the practices of higher and lower value-added teachers in more and less functional schools, we conduct MANOVAs of observation scores and use qualitative coding of field notes. We find value-added measures and observation protocols provide confirmatory information in less functional schools but provide contradictory information about teacher quality in more functional schools. Implications for teacher education, policy, and future research are discussed.