Secondary English Language Arts Research Articles

Promoting Theory and Practice: A Year-Long Residency Program to Better Prepare Future Educators

A challenge frequently voiced in the field of teacher preparation is the divide between theory and practice. Specifically, university coursework is often viewed as “the theory,” with classroom teaching experiences in PreK-12 settings being considered “the practice.” One Teacher Preparation Program re-designed their program to address this divide and better prepare pre-service teachers (PSTs) for their futures as educators. To do this, the re-designed program included more authentic classroom experiences through the implementation of a year-long residency model and the creation of a residency-specific course. This article details how an English methods course and residency course were designed to support PSTs as they made connections to their residency experiences. In this way, PSTs majoring in secondary English Language Arts (ELA) education were immersed within middle and secondary ELA classrooms as residents, while simultaneously engaging in rigorous university coursework, which sought to promote educational theory and practice. Specific instructional approaches and assignments are shared, along with reflections on what was learned.

We Teach English in Times of Perpetual Crisis: The Long (and Tedious) History of Reading Crisis

Secondary English language arts teachers need to reclaim the complex and true stories of literacy as a resistance to the “science of reading” movement and new reading legislation across the US.

Opening, deepening, and widening dialogic space in argument classrooms

ABSTRACT Given the importance of teaching and learning argumentation, across disciplines for participation in academic and civil discourse, this article examines how dialogic space is created and sustained in classrooms where argument is taught and learned and, when it is created, what affordances it brings to learning argumentation. Dialogic space is a shared space of mutual resonance where we see, feel, or think things from at least 2 points of view at once. While any instructional setting has the potential to create dialogic space, this potential is not always realized. Using data from previously published research on classroom discourse around argumentation in secondary English language arts classrooms, I present how dialogic space can be opened, deepened, and widened as well as how teachers can engage students in argumentation within this space. I conclude by briefly discussing the contexts and affordances of creating dialogic space in argument classrooms.

Relational Poetic Practice: Affordances and Possibilities of High School Teachers’ Online Poetry Community during COVID-19

Using interpretive phenomenological analysis of oral history interviews, this study explored poetic experiences of nine US secondary English language arts teachers who participated in a month of online poetry writing during COVID-19. The manuscript explores how poetic relationality created space for these secondary English language arts teachers, mostly in rural school districts, to reflect on their realities during COVID-19. These teachers came to understand themselves not just as teachers but also as poets, an understanding that helped sustain them as they taught in digital contexts, during social distancing and school closures.

Stories of Self, Stories of us: Bearing Witness and Writing Testimonios

This article examines the purpose of testimonio as a written genre and the ways in which personal, identity-driven writing instruction can be valuable in a secondary English language arts classroom.

Down but not out: Using restorying to imagine beyond the constraints of mandated texts for critical thinking, empathy, and identity work

AbstractIn this paper, we highlight how restorying with preservice secondary English language arts teachers can encourage them to explore what is possible with mandated texts, like those found in the canon, for diverse world building centered in empathy, self‐exploration, and justice. Findings highlight the critical reflective process preservice teachers engaged in as they restoryed canonical texts. These findings highlight and how preservice teachers can use restorying as a way to engage the self and others for more inclusive storytelling. Finally, the authors argue that in oppressive spaces that seek to silence marginalized voices, restorying can act as a subversive tool to engage in work that bends toward justice.

Capturing the Shift: Interviews During Pivotal Covid-19 Debut

During a two-term observational study of my Secondary English Language Arts (ELA) class, I introduced “surrealism” to the existing curriculum. Jot notes, personal interviews, and a self-study comprised my data strands. The Covid-19 pandemic struck shortly before my scheduled in-person interviews. This uncertainty disrupted my doctoral study plans, but offered a valuable opportunity for critical reflection. The fears and questions prompted by the pandemic were captured in the vulnerable “safe space” of our at-home Zoom interviews. This process thus prompted my contemplation about interviews as a continued method for combatting the stagnancy of educational spaces.

Identifying factors that promote or inhibit disability-related discussion in secondary English language arts classrooms

ABSTRACT Although disabled people encounter discrimination in almost every facet of life – such as employment, housing, education, healthcare, and transportation – disability is often missing from conversations regarding social justice. Disability-related discussion (DRD) in English Language Arts (ELA) offers an inroad to having students view disability through a social justice lens. This exploratory, qualitative study examines the factors that influence 13 secondary (6–12) ELA teachers’ decisions to lead (or refrain from leading) DRD in classrooms in the United States. Findings reveal that primary factors that helped or hindered DRD included the role of subject/curriculum, school and classroom culture, and personal factors. Participants also expressed a desire for professional development related to DRD, as well as increased curricular representation within ELA. This study represents a critical first step in solidifying disability as a component of social justice by identifying factors that secondary ELA teachers encounter when attempting to discuss disability in their classrooms.

High School Matters: Game On: Writing with Twine in a Secondary English Language Arts Classroom

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Illustrating linguistic dexterity in “English mostly” spaces: how translanguaging can support academic writing in secondary ELA classrooms

PurposeLittle research has been done exploring the nature of multilingual students who are not categorized as English language learners (ELLs) in English language arts (ELA) classes. This study about a group of multilingual girls in an ELA class led by a monolingual white teacher aims to show how, when a teacher makes space for translanguaging practices in ELA, multilingual students disrupt norms of English only.Design/methodology/approachThe authors use reconstructive discourse analysis to understand translanguaging across a variety of linguistic productions for a group of four focal students. Data sources include fieldnotes from 29 classroom observations, writing samples and process documents and 8.5 h of recorded classroom discourse.FindingsStudents used multilingualism across a variety of discourse modes, frequently in spoken language and rarely in written work. Translanguaging was most present in small-group peer talk structures, where students did relationship building, generated ideas for writing and managed their writing agendas, including feelings about writing. In addition, Spanish served as “elevated vocabulary” in writing. Across discourse modes, translanguaging served to develop academic proficiency in writing.Originality/valueThe authors proposed a more expansive approach to data analysis in English-mostly cases – i.e. environments shaped by multilingual students in monolingual school contexts – to argue for anti-deficit approaches to literacy development for multilingual students. Analyzing classroom talk alongside literacy allows for a more nuanced understanding of translanguaging practices in academic writing. They also show how even monolingual teachers can disrupt monolingual hegemony in ELA classrooms with high populations of multilingual students.

The Category Is “Pandemic Queer”: Reading, Connecting, and Reimagining Literacy with LGBTQ+ Youth in the Age of COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic, coupled with the ensuing lockdown and political turmoil, ruptured many young people’s experiences and well-being, particularly students who face additional marginalization due to systemic oppression. A national survey conducted by the Trevor Project (2021) found that nearly 70% of LGBTQ youth noted that their health was “poor” most or all of the time during the COVID-19 pandemic. Factors contributing to this deterioration include LGBTQ youth being isolated from the supportive communities formed at school, lacking access to social services provided by schools, and being quarantined with family members who were unsupportive (Cohen, 2021; Valencia, 2020). These fissures in support and resource structures curtailed potentially affirming and integral education, social, and emotional experiences, particularly for LGBTQ youth who thrived in traditional schooling settings. However, it is also important to note that even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, many schools were not idealized institutions for LGBTQ youth. K-12 schools, situated in the broader socio-political landscape of the United States, are bastions of homo-, trans-, and queerphobia (Mayo, 2014). Still, many LGBTQ young people employed resilience and ingenuity to create affirming and loving social circles, which were thus interrupted by restrictions, trauma, and isolation during the pandemic. As LGBTQ educators we sought to co-create an online community that could reflect the brilliance and joy of LGBTQ youth during the 2020-2021 school year. Through both our own experiences and the research, we know that LGBTQ youth find ways to construct community through online avenues, even when said avenues are limited and flawed, such as Tumblr (Cavalcante, 2019; Haimson, et al., 2021; Wargo, 2017). Building on our experiences as secondary English language arts teachers, we constructed a national online book club dedicated to reading, analyzing, and celebrating LGBTQ young adult literature with LGBTQ youth. After a summer of planning, we launched the online book club that resulted in over 125 secondary students from across the United States (and some international students) joining us for a year to engage in readings of Abdi Nazemian’s Like a Love Story (2019), Dean Atta’s Black Flamingo (2019), Gabby Rivera’s Juliet Takes a Breath (2016), and Mark Oshiro’s Anger is a Gift (2018). This article details how we structured a community of readers who worked to analyze young adult literature through intersectional and anti-oppressive lenses (Blackburn &amp; Smith, 2010; Durand, 2015; Herman-Wilmarth &amp; Ryan, 2015), deepen their critical consciousness relating to contemporary LGBTQ socio-political topics (Kelly &amp; Currie, 2020), and leveraged social media and online avenues to construct community that expanded the boundaries of school hallways (Lucero, 2017; Mayo, 2014). Collectively, we seek to illustrate how LGBTQ+ communities (and queer pedagogies) can flourish and develop outside the limitations of K-12 institutions.

Re-narrating grammar instruction: addressing teachers’ narrative understanding of language use

This study examines teaching about grammar and language use in secondary schools through a narrative lens. The author analyses narrative episodes in interviews with three secondary English language arts teachers in the USA to identify patterns in stories of teaching about language use. Findings show teachers with vastly different life experiences teaching in different contexts orient to the same dominant school language narrative that requires students to accommodate the prejudicial expectations for language use held by a wider society. The author argues the maintenance of traditional school language teaching, despite more than 60 years of research in educational linguistics showing its ineffectiveness, stems from the strength of this dominant school language narrative. Ultimately, the author proposes an adoption of narrative methods in working with teachers to actively re-write the dominant school language narrative; foregrounding a critical approach with the goal of addressing social inequities through language use.

Embedding learning goals into secondary literacy curriculum: Assessing and implementing teachers' feedback

AbstractFocusing on a large study of the implementation of secondary English Language Arts curriculum in California and Washington, we assess how teachers use learning goals to support students developing expert learning practices. Highlighting the value of goal setting to support students' agency in learning to write, we describe teachers' reasons for not teaching these strategies more than any other aspect of the curriculum, as well as highlight the strategies of teachers who made learning goals meaningful. We ultimately offer the cycle for cultivating expert learners as a possible solution for professional development to better support goal setting through curricular planning.

Shifting pedagogy, shifting practice: teachers’ perceptions of project-based learning in English language arts

PurposeThis paper aims to explore teachers’ shifts in pedagogy and practice as they implemented a project-based learning (PBL) approach to teaching English Language Arts (ELA) for the first time.Design/methodology/approachThe authors interviewed 10 ninth-grade ELA teachers in three schools after their first year enacting PBL. Initial codes were developed deductively from the interview questions and others emerged from the data. The authors also used memos to contextualize the interviews and triangulate findings.FindingsTeachers described embracing new, expansive approaches to teaching ELA as they shifted from focusing on skills to big questions, and from literary analysis to “real-world” writing and assessment. These data illuminated three tensions around “traditional” versus PBL approaches to ELA: What counts as ELA? What counts as student success? And is PBL for everyone?Originality/valueFew studies have explored teacher perceptions of PBL in secondary ELA classrooms. This paper uniquely illuminates some pathways for addressing the tension between “traditional” and PBL approaches. The authors call for deliberate, ongoing and gradualistic approaches to engaging in PBL routines that support educators to make meaningful shifts in instruction.

Playful Multiliteracies: Fan‐Based Literacies' Role in English Language Arts Pedagogy

AbstractStandards and their corresponding assessments have continued to narrow English language arts (ELA) curricula, pushing more playful, creative composition to the margins or to out‐of‐school pursuits. Simultaneously, students enjoy writing creatively in many extracurricular spaces and activities, like fanfiction. Building from research showing that fan‐based literacies align with ELA curriculum, this collective case study explores how three secondary ELA teachers incorporated their professional learning about fandoms into their classrooms. Framed in multiliteracies and theories of play, qualitative data generated through interviews, surveys, and artifact collection were iteratively analyzed to establish themes that illuminate how these teachers valued fan‐based literacies within their curricula. Findings reveal teacher perspectives about fanfiction's role in fostering analytic reading of texts, cultivating creative responses to literature, scaffolding essay writing about real questions, and engaging students in the work of ELA. An argument for centering playful reading and writing in classrooms is presented.

Research: ELA Teachers and Whiteness: Hesitancy as Barrier to Teacher Agency Development

This study examines ways preservice teachers transfer their developing agentive identities—specifically around race/ism, inequity, and whiteness—from the teacher education context to secondary English language arts classrooms, as well as barriers preventing that transfer. This inquiry utilized qualitative case study methods to conduct in-depth analysis of six ELA preservice teachers’ written reflections, class discussions, and student-instructor conferences. While the preservice teachers showed evidence of developing “theoretical agency” in the teacher education context, they often struggled to maintain their agentive poses within secondary ELA contexts. Their struggles manifest as hesitancy connected to their awareness of and navigation of their own whiteness. Findings suggest preservice teachers need opportunities to interrogate whiteness through curricula and structural inequities and to engage in agency development across a variety of contexts.

Research: “Can Someone Please Say Something?”: Avoiding Chaos in a Virtual Environment

This study investigated the experiences of preservice secondary English language arts (ELA) teacher candidates (n=12) as they attempted to complete their crucial student teaching field experience during the 2020–2021 pandemic crises. In addition, it looked at their university supervisors’ (n=3) experiences as they sought to mentor and guide the teacher candidates through a virtual environment. Findings indicated both positive and negative consequences for participants. Overall, the student teachers and university supervisors remained optimistic about the internship experience and found value in it. Yet the complexities of schedules, digital platforms, and expectations took a heavy toll with one student dropping out and another deciding to go to law school after finishing their education degree. Implications for supporting student teachers and mentors in virtual environments are included, along with recommendations for future research on promoting the cultivation of digital pedagogy in ELA preservice coursework.

Toward the automated analysis of teacher talk in secondary ELA classrooms

Qualities of teacher talk strongly affect student learning, yet opportunities for teachers to receive feedback on their talk face time and cost limitations. To address this, we developed a semi-automated method of analyzing teacher talk using Automated Speech Recognition technology, compared it to traditional methods, and used it to analyze teacher talk features in 127 secondary English Language Arts lessons. We found the new method aligned with traditional methods, allowing us to reliably identify interrelated but distinct talk features. These features often reflected dialogic instruction. Our findings contribute to future studies of instructional discourse and technology-driven teacher learning opportunities.

Video Games in the Secondary English Language Arts Classroom: A State‐of‐the‐Art Review of the Literature

AbstractEnglish language arts (ELA) teachers and literacy researchers are increasingly attending to the ways that digital technologies may be integrated into the curriculum. Video games, which now feature extensive narrative structures, interactive play systems, and complex multimodal semiotics, offer one avenue through which ELA teachers can expand upon the texts and literacy practices included in language arts curricula. However, professional resources and research on the use of video games in literacy classrooms remain scarce. To understand how educators have begun to integrate games into ELA curriculum and instruction, the authors conducted a state‐of‐the‐art review of the emerging literature on video games in secondary ELA classrooms. Through an inductive search and coding process, 21 studies were identified and analyzed. Two major findings emerged regarding both the specific instructional practices that instructors in the studies employed and the overall effects on students' learning described in the studies. First, the studies highlighted examples of video game instruction through the use of game analysis, game design and production, text production, and inquiry/research. Second, studies emphasized students’ expanded conceptions of literacies, development of literacy practices, growth of critical and analytical thinking skills, enhanced engagement, and increased opportunities for peer collaboration and mentoring. The authors discuss the implications of these findings for literacy instruction and research.

Moving Beyond Interpretive Monism: A Disciplinary Heuristic to Bridge Literary Theory and Literacy Theory

In this essay, authors Todd Reynolds, Leslie S. Rush, Jodi P. Lampi, and Jodi Patrick Holschuh provide a disciplinary heuristic that bridges literary and literacy theories. The secondary English language arts (ELA) classroom is situated at the intersection between literary theory and literacy theory, where too often literary theory does not include pedagogical practices and literacy theory does not take disciplinary differences into account. Reynolds and coauthors propose an English Language Arts heuristic for disciplinary literacy to guide teachers toward embracing student-led interpretations. They explore the connections among the Common Core State Standards, New Criticism, and the ELA classroom and focus on the prevalence of interpretive monism, which is the belief that only one interpretation is appropriate for students when reading a literary text. The essay explicates a heuristic for ELA literacy that centers on students actively creating interpretations of and transforming literary texts. By embracing this heuristic, the authors assert, teachers can focus on student-led interpretations of literary texts and thus empower their students.