Education

This visual literacy study, embedded in an intergenerational instructional innovation at an urban primary-junior school in Ontario, Canada, used photography to ascertain caregivers' perceptions of their children's everyday experiences. Photographs, logs, and discussion sessions documented the culture-filtered understandings and sensibilities of caregivers as they reflected upon children's educational experiences in their newly adopted country. Beyond this anticipated function, these data sources served as conduits through which professional educators could access domains of knowledge related to spheres of influence in children's lives that are not normally discovered through standard schooling practices. Equally importantly, they helped immigrant parents to access, and better understand, the diverse resources that children call upon as they navigate various aspects of their Diaspora experiences. Thusly, the photographs functioned not simply as representational icons that substituted for verbal texts but also as heuristics that drove participants' thinking about the psychological and social worlds of immigrant students.

The school-age population in North America is characterized by increasing linguistic, cultural, and ethnic diversity. The authors argue that non-mainstream students do not perform as well in schools as mainstream students (predominantly white, middle-class English speakers) because they are not equitably served by the educational system. They explore some of the complexities of educational equity and consider equity issues in the literacy education of language minority students from four different perspectives: individual student characteristics, sociocultural factors, language issues, and instructional issues. In support of their position, they examine each of these areas in turn, providing illustrations and analysis. They conclude with several principles upon which to build practices to make literacy education more equitable for all students.

We report findings of an ethnographic study that explored complexities of English Language Teaching (ELT) in a minority indigenous context in northwestern Mexico. The study investigated a trilingual education setting at the nexus of 2 major events: incorporation of Intercultural Bilingual Education throughout Mexico and integration of ELT into the country's public school system. Methods included participant observation in primary-level language classes and semi-structured interviews with educators and other stakeholders affiliated with a rural school where an indigenous variety, a societal variety, and a foreign language were taught. Findings indicate that teacher agency was a powerful tool in linguistic and cultural maintenance and transforming language policy and planning at the local level. Although the spread of English may be unavoidable, with local community involvement and a school-based commitment to support linguistic and cultural maintenance, the micro language policy context can be configured to promote a symbiotic relationship among linguistic varieties.

This article reports key findings from a project that focused on the academic literacy development of children who are born and/or begin their formal schooling in Canada but are raised in homes where the societally dominant language is not the primary idiom. Analyses involved characterizing students' home ecological environments; assessing the nature of students' challenges in relation to schoolbased literacy demands; and documenting collaborations with professional educators in generating cognitively and pedagogically differentiated instructional approaches. Findings are interpreted as three disjunctive conditions that impede the development of academic literacy competencies and, thus, schooling success of G1.5 linguistic minority students. Précis/Résumé Cet article présente les principaux résultats d'un projet axé sur le développement de la littératie scolaire des enfants qui sont nés et / ou de commencer leur scolarité au Canada, mais sont élevés dans des foyers où la langue dominante socialement n'est pas l'idiome primaire. Analyses impliqués caractérisation des étudiants environnements domestiques écologiques, d'évaluer la nature des difficultés des élèves par rapport aux exigences d'alphabétisation en milieu scolaire, et la documentation des collaborations avec des professionnels de l'éducation dans la production cognitive et pédagogique approches pédagogiques différenciées. Les résultats sont interprétés comme trois conditions alternatives qui entravent le développement des compétences en littératie académique et, par conséquent, la réussite scolaire des élèves issus de minorités linguistiques G1.5.

This paper is about the role played by ideology in a teacher research group. Treatments of teacher research remain mainly directed at clarifying the content, the status, and the boundaries .of the research practice engaged in by teachers and describing how teacher research contrasts with "university research" with regard to these elements. We focus on the differing ideologies of research, teaching/learning, and writing held and developed by the members o f a teacher research group. The concept of ideology is used to emphasize that beliefs about society, politics, and cognition were intimately bound up in the teacher researchers' different perspectives. In analyzing the ideological positions that developed within the group, and the conflicts and interchanges among participants, we show that there exist important divisions within the teacher research movement that are intellectually creative and socially important in their potential to generate needed discussion of assumptions underlying pedagogic practice.

This paper reports findings of a study which addressed caretakers' rationales and actions in support of Spanish language maintenance and the issues they confronted in pursuing this goal. Analysis focuses on both respondents' attitudes regarding individual bilingualism as an idealized social construct and the reasons behind their personal decisions with regard to home language use. On a societal level, respondents favored an arrangement defined by cultural pluralism and viewed individual bilingualism as a means to promote this goal. The rationale given most frequently by caretakers when asked specifically about their personal motivations for using Spanish with their children concerned instrumental benefits from being bilingual: knowing Spanish would serve their children well academically, give them an advantage in a competitive job market, and help them to adapt in the face of possible geographic relocation. However, analysis of the interviews as life stories revealed that when not explicitly asked about rationales for their personal decisions on behalf of Spanish, caretakers tended to emphasize their commitment to the minority language as an act of affirmation of group identity. Such analysis also revealed that support for a strategy of maintenance required constant reaffirmation as families struggled with changes in their life circumstances.

This annotated bibliography includes about 170 citations of dissertations, articles, papers, and other studies concerning the development of writing skills in non-native English-speakers. The works cited are based on the collection and analysis of data, and do not include articles describing or prescribing pedagogical approaches or curricula. Similarly, pieces written primarily for the purpose of constructing evaluative measures are not included. Entries are presented in five sections that focus on the following: (1) text features (error analysis of syntax and mechanics, discourse features); (2) non-native writing proficiency development (bilingual emergent literacy, later elementary and secondary development, literate adults); (3) the writing process (relationship to attitude, revision, and effect of task and other conteXtual variables); (4) non-native writing and other language skills (reading/writing relationship, speaking/writing relationship, relationship to native language writing ability); and (5) instructional factors (curriculum and program design, teacher response to student writing). An author index is included. (MSE)

Using ethnographic observations of 30 children in a multicultural inner-city fifth grade class over a period of one year, a study examined the children's classroom interactions with the literary genres of science fiction and fantasy, investigating their sequential acquisition of the constitutive elements of the two genres as well as their abilities to differentiate between these genres along dimensions such as true/untrue or possible/impossible. The study also examined the relationship between the literature children read and the stories they write, and traced the evolution of children's constructs of genre with cumulative exposure to a genre based curriculum. Field notes were taken on the teacher's structuring of classroom curriculum, the participant formats of Language Arts activities, and the literacy environment (books in the classroom and library, videos, audio tapes, field trips) in which the acquisition of genre was embedded. Data also included lesson transcripts, and transcripts of learners' formal and informal interviews with the teacher and a researcher. The children's stories were collected after they had read within a particular genre. Finding$ suggest that a combination of inter-and intra-genre exploration across different media, facilitated by context-sensitive pedagogical strategies, best promotes the extension of children's notions of genre. (Two student stories and 26 references are appended.) (MM)

This article explores findings of a project that addressed the academic literacy development of children who are born and/or begin their formal schooling in Canada, but who are raised in homes where the societally dominant language is not the primary idiom. It focuses on collaborating educators’ professional learning through engagement in community-referenced action research that provided opportunities for eighth graders to explore themes related to their developing personal and socially situated identities. One key insight pertained to students’ access to information regarding their family histories and trajectories; a second, to linguistic dynamics internal to generation 1.5 linguistic minority youths’ households.

This article elucidates findings of an action research initiative that focused on the school engagement and social and cultural adaptation of a cohort of early study abroad students, aged 15–19, attending an urban secondary school in Ontario. The study was part of a federally sponsored partnership that supported the collaboration of postsecondary researchers with professionals working within a publicly funded organization. Despite challenges and disruptions to the schooling context, the team proactively pursued a strategy of developing students’ resilience and self-advocacy skills while promoting their adaptation and acculturation to Ontario schooling and society. An agenda that fostered opportunities for face-to-face activities inside and outside class helped build social connections among international students and between students and staff that proved key to their academic engagement, cultural integration, and sense of well-being.

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This article addresses findings of a pilot study focused on the schooling experiences and social and cultural adaptation of international/visa students who have come to Canada to learn English and obtain an Ontario Secondary School Diploma. Nonnative speakers of English and noncitizens of Canada, they are generally brought to Canada by relatives who depart after installing them with host families with whom they have had virtually no previous contact. Respondents reported that most of these youths’ parents have made considerable sacrifices in the hope that acquisition of “legitimate” English will give their child access to global citizenship and a secure future. Findings indicate that many early study abroad international students experience difficulties with second language socialization and are considered “at risk” for academic failure. Testimony from educators and focal students reveals that this cohort experiences significant adaptation issues, including: loneliness and disorient...

Reviewed by LUCY JONES Discourse and Identity is a monograph aimed at scholars and students interested in identity and its relationship to language. An introduction to theories and approaches, this book offers a guide to the field via existing data and analyses and is designed to be a valuable resource and reference for scholars in this area. The book aims to introduce the study of identity as constructed in discourse across a variety of disciplines (including linguistics, psychology and cultural studies) and the authors offer case studies to support their overview of work in each area. Focusing primarily on methodology, the first half of the book considers interactional and ideological approaches to identity through the analysis of discourse extracts. Though confusing at times due to the huge variety of approaches covered, the authors impressively link together the array of interdisciplinary methods in order to set the foundation for the remainder of the book. The second half considers some literal and ideological contexts in which identity is constructed through discourse, at which point the foundation laid out by the opening chapters on methodology becomes clearer. In this sense, the second half of the book contextually applies the theory and method detailed in the first. To introduce the book, the authors use an illustrative stretch of discourse from British fashion show What Not to Wear (BBC Television), where the 'style gurus' from the programme explain how they can find their participant's 'true identity' by setting her up in the 'right' clothes. The brief analysis offered raises the issue of identity as stylistic practice (since it is apparent that the way in which we adorn ourselves is seen as an expression of our identity) yet it also demonstrates the assumptions of essentialism that underlie much of the work into identity to date. The concept of identity as constructed through style is a contemporary one, with scholars such as Irvine (2001) arguing that the meaning behind style is ideologically mediated and thus contextually specific. This approach demonstrates how style is used to construct fluid identities rather than it being a reflection of a 'true' or 'natural' self. This is in contrast to early variationist work in sociolinguistics which took the vernacular, or 'unconscious' speech as reflective of a fixed social identity. Approaches which consider discourse as the means by which identity is constituted rather than the place in which it is reflected have since come to fruition (cf. Eckert and Rickford 2001), and it is this constructionist stance which is articulated in the book's introduction.