Social Justice Educators Integrating Social Studies and Language Arts

• In Event: Sylvia and Aki: The Power of a Mentor Text for Innovation in the Teaching of Language Arts and Social Studies With Diverse Students

Abstract

Objectives
The primary purpose of this research was to cultivate a rich description of ways fourth grade bilingual teachers read, discuss, and provide affordances across two languages for students learning about and responding to the characters and historical events represented in mentor texts. Drawing from a larger qualitative study, this paper examines the literary responses, both oral and written, of students in two fourth grade classes.

Theoretical Framework
Informed with a critical visual and textual analysis approach (Rogers, 2009), the two teachers planned for students to develop linguistic, cultural and literate repertoires through an integrated language arts and social studies unit based on texts with social justice themes. Specific biographical picture books such as The Story of Ruby Bridges (Coles, 2010) and José Born to Dance: The Story of Jose Limón (Reich, 2005) were used to introduce the unit. The central text was the chapter book, Sylvia and Aki (Conkling, 2011). This mentor text and its book cover by award-winning illustrator, Raúl Colón, provided opportunities to study ways illustrators complement texts with imagery. The texts and images offer accurate, engaging representation of the Mexican-American, African-American, and Japanese-American experience. In short, the texts fulfill the criteria for mentor texts to “show, not just tell, students how to write well” (Dorfman & Cappelli, 2007). Literacy educators propose that mentor texts positively influence the choices children make in the voice and literary features of their own writing (Corden, 2009) and assist them in their emergent knowledge of different genres (Chapman, 1994).
Methods/Data Sources
An instrumental case study method was used for data collection (Stake, 2006) in order to examine the research question: How do bilingual educators utilize a mentor text for students to compose across the social studies and language arts curricular areas and for their own purposes? 44 fourth graders in two classrooms participated in the study.
Results
Over the six-week unit, students’ growing understandings of historical events (e.g. Japanese internment camps, school segregation) were traced and themes of borders and separation, sympathy and empathy, and insider and outsider perspectives were examined. Overall, students demonstrated increased metalinguistic awareness of literal and figurative language and experienced critical encounters with societal issues. The findings endorse the use of culturally relevant mentor texts for making fluid connections across texts, content areas, and languages.

Significance
The rationale for selecting fourth grade relied on the premise that it is a transitional year. Some have characterized fourth grade as a critical transition for students. While some children transition smoothly to fourth grade, other students struggle with content area material. Additionally, in transitional bilingual programs students are also typically moving listening, speaking, reading and composing in Spanish to English. While the teachers read the mentor text, Sylvia and Aki, out loud in English, they provided many scaffolds for unknown vocabulary, events, and literary features by using Spanish language support as needed. These hybrid language practices along with analysis of culturally specific visual communication (Cowan, 1999) that accompany mentor texts provides innovative directions for future research.

Authors

• Lucia Cardenas Curiel, The University of Texas - Austin

• Noreen Rodriguez, University of Texas