Social Dimensions of Adolescents’ Engagement With Narrative Texts

• In Event: Negotiating Identities, Cultures, and Discourses in Educational Settings

Abstract

This mixed methods study expands the construct of engaged reading in narrative texts. Using (a) quantitative measures from 343 eighth graders linking behavioral and cognitive engagement to social phenomena, including dialogic interaction inside and outside of texts, and (b) qualitative data from 149 interviews from students in highly engaged classrooms, we argue that engaged reading of narrative texts--typically conceived as an individual event-- is fully and inseparably social. Specifically, our data demonstrate that it involves one layer of social engagement through dialogic relationships with characters and a second, but not separate, layer that involves dialogic relationships with others outside of texts. These social processes are linked not only to literacy development, but also to social and personal development.

Authors

• Peter H. Johnston, University at Albany - SUNY

• Gay Ivey, University of Wisconsin - Madison