Background and Relevance in Text Selection

• In Event: 73.061 - Roundtable Session 32
  In Roundtable Session: 73.061-1 - Negotiating Multiple Literacies Across Social Contexts

Abstract

In today's increasingly time-strapped classrooms, purposeful text selection is essential for students to obtain frequent opportunities to participate in higher order thinking about texts. This year-long ethnographic study examined the discursive processes and practices over time of elementary students (and their teacher) before, during, and after teacher-led read-aloud discussions of literary texts in an after-school club. The study investigated the student opportunities for talking, thinking, and understanding provided by discussing the controversial topics of the texts. The analyses illustrate the consequences to student thinking and meaning-making when controversial texts are used in read-alouds as a springboard for discussion.

Authors

• Kim Skinner, Louisiana State University

• Audra Skukauskaite, University of the Incarnate Word