Connecting Kids to Texts: Connections, Positioning, and Participation in an ESL Book Group

• In Event: Relationality in Multilingual Language and Literacy Learning

Abstract

This qualitative research study examined the connections made by refugee and immigrant youth in an elementary ESL book group. Employing positioning as theoretical lens, I used discourse analysis to examine data collected through ethnographic methods. Findings indicate that despite prompting by the teacher, students tended not to make connections to the text’s portrayal of refugees, despite being refugee-background themselves. Instead, they seemed to resist the teacher’s positioning of them as similar to refugees in the text. Alternatively, when given freedom to choose the content of their text connections, students were more likely to make connections to the text, and to position themselves as experts on a topic of their choosing. Implications for literacy research, theory, and teaching are discussed.

Author

• Jackie Ridley, Kent State University