Examining Critical Moments During Classroom Conversations in Two Literacy Classrooms

• In Event: Engaging With Teachers in Justice-Oriented and Culturally Sustaining Pedagogies

Abstract

In classrooms, the work of critical literacy often happens within moment-to-moment and improvised interactions, despite teachers’ planned lessons. These critical literacy moments can be opportunities for constructive dialogue or they can be missed opportunities that are not taken up by teachers and students for a variety of reasons. The purpose of this proposal, then, is to explore critical literacy as situated moments within classroom interactions. To do that, we draw on Dewey’s concept of transactional realism to investigate classroom talk within critical literacy moments in a grade 6 Swedish classroom and in a U.S. high school classroom. Critical literacy as critical moments are important for teachers who strive to make the classroom a critical environment for the students.

Authors

• Catarina Schmidt, Jönköping University

• Ninni Wahlstrom, Linnaeus University

• Amy Vetter, University of North Carolina Greensboro