Destabilizing Certainty in Education: Moving toward Teaching and Learning Literacy as Uncertainty and Risk

Session Submission Type: Symposium

Abstract

Certainty in education is encouraged in today’s high-stakes testing and accountability milieu. This symposium moves toward uncertainty in literacy instruction. First, we begin with the theoretical underpinnings which make this movement toward uncertainty possible. Second, we theorize preservice teachers’ articulation of uncertainty in “narratives of tension.” Finally, we interrogate notions of pedagogical risk-taking as uncertainty when supporting language validation. All three studies frame uncertainty as a means for mobilization and humanization in ELA classrooms.

Content Area

• Area 3: Literacy Instruction and Literacy Learning

Chair

• Kevin J. Burke, University of Georgia

Discussant

• Kevin J. Burke, University of Georgia

Individual Presentations

• Destabilizing Certainty in Education: Moving toward Teaching and Learning Literacy as Uncertainty and Risk - Mary Martha Neville, Michigan State University; Mandie Dunn, Michigan State University; Scott Jarvie, Michigan State University; Jennifer VanDerHeide, Michigan State University