Options, Choices, and Strategies: Academic Literacy and Problem-Solving Capacities of Immigrant Youth

• In Event: 14.044 - Roundtable Session 2
  In Roundtable Session: 14.044-3 - Highlighting Immigrant Capacity, Voice, and Resistance in Learning Contexts

Abstract

Drawing on sociocultural literacy perspectives and utilizing interpretive inquiry approaches, the researcher investigates the ways in which a first-generation immigrant youth from Guinea wrestles with problems posed by academic texts and tasks. Interviews and ethnographic observation data, as well as the youth’s writing samples were collected as part of a larger multi-year study of urban immigrant youth who participate in an after-school program. The findings focus on not only what decisions the youth makes, but also what strategies and knowledge she draws upon when problem solving. The proposed paper contributes to our understanding of what youth think and know about academic literacies, and what they do in response to challenging academic texts and tasks.

Author

• Jie Yie Park, Clark University