Understanding Secondary Educators' Changing Beliefs About and Practices Supporting Adolescent Literacy Learners in Secondary Schools

• In Event: Complicating Asset-Oriented Literacy Pedagogies in the Classroom and Community: Negotiating Funds of Knowledge/Identity Entanglements

Abstract

This study examines secondary educators’ beliefs about readers positioned as needing intervention, and their practices related to instruction and intervention for those readers. The focal educators included in this study served in various roles in 10 urban schools, and participated in a year-long professional development (PD) exploring their approaches to adolescent literacy intervention. Based on an analysis of survey data collected before and after the PD, we found that participants’ beliefs about readers shifted in the post-survey to a more asset-based perspective, where educators identified the specific capabilities of adolescent readers. As well, in the post-survey, participants more clearly described the specific types of interventions they would employ to better support specific adolescent readers in their classrooms and schools.

Authors

• Mark A. Lewis, James Madison University

• Sarah M. Lupo, James Madison University

• Alison Wilson, Relay Graduate School of Education

• Katherine K. Frankel, Boston University