bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
“Students’ Right,” English Only, and Re-imagining the Politics of Language
Authors: Horner Bruce
Published: March 2024

Argues that a lack of language legislation is indicative of a pervasive, tacit policy of “English Only” in composition and of a constellation of assumptions about languages, and language users that continues to cripple public debate on English Only and compositionists’ approaches to matters of “error.” Proposes an approach to language and “error” considering the relations of language to power.
Making Writing Matter: Using “the Personal” to Recover[y] and Essential[ist] Tension in Academic Discourse
Authors: Hindman Jane E.
Published: March 2024

In three voices - one as a scholar, one as a writer, and one as an alcoholic - Hindman considers the question: in what ways can our own personal writing illuminate the theory and practice of teaching composition? Demonstrating the process of composing the self within the professional, she responds both passionately and personally to literary criticisms about recovery discourse. Her purpose is to “make writing matter” and, in doing so, to attempt to dispel the tension between competing versions of how the self is constructed. She also considers how, in and for recovery, she learned to write, and how it has affected her professional writing. This type of writing, which she has called “embodied rhetoric,” offers lessons for composing a better life.
REVIEW: Reading Details, Teaching Politics; Political Mantras and the Politics of Luxury
Authors: Stockton Kathryn Bond
Published: March 2024

Teaching, like politics, can be considered to be the “art of repetition.” But teaching, again like politics, is also capable of enlarging our political views by challenging current arguments or by examining the limitations of the argument. The four books reviews here, which examine race, culture, and sexuality, are poised to inform the politics of their readers, but find themselves bound by the problem of political mantras. Says Stockton: “Never have so few propositions been repeated by so many in such a shore time over such a broad range.” Although not without merit, all four books struggle with politicized texts that have all been done before.
Ghosts: Liberal Education and Negotiated Authority
Authors: Gorzelsky Gwen
Published: March 2024

Discusses the relation between professional training and a humanities education. Notes that the humanities in general education and English studies in particular face pressure, in the wake of poststructuralism, to address extra-academic audiences--particularly working-class, working-poor, and lower-middle-class families--with a revised articulation of what a liberal arts education offers.
Opinion: Professional Discord
Authors: Wallen Jeffrey
Published: March 2024

Discusses how the rise of a culture of professionalism--and the attitudes, institutions, and interests that separate and define those within a profession from others--has been of great interest to historians and sociologists, and also to professors of literature. Draws attention to the ways in which professionalization channels discord into a few acceptable forms.
More Than a Feeling: Disappointment and WPA Work
Authors: Micciche Laura R.
Published: March 2024

Addresses the climate of disappointment that characterizes English studies generally and composition studies--particularly writing program administration (WPA). Considers that the context of disappointment is shaped by a number of overlapping factors including: the widely perceived job market collapse in the humanities; the national abuse of adjunct teachers of first-year writing courses; and the general devaluation of the humanities.
Meaning Finds a Way: Chaos (Theory) and Composition
Authors: Kyburz Bonnie Lenore
Published: March 2024

The author suggests that if compositionists consider their work in the context of postmodern sciences such as chaos theory they may entertain the notion that order emerges from chaos in unpredictable yet comprehensible (albeit new and radical) ways. She offers the hope that such a notion may aid them in effectively resisting pressures to define themselves and their students, through practices such as retrogressive pedagogies and standardized testing, as the gatekeepers and practitioners of “order.”
Transforming Audiences for Oral Tradition: Child, Kittredge, Thompson, and Connections of Folklore and English Studies
Authors: Rudy Jill Terry
Published: March 2024

The author examines the careers of Francis James Child, first professor of English at Harvard, and his followers George Lyman Kittredge and Stith Thompson to show how these early professionals’ decisions regarding audience and the relationship of literary and folkloric studies to composition helped to establish issues and audiences in English studies. She suggests that recognition of lingering limitations from the discipline’s early days may enable academics to consider different choices today.
REVIEW: Mind the Gap: Stepping Out with Caution in Assessment and Student Public Writing
Authors: Kalikoff Beth
Published: March 2024

Reviewed are:Public Works: Student Writing as Public Text, edited by Emily J. Isaacs and Phoebe Jackson; Re(Articulating) Writing Assessment for Teaching and Learning, by Brian Huot; and What We Really Value: Beyond Rubrics in Teaching and Assessing Writing, by Bob Broad.
My Learning Disability: A (Digressive) Essay
Authors: Loewenstein Andrea Freud
Published: March 2024

The author recalls her struggles and adaptations—to school, to anti-Semitism, to her family’s history, to her feelings for other women, to her learning disability—before there were terms to make what she experienced a familiar part of our discourse. She suggests that,because the words that might have exempted her from effort or locked her into one category or another were never spoken, she found ways to do what was required and methods of coping that have served her well in life.
Para la Mujer: Defining a Chicana Feminist Rhetoric at the Turn of the Century1
Authors: Enoch Jessica
Published: March 2024

Focusing on the rhetorical work of definition in the writings of Maria Rentería, Sara Estela Ramírez, and Astrea, contributors in the early years of the twentieth century to the Spanish-language newspaper La Crónica, this essay argues that these writers redefined who the Mexican woman was and what her role in the borderlands of Texas and Mexico could be. Its exploration of their definitional claims historicizes Chicana feminist rhetoric, and examines how their work infuses rhetorics of/from color with concerns of gender and class.
Writin da Funk Dealer: Songs of Reflection and Reflex/shuns
Authors: Monroe Kelvin
Published: March 2024

“As if the problem of racism outside of the academy isn’t enough,” the author says, “try thinking about the ways it has informed the very notion of academy and maintains a presence in our academic institutions.” He reflects on his own position in the academy as racialized subject, educand, and educator, departing from Mary Louise Pratt’s notion of an “autoethnography” to engage in a “selfiography,” in the process interrogating not only notions of “blackness” but also the too-often-naturalized assumptions of whiteness.
Making Work Visible
Authors: Seitz David
Published: March 2024

In contrast to the idea that students’ instrumental views of their own education are necessarily productive of conservative middle-class values, the author describes a “work memoir” project he has developed in which working-class students reflect on and articulate their own values, memories, and expectations related to work. The students in the project, four of whom are discussed in detail in the essay, reveal far more complex concerns of identity, social capital, and acculturation.
Opinion: Partisan Review, Our Country, and Our Culture
Authors: Lazere Donald
Published: March 2024

The author raises several issues regarding cultural shifts over the last half-century that he believes were evaded in the Fall 2002 Partisan Review symposium that gives his article its title—including attitudes toward mass culture, the significance and aims of cultural studies, the roles and institutional affiliations of the conservative counterintelligentsia, and the question of intellectual honesty and civility—in the hope of fostering a more productive dialogue between right and left than has recently been the case.
To Elevate I Must First Soften: Rhetoric, Aesthetic, and the Sublime Traditions
Authors: Ianetta Melissa
Published: March 2024

Rereading the work of Letitia Elizabeth Landon in light of Hugh Blair’s 1783 Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres, the author suggests that current disciplinary definitions of the sublime that separate its aesthetic heritage from its rhetorical foundations suppress those of its aspects that were the particular province of women writers in the nineteenth century, and limit our current understanding.
Professional Writers/Writing Professionals: Revamping Teacher Training in Creative Writing Ph.D. Programs
Authors: Ritter Kelly
Published: March 2024

Examines (1) job opportunities available for PhDs in creative writing as contextualized within the larger English Studies job market; (2) arguments for and against training such candidates to be university teaching professionals; and (3) training that might better prepare these candidates for both more productive, successful university teaching careers as well as more productive, successful undergraduate creative writing classrooms.
Taking an Anthropological Stance: Implications for Supervising New Teachers
Authors: Duffy Helen
Published: March 2024

Considers complex ways in which a student teacher negotiated her status and derived her authority in the multiple sites in which she worked as student, as apprentice, and as teacher. Illustrates the importance of encouraging teachers to adopt an “anthropological stance.” Shows how teacher education is complicated by the layered nature of the work in universities and in field supervision.
Starting from Scratch
Authors: Larson Mark
Published: March 2024

Presents ideas to better connect with students. Considers how teachers might think about questioning themselves and their experiences daily to find the answer to becoming the teacher every educator wants to be. Concludes that children are great learners because they modify and change what they already know to gain new knowledge.
Conversations from the Commissions: CEE 2001: The Commission Odyssey Continues
Authors: Pope Carol A.
Published: March 2024

Focuses on the history, nature, and accomplishments of the CEE (Conference on English Education) Commissions within the National Council of Teachers of English. Gives a sense of where the Commissions are headed in the new millennium.
Professional Development That Mingles Word Wizards and Number Crunchers
Authors: Stroble Beth , Karp Karen S.
Published: March 2024

Describes a summer institute designed to connect those self-identified “word wizards” and “number crunchers” —those teachers who might name themselves as either more comfortable with written literacy or with numeracy. Concludes that teachers need professional development that provides the opportunity to team with others (different disciplines, different grade levels, different ranges of experiences) in an environment that encourages team exploration.
Beginning Words: Teaching and Writing across Traditional Boundaries in English Education
Authors: Fox Dana L. , Fleischer Cathy
Published: March 2024

Negotiating boundaries in English education requires that we reflect critically upon the structure and history of our discipline and programs, question our beliefs and assumptions, and consider our responses to alternative viewpoints. The authors of the articles in this issue challenge us to look through these boundaries.
Prejudice and Pride: Japanese Americans in the Young Adult Novels of Yoshiko Uchida
Authors: McDiffett Danton
Published: March 2024

Discusses five books for young adults by author Yoshiko Uchida. Notes that these books, accessible to children in grades 5 and above, describe the prejudice against Japanese Americans, internment camps, and upheaval, sorrow, and anger spawned by the American government’s racist actions. Shows how the books can prompt discussions about cultural differences, prejudice, friendship, and governmental responsibility towards citizens.
From the Secondary Section: Young Adult Literature and the English Teacher
Authors: Mitchell Diana
Published: March 2024

Illustrates ways in which becoming a reader of young adult literature enriched the author’s life by making her a better teacher, allowing more connections to students, increasing student involvement, broadening her view of literature in general, connecting her with a rich network of professionals, and putting her back in touch with a part of herself she did not know was missing.
The Changing Discourse of Language Study
Authors: Wilson Marilyn
Published: March 2024

Argues that a study of dialects, language attitudes and biases, and issues of power related to language policies should be part of courses for preservice English teachers. Describes class activities that deal with investigating language attitudes, validating linguistic variation, validating all dialects, understanding the politics of language, and learning the complexities of language and the major principles of language learning.
Moving Marginalized Students inside the Lines: Cultural Differences in Classrooms
Authors: Quinn Angela Elder
Published: March 2024

Discusses what the author has learned in her job at an elementary school in Northeast Mississippi as liaison between English-speaking school personnel and Spanish-speaking students and parents, most of whom are recent immigrants from Mexico. Discusses what the author learned, through extensive talking and questioning of students and parents, about how cultural differences affect classroom activities and interaction.
What’s a (White) Teacher to Do about Black English?
Authors: Jonsberg Sara Dalmas
Published: March 2024

Argues that it is important for Black students and for all students to understand that Black English is indeed a language with rules, beauty, and power so that they come to respect it, respect its history, and respect their own bilingualism
A Bridge from Home to School: Helping Working Class Students Acquire School Literacy
Authors: Hagemann Julie
Published: March 2024

Discusses how and why a pedagogy of overt comparison between students’ home language (vernacular dialects of English) and school language (standard English) helps students learn the more global features of academic writing and the more sentenced-level features of Standard English. Outlines a pedagogy of overt comparison. Notes it motivates students, helps them learn conventions of academic writing, and develop proofreading skills.
Writing Workshops: Linking Schools and Families
Authors: Biggs Susan Connell
Published: March 2024

Describes family writing workshops as a way to share with the families how writing is used in high school classroom, as they brainstorm memories, do 20 minutes of free writing on a memory from their list, share their writing, and write closing letters. Discusses benefits and the impact of these workshops and offers guidelines.
Publishing with a Purpose: Caring for Our Community
Authors: Ruggieri Colleen A.
Published: March 2024

Describes lessons and units that allow the author’s high school English students to make important connections with members of their community, publish their efforts, and thus bridge the gap between young adults and their communities. Describes a “literary cookbook” (published and distributed in their community) in which each student wrote one informative piece and one creative piece.
A Tale of Two Cemeteries: Gravestones as Community Artifacts
Authors: Mitoraj Suzanne O.
Published: March 2024

Describes a unit for high school English students that makes the Colonial period in American literature come alive by studying eighteenth-century gravestone images and epitaphs. Describes how this study becomes a journey into their community, into local history, and ultimately into themselves.
Designing a Town-Based Writing Project
Authors: Gilbert Barbara
Published: March 2024

Describes a range of community-based writing projects that the author used with her middle and high school students of all levels. Discusses how these projects (ranging from simple interviews, to short biographies to profiles published and distributed in the community) not only became part of students’ home town, but also helped students distill valuable knowledge from their subjects.
Young Adult Literature: Silverstein and Seuss to Shakespeare: What Is in Between? by Margie K. Brown
Authors: Crowe Chris
Published: March 2024

Points out the rich variety of poetry for teenagers available today, and suggests reasons why teenagers might have a difficult time finding it. Appends a list of more than 120 collections of poetry, arranged in categories.
“Those Kids Can’t Read This Book—It’s Too Thick”
Authors: Jacobs C. Lynn
Published: March 2024

C. Lynn Jacobs reflects on her experiences with an English Language Development (ELD) class and proposes that teachers should look to students for guidance on how to lead them towards ownership of their own language process. She first used worksheets for teaching The Outsiders, but after questioning her students on how a book should be taught, realized that the love of reading was missing. When, with Where the Heart Is, she allowed her students to freely select quotes in the text, write about them in their journals, and discuss them in class, her students displayed greater confidence and an increased interest in reading for pleasure.
Fusing Social Justice with Multigenre Writing
Authors: Slack Delane Bender
Published: March 2024

It is up to every teacher to humanize students in order to prepare them for dealing with life. With the goal of instilling empathy, optimism and quality in her high school students, Slack assigned a multigenre research paper to investigate social movements, defined as a group of people coming together to create change.
Structure and Freedom: Achieving a Balanced Writing Curriculum
Authors: Casey Mara , Hemenway Stephen I.
Published: March 2024

Findings of a longitudinal study of the perspectives of writing for students in grades three, six, eight, ten and twelve reveal declining motivation and enthusiasm, isolation, mechanical writing, and loss of voice due to trying to fit into a mold.
Portfolios across the Curriculum: Whole School Assessment in Kentucky
Authors: Berryman Lizabeth , Russell David R.
Published: March 2024

Discusses the experience of English teachers in one Kentucky school as they worked with their students to prepare portfolios to meet the requirements for the new Kentucky Education Reform Act. What they learned was that merely assigning writing and stuffing the products in the folder didn’t produce highly graded portfolios. What the whole school learned was that producing the portfolios was all about improving students’ writing through meaningful experiences across the curriculum and that to do that, all the teachers needed to teach and use writing in their classes.
Young Adult Literature: Sports Literature for Young Adults
Authors: Crowe Chris
Published: March 2024

Describes approximately 60 fiction and about 10 non-fiction young adult literature books and other print media about sports. Notes the importance of sports in American society.
Teaching in the Time of Testing: What Have You Lost?
Authors: McCracken Nancy Mellin , McCracken Hugh Thomas
Published: March 2024

In preparing for this essay, the McCrackens asked teachers, “What have you lost from your teaching or your classroom since the growth of mandated standardized testing?” Respondents noted not only loss of instructional time but, more significantly, loss of themselves as teachers and declining desire to teach. The authors express further concern for teacher preparation in the age of high-stakes teacher testing and present a critical view of the Praxis II.
Reading the Data: Making Supportable Claims from Classroom Assessment
Authors: Adkison Stephen , Tchudi Stephen
Published: March 2024

Stephen Adkison and Stephen Tchudi discuss how teachers “can become more skilled at reading and explaining an increasing range of assessment information.” The authors use logician Stephen Toulmin’s model of argument and his belief in “the relevance of higher learning to the problems of human life” to outline a method for assessing and making sense of the wide variety of data daily confronting teachers.
The Impact of the MCAS: Teachers Talk about High-Stakes Testing
Authors: Luna Catherine , Turner Cara Livingstone
Published: March 2024

Massachusetts English Teachers talk about the impact of the new Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) and how they are dealing with this test in their classrooms and schools, expressing concerns about how it has changed the way they teach, how they are teaching to the test, and how the test has resulted in loss of creativity and thought.
Teacher to Teacher: How Do You Test Your Students' Knowledge of What You Teach?
Authors: Crist Patricia , Shafer Gregory
Published: March 2024

Crist explains how she and her school help students cope with the MCAS (Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System) exam. Shafer describes her end-of-the-year literacy research project.
From the Editor
Authors: McClaskey Janet , Monseau Virginia
Published: March 2024

For this themed issue, “Assessing Ourselves to Death,” the editor adds her “two cents” to the discussion. She goes on to list several variables that teachers cannot control, yet they are powerful enough to render testing outcomes inaccurate and unreliable. Student absenteeism, weak parenting and student apathy, and text anxiety are all contributors to lowered test scores. However, politicians continue to ignore these factors and instead target teachers as being responsible.
Learning with Technology: “Telling Stories Long into the Night”: Romantic Circles High School Project
Authors: Walton Brenda H. , Bork Tara , Owen Trevor
Published: March 2024

Walton and Bork report on their experiences in the Romantic Circles High School Project, an online educational network built by and for a national community of teachers and students and dedicated to the humanities, particularly the study of nineteenth-century British literature and culture. They describe in detail the use of a MOO (Multi-User Object Oriented System), which allows students to participate in online activities with teachers and scholars.
Beyond Filling Out Forms: A More Powerful Version of Workplace Literacy
Authors: Darvin Jacqueline
Published: March 2024

In this article, Jacqueline Darvin shares her observations of her students--self-proclaimed poor readers--reading highly technical professional texts, and writing articulate journal entries. She also provided ideas for creating a more powerful vocational English curriculum by integrating creative writing assignments with the reading of informational texts.
Language: A Pernicious and Powerful Tool
Authors: Parker Jessica
Published: March 2024

Two principles guide Parker’s teaching: first is the belief that curriculum should connect with life, and second, is that she has an obligation to promote tolerance and acceptance of homosexuality. An important aspect of this is revealing to her students her own sexual orientation. In this article, she explains why she exposes her personal life, and describes how she creates a dialogue with her students about homosexuality, beginning with how the word “gay” is used in everyday language, specifically as a term to belittle peers. She also explains how infuses gay and lesbian literature with studies of canonical literature.
Lighting the Flame: Teaching High School Students to Love, Not Loathe, Literature
Authors: Milburn Michael
Published: March 2024

In this article, Milburn takes a critical view of a recent article appearing in Harper’s magazine, in which the author condemns English teachers and the materials they teach as the reason students learn to loathe literature. On the contrary, says Milburn: every day kids show us how to help them love literature; all we have to do is listen.
From the Editor
Authors: Monseau Virginia R.
Published: March 2024

The editor shares her experience of finding a school newspaper from 1979. An article written by former student inspires her to reflect on the personal connections she’s made with her students throughout the years.
Speaking My Mind: The Problems with Feel-Good Education
Authors: Reiner Andrew
Published: March 2024

Teaching students-feel good curriculum that nurtures their self-esteem, says Reiner, has been done to the detriment of self-respect and confidence that they deserve. It has denied them of a sense of responsibility for their own grades and behaviors and has prompted them to seek quick fixes and easy answers.
Cross Conversations The Price of an A: An Educator’s Responsibility to Academic Honesty
Authors: Whiteman Sherri A. , Gordon Jay L.
Published: March 2024

In the Internet Age, the price of an ‘A’ is $9.95. Is there a solution to Internet Plagiarism? In this exchange of ideas, two teachers argue the possibilities.
Insights for Interns How Do Teachers Avoid Emotional Involvement with Students?
Authors: Vanoverbeke Christina , Cavanaugh Judy
Published: March 2024

Vanoverbeke, a pre-service teacher, wonders: How does a teacher strike a balance between not caring at all and caring so much about students that it affects health and well-being? Cavanaugh responds with advice and words of encouragement.
Talk About Books: Fathers and Sons
Authors: Moore John Noell
Published: March 2024

This month’s column explores the relationship between fathers and sons in My Old Man and the Sea, by Wallace Green, and Jim the Boy, by Tom Earley.
Question and Answer: Reading Nonfiction to Develop the Persuasive Essay
Authors: Pedersen Don
Published: March 2024

Instead of having his students read fiction in order to write argumentative and analytical essays, Don Pedersen wanted them to become critical readers “so that independently they, as writers, could begin to anticipate the specifics and development needed to convince the reader of an author’s credibility and a writing’s worth.”
Using Primary Sources to Build a Community of Thinkers
Authors: Morgan Katherine R.
Published: March 2024

According to Katherine Morgan, “the words ‘primary source’ conjure up stale ideas of moldy texts on brittle paper preserved in archival sleeves in historical collections. History or social studies teachers might react positively to the idea of the primary source document as a vehicle for learning, but English teachers might be less enthusiastic.” Read this article to find out how “primary sources and nonfiction [can] offer valuable opportunities for interdisciplinary learning and critical thinking in all fields of study.”
From the Secondary Section: What's the Truth about Nonfiction?
Authors: Hirth Paul
Published: March 2024

Argues for the use of nonfiction in classrooms. Presents three passages from sources usually far removed from the typical secondary language arts classroom to help make the point. Concludes that just as the study of fiction, drama, and poetry help students explore their thoughts and feelings, nonfiction can offer a reality check with which to measure their individual responses.
Talk About Books: Magical Landscapes: Two Love Stories
Authors: Moore John Noell
Published: March 2024

Introduces two books about magic, one a collection of essays “Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader,” which describes the author’s inherited lifelong passion for books and reading; and the other a novel, “Mangos, Bananas and Coconuts: A Cuban Love Story,” which tells a story of love and magic that seems both real and surreal.
Young Adult Literature: De Facto YA Literature and False Expectations
Authors: Crowe Chris
Published: March 2024

Notes that English teachers have to do their part in teaching literary-cultural literacy, but they also have a responsibility to expose students to the wide range of literature that exists outside of the de facto Young Adult Literature perpetuated by school curricula. Presents annotations of 10 new or overlooked Young Adult books worth reading.
From Archetypes to Xenophobia: World Literature Is the “Rite” Stuff
Authors: Bingen Mark J.
Published: March 2024

Describes how a small team of district teachers created a year-long course for senior honors using world literature to help confront seniors’ passage between childhood and adulthood by raising the questions that echo through time and by offering diverse and insightful suggestions.
Learning for Understanding: The Role of World Literature
Authors: Reese James D.
Published: March 2024

Considers what educators can do in the classroom to foster openness to other cultures, religions, and ways of being. Notes that as a teacher in an international school, the author perhaps faces challenges and opportunities different from teachers in typical American secondary schools. Concludes that the strategies used to teach literature in his English classroom have universal application.
Young Adult Literature: What To Do For Your Summer Vacation: Resources for Recharging Your YA Literature Batteries
Authors: Crowe Chris
Published: March 2024

Notes that English teachers have to do their part in teaching literary-cultural literacy, but they also have a responsibility to expose students to the wide range of literature that exists outside of the de facto Young Adult Literature perpetuated by school curricula. Presents annotations of 10 new or overlooked Young Adult books worth reading.
From the Secondary Section: Connecting across Distances and Differences
Authors: Kippes Willa Mae
Published: March 2024

Members of the Secondary Section Steering Committee comment on topics of importance to English language arts educators.
Snapshots: Writing through a Tragedy
Authors: Hughes Hilary E.
Published: March 2024

Snapshots offers insights about teaching and learning through teacher stories about a particular classroom event.
Speaking My Mind: Read Before Voting
Authors: Berger Allen
Published: March 2024

Speaking My Mind invites readers to speak out about controversial issues relevant to the teaching of English language arts.
Teaching Drama in a Rural Setting: A Comedy of Erros in Three Acts
Authors: Schneider Autumn
Published: March 2024

Teaching a drama class and staging performances with available resources has required Autumn Schneider to borrow and improvise. She recounts some of the more challenging circumstances and demonstrates that, with a sense of humor and community support, the shows can go on.
Thriving in Rural Alaska
Authors: Skelton Sheri
Published: March 2024

Sheri Skelton has taught in a rural Alaskan village for thirteen years, but it was immediately clear to her when she arrived from Iowa that rural does not have the same meaning everywhere. Against a detailed backdrop of the people and the land, she reveals what she has learned about her students’ knowledge of place and culture and how she uses her understanding to teach more effectively.
English in the City: Story by Story
Authors: Hamilton Greg
Published: March 2024

“English in the City” focuses on the particular challenges, choices, and celebrations relevant to teaching in an urban setting.
Personal Reading: Unto the Least of These
Authors: Null Linda , Alfred Suellen
Published: March 2024

“Personal Reading” contains reviews of fiction and nonfiction books, with a special interest in multicultural works.
Bold Books for Innovative Teaching: Summer Reading—2004
Authors: Gallo Don
Published: March 2024

“Bold Books for Innovative Teaching” provides dynamic, informative viewpoints on important issues in publishing and teaching contemporary literature, especially literature for adolescents. Reviews of young adult literature will also appear in this column.
From the Secondary Section: Reforming Writing Instruction
Authors: Shanley Roger
Published: March 2024

Members of the Secondary Section Steering Committee comment on topics of importance to English language arts educators.
Snapshots: The Humanist
Authors: Romano Tom
Published: March 2024

“Snapshots” offers insights about teaching and learning through teacher stories about a particular classroom event.
Speaking My Mind: Don’t Worry, It’s Just Communist Propaganda
Authors: Hartwell Richard D.
Published: March 2024

“Speaking My Mind” invites readers to speak out about controversial issues relevant to the teaching of English language arts.
Toppling the Idol
Authors: Roessing Lesley
Published: March 2024

Having perfected her instruction of the five-paragraph essay, Lesley Roessing realized that her eighth-grade students had mastered the formula but lost their voices. She describes her transformed approach to teaching writing and offers specific assignments that helped students “think outside the five-paragraph-essay box.”
Reforming Writing and Rethinking Correctness
Authors: Shafer Gregory
Published: March 2024

Emphasizing “the dynamic aspects of language correctness,” community college teacher Gregory Shafer helps students understand that achieving correctness is not simply a matter of following a set of rules. He then asks students to write letters and speeches in which they demonstrate the relationships among language, power, purpose, and audience.
Writing for Something: Essays, Raps, and Writing Preferences
Authors: Cooks Jamal A.
Published: March 2024

Students’ out-of-school literacy practices can complement in-school speaking and writing—if the teacher knows how to incorporate them. Drawing from a larger study, Jamal A. Cooks analyzes how one student writes an essay and a rap on the same subject. Cooks recommends bringing hip-hop culture into the classroom to help students become academically successful.
Lifelines: An Ethnographic Study of an IEP Student
Authors: Bro Elsa C.
Published: March 2024

River guides and teachers share important characteristics, according to Elsa C. Bro. She calls on the similarities as she studies a high school sophomore with learning difficulties.
Research Matters: “Awesome, Dude!” Responding Helpfully to Peer Writing
Authors: VanDeWeghe Rick
Published: March 2024

“Research Matters” provides teachers with review and application of research that illuminates the daily concerns and activities of English language arts teachers and classrooms.
Snapshots: Transcending Bias through Reader-Response Theory
Authors: Soublis Theoni , Winkler Erik
Published: March 2024

“Snapshots” offers insights about teaching and learning through teacher stories about a particular classroom event.
Neil Postman and the Teaching of English
Authors: Moran Terence P.
Published: March 2024

Throughout his career, Neil Postman challenged educators to think critically and broadly about the roles language plays in human behavior and society. Terence P. Moran, who knew him in various capacities for forty-one years, highlights Postman’s influence on English education
Dancing with Words
Authors: Schwartz Jeffrey
Published: March 2024

Interdisciplinary collaborations are subversive when they help students and teacher see beyond traditional subject boundaries. High school teacher Jeffrey Schwartz describes a collaboration with the school’s dance instructor that helped students see Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal Dreams in a new way.
Reclaiming the Power of Subversive Language in Romantic and Transcendental Literature
Authors: Nugent Kelly Ann
Published: March 2024

High school teacher Kelly Ann Nugent asked her students to design schools that embodied the principles of learning suggested by writers such as Dickinson, Emerson, Poe, Thoreau, and Whitman. By doing so, students understood better not only the ideas of the writers but also the sometimes-contradictory conditions of their own schooling.
Lying to Expose the Truth
Authors: Clendenning George
Published: March 2024

George Clendenning uses an exercise that forces students to recognize their unconscious stereotyping. He argues that the instructor’s subversive moves are essential to the effectiveness of the activity.
The Monologue Project for Creating Vital Drama in Secondary Schools
Authors: Frkovich Ann , Thoms Annie
Published: March 2024

High school students create and perform interview-based monologues that help them “talk about the critical issues that underlie our daily lives.” Ann Frkovich and Annie Thoms share student samples and advice for teachers who want to give students a powerful speaking and writing tool.
New Voices: Teaching Subversively
Authors: Hunt Tiffany J. , Hunt Bud
Published: March 2024

“New Voices” raises questions, offers insights, and provides a forum for novice teachers to engage in the professional conversation surrounding the teaching of English.
Speaking My Mind: Teaching before 1984
Authors: Goodson F. Todd
Published: March 2024

“Speaking My Mind” invites readers to speak out about controversial issues relevant to the teaching of English language arts.
Using Reading Workshop to Inspire Lifelong Readers
Authors: Lausé Julie
Published: March 2024

Inspired by Nancie Atwell’s work, high school teacher Julie Lausé designed a curriculum that, in her words, “has transformed our students and our school.” Students’ reading speed, comprehension, and motivation increase as a result of this program that combines choice and challenge.
“Mirror, Mirror on the Wall”: Readers’ Reflections on Literature through Literary Theories
Authors: Golden Joanne M. , Canan Donna
Published: March 2024

Seeking to enhance students’ experiences with literature, a high school teacher and a university professor collaborated on implementing the study of literary theories in two sophomore English classes. Through analyzing a fairy tale, a short story, and a novel, high school students developed divergent and critical thinking about literature.
Walking a Maze of Views to the Center: Teaching Point of View
Authors: Cecil Kathleen
Published: March 2024

Students find books with multiple narrators or points of view difficult to follow, and this interferes with comprehension of literary themes. High school teacher Kathleen Cecil details the material, activities, and project that she uses to help urban students see connections between various texts on a topic or theme and create, ultimately, “a harmonious whole.”
Email Partnerships: Conversations That Changed the Way My Students Read
Authors: Borsheim Carlin
Published: March 2024

Through an email exchange with university students about To Kill a Mockingbird, ninth graders increased their confidence in reading and discussing literature. Carlin Borsheim, their teacher, found that students thought more deeply and critically about what they read as a result of the conversations with their university partner.
Let Every Voice Be Heard: Focus Essays Create Democratic Classrooms
Authors: McHaney Pearl Amelia
Published: March 2024

Creating a democratic classroom challenges teacher authority and power. Yet nothing is more important if students are to learn to think critically and act thoughtfully. Pearl Amelia McHaney employs focus essays as a tool for students to develop their thoughts and contribute to meaningful class discussions. When authority is distributed, teacher and students share a powerful, intellectually engaging relationship.
English in the City: A Tree Grows in New York City, or Does It?
Authors: Hamilton Greg
Published: March 2024

“English in the City” focuses on the particular challenges, choices, and celebrations relevant to teaching in an urban setting.
The Paradox of Structure and Freedom: An Experiment in Writing Poetry
Authors: Womelsduff Deborah
Published: March 2024

Using a traditional African poem as a model, Deborah Womelsduff helps ninth-grade students find their writing voices. She has learned through teaching this poetry project that having a well-defined structure allows students to think and write creatively.
Teaching Works We Love: Hazards of the English Classroom
Authors: Hayden Rebecca
Published: March 2024

When students reject or ridicule our favorite work of literature, it is easy to take the rejection personally. High school teacher Rebecca Hayden relates what happened when she taught the novel she credits with turning her into an English teacher.
TBI: Our Teachers Are Not Prepared
Authors: Bouldin Kelly V.
Published: March 2024

As a high school student, Kelly V. Bouldin suffered a traumatic brain injury (TBI) that resulted in partial amnesia and learning disabilities. Now a graduate student preparing to teach, she describes the difficulties she faced in returning to school and recommends strategies educators can use to help similar students they encounter in their classrooms.
The Mouse That Roared: Teaching Vocabulary with Source-Based Lessons
Authors: Blasingame James , Nilsen Alleen Pace
Published: March 2024

Since current research suggests that the best way to teach vocabulary is to group related words, James Blasingame Jr. and Alleen Pace Nilsen present a lesson focusing on the names of muscles but relating them to more common words. Students create visual representations of word groups and teach the words to the class.
Liberating the Student’s Voice: A Teacher’s Story of the College Essay
Authors: Holding Mark
Published: March 2024

High school teacher Mark Holding created a unit to help uninspired seniors write personal essays for college applications. The carefully developed steps help students move away from formulas to regain their freedom and voice in writing.
Continuing the Classroom Community: Suggestions for Using Online Discussion Boards
Authors: Jewell Vivian
Published: March 2024

Thoughtful use of technology to supplement classroom instruction can improve student learning. High school teacher Vivian Jewell shows how the use of online discussions of literature assignments increases student participation by extending dialogue beyond the physical space and time of a single class.
Lessons on Grammar
Authors: Wilcox Bonita L.
Published: March 2024

Having spent years teaching traditional grammar and mourning the fact that grammar drills weren’t improving writing, Bonita Wilcox introduces articles that shed light on the longtime debate, offer suggestions for varied and flexible methodologies, highlight resources on grammar pedagogies, and tackle the challenges of teaching grammar to ESL students.
Roundtable on Books
Authors: Dorsey-Gaines Catherine , Ashelman Polly , Jackson Norma , Jackson Peter
Published: March 2024

This installment of our Roundtable on Books column includes reviews of a variety of professional books ranging from texts that focus on issues of race, to books that take up emergent literacy, to texts on beginning teaching.
Talking About Books: The Aesthetic Power of Poetry
Authors: Crawford Kathleen Marie , Hartke Jill M. , Humphrey Angela , Spycher Ellen , Steffan Marjorie , Wilson Jennifer L.
Published: March 2024

This issue’s Talking about Books column presents poetry books that highlight “the power of language to invite new relationships, to cast familiar experiences in a new light, to fill our minds with the richness of the people around us, and the world around us.”
Worlds of Words
Authors: Atkins Jonathan
Published: March 2024

Like tracing the movement of dancers in a dance, Atkins follows writers and readers as they engage in working through and exploring the depths, boundaries, and sheer imaginative force of written texts.
The Arts Meet the Language Arts in Kindergarten: A Photo Essay
Authors: Strecker Susan Keehn , Wells Jane
Published: March 2024

The arts and language arts are mutually supportive. Music is a natural form of listening to language; theater is the mechanism for performing language; and art is a way of visualizing language. The arts, rather than being a “frill” unrelated to literacy learning, are media of human innovation and conceptualization that offer alternative ways to construct meaning and to communicate ideas. As such, the arts can be a powerful avenue to the language arts for young children.
Teaching, Learning, and Growing as a Member of a Professional Education Community
Authors: Bloome David , Harste Jerome C.
Published: March 2024

What role do professional organizations play in helping us live our lives as intellectuals? David Bloome and Jerome C. Harste talk of the importance to them of NCTE’s professional community.
What to Do about Jabbering Parrots: Lessons Learned while Advocating for Best Practices
Authors: Ford Michael P.
Published: March 2024

Staying true to our beliefs during the political debates demands the support of a knowledgeable professional community that offers practical strategies to respond to critics.
Reading Corner for Educators: High-Stakes Testing
Authors: Nieto Sonia , Irizarry Jason G. , Luna Cathy
Published: March 2024

Discusses four books that provide critical information about the nature of high-stakes tests; the impact of these tests on teaching, learning, and students; the political issues surrounding high-stakes testing; and ways that educators can take informed action to appropriately respond to these tests.
Reading Corner for Children: Tests Faced by Children’s Book Characters
Authors: Yokota Junko , Cai Mingshui
Published: March 2024

Looks at testing from a broad perspective and selected works of children’s literature in which the characters face tests of many kinds. Organizes books in the following ways: tests at school, tests of survival, tests of courage, tests of character, tests of relationships, and tests of extraordinary life hardships.
Profile: Milton Meltzer: A Voice for Justice
Authors: Chatton Barbara
Published: March 2024

The profile of Milton Meltzer by Barbara Chatton highlights his lifetime of writing nonfiction books related to people and causes he cares about.
Suggestions for Further Reading on Critical Literacy
Authors: Edelsky Carole
Published: March 2024

Suggestions for further reading on critical literacy.
The Practice of Democracy and Dewey’s Challenge: The struggle over corporate hog farms serves as a metaphor for rethinking literacy policies and remaking democracy in our classrooms.
Authors: Shannon Patrick
Published: March 2024

The struggle over corporate hog farms in Pennsylvania offers three lessons for educators who worry about heavily-funded, scientifically authorized, and government sanctioned corporate insurgence into public schools: 1) the need to question science and the market as the determining factors in decisions about our lives; 2) the importance of investigating connections between science and the market which undermine the objective authority of either; and 3) the necessity for developing a deeper freedom than the ability to choose among the options that others present.
Of Magic Doors There Is This….
Authors: Stephens Diane
Published: March 2024

Diane Stephens prepared the following talk for the 2000 NCTE Conference in Milwaukee upon receiving the Alan C. Purves Award, presented to the RTE article from the previous year’s volume judged most likely to have an impact on the practice of others. In her talk Stephens considers the doubts she has had about the design of the award winning study, focusing especially on a researcher’s obligation to help the teachers with whom the researcher is working, even at the risk of jeopardizing a study’s design. Stephens traces the way that her engagement with that question has led to her current professional commitments.
Annotated Bibliography of Research in the Teaching of English
Authors: Beach Richard , DeLapp Peggy , Galda Lee , Helman Lori , Lensmire Timothy , O’Brien David , Rijlaarsdam Gert , Janssen Tanja
Published: March 2024

The committee reviews important research works in the teaching of English that have been published in the last year. Committee members include Richard Beach, Peggy DeLapp, Lee Galda, Lori Helman, Timothy Lensmire, and David O’Brien, Gert Rijlaarsdam, and Tanja Janssen.
A TA Perspective of a Community College Faculty-in-Training Pilot Program
Authors: Cowan Toni , Traver Joyce , Riddle Thomas H.
Published: March 2024

Offers reflections and descriptions of three teaching associates on their experiences in the pilot year of the Guilford Technical Community College Faculty-in-Training Program. Discusses beginning the program, the varied student populations, faculty involvement, and program components (including the observation process, writing center, distance learning, conferences, weekly seminars, and camaraderie).