Moving beyond “Agreeable” Texts and “Boring” Tasks: Pairing Young Adult Literature and Critical Literacy in Teacher Education
Abstract
This article considers the power of approaching young adult literature from a critical literacy perspective in teacher education and how that affects emer- ging teachers’ ability to consider its role in their future teaching. Specifically, the authors explore how critical literacy—the exposure to a variety of texts, ways of approaching texts, and means of processing texts—can elevate preservice teachers’ understanding of literature and the world around them, and thus, their ability to teach their future students from a critical literacy perspective. In this qualitative study of the teaching and learning of critical literacy in an Introduction to Adolescent Literature teacher education course, the authors illustrate how the pairing of literary theory and young adult literature can provide preservice teachers the tools for questioning texts and larger societal issues with their future students. The current study has practical implications for the field of teacher education in the way literature courses for preservice teachers are designed and conceptualized.
Reference
Shanahan E. M. & Dallacqua A. K. (2018) Moving beyond “Agreeable” Texts and “Boring” Tasks: Pairing Young Adult Literature and Critical Literacy in Teacher Education, Action in Teacher Education, (40)1, 38-57, DOI: 10.1080/01626620.2018.1424659
Journal
Action in Teacher Education
Analysis
Is this article part of a larger project or series of studies?
no
Does this study draw on a large, preexisting data set?
no
Research Approach
- design study
- Qualitiative
Geographic Setting
Institutional Context
Certification Level
Programatic Focus
Research Location Context
- young adult literature course
Preservice Participants
- undergraduate preservice teachers
Preservice Sample Size
25
Other Participant Data
- Undergraduates (NOT preservice teachers/education majors)
Duration of Data Collection
Data Sources
- Audio recordings
- fieldnotes
- semi-structured interviews
Data Analysis Tools
- coding (emergent categories)
- Recursive analysis
Researcher Positionality
- Inside (studying their own programs)
Research Questions
What curricular and instructional strategies were employed by a university instructor to incorporate critical literacy practices into her adolescent literature course?
Is this research question explicit from the manuscript? Yes
What were the perceptions of the instructor in this course in regards to the use of critical literacy practices and its impacts on preservice teachers as readers and as future teachers?
Is this research question explicit from the manuscript? Yes
What were the perceptions of the preservice teachers in this course in regards to the use of critical literacy practices and its impacts on how they see themselves as readers and as future teachers?
Is this research question explicit from the manuscript? Yes