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Preparing Teachers to Use Critical Literacy in the Early Childhood Classroom (aricle)

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Preparing Teachers to Use Critical Literacy in the Early Childhood Classroom (aricle)

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This article is from a previous course last semester. It discusses critical literacy importance, use in children literature, culturally responsive teaching, and how to implement it in the classroom.
Reference: Norris et al (2012). "Preparing Teachers to use Critical Literacy in the Early Childhood Classroom" Examining Critical Literacy. 59-62

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Quote from Katherine Batchelor of Miami University on critical literacy and the relationship between language and power. I have also linked the article as well that the quote belongs to but my main intention in this post is the quote.
https://www.miamioh.edu/ehs/news/2019/03/critical-lit.html

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Critical Literacy in the 21st Century (website)

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Critical Literacy in the 21st Century (website)

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This website provides information on critical literacy, lesson plan ideas, theories, helpful links, and children's literature resources.

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Critical Literacy - Critical Literacy in the 21st Century

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Critical literacy is the ability to actively read text in a manner that promotes a deeper understanding of socially constructed concepts; such as power, inequality, and injustice in human relationships. Critical literacy encourages individuals to understand and question the attitudes, values, and beliefs of written texts, visual applications, and spoken words.

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Preservice Elementary Teachers Engaging in Digital Critical Literacy Practices to Advocate for Critical Perspectives of Text (peer reviewed article)

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Preservice Elementary Teachers Engaging in Digital Critical Literacy Practices to Advocate for Critical Perspectives of Text (peer reviewed article)

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This article discusses teaching practices done by preservice teachers while they attend a literacy methods course. They go on to discuss incorporating these practices in their field experiences. There are many preservice teachers in this course so I think this is a great article to reference for critical literacy in your field placements and future classrooms.
Reference: Delacruz, S., & Jackson, V. (2019). Preservice Elementary Teachers Engaging in Digital Critical Literacy Practices to Advocate for Critical Perspectives of Text. Literacy Practice & Research, 44(2), 5–17.

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Diagram to show the power a child has when using critical literacy skills. They use their skills for empowerment with parents, media, schools, and peers. All in all, they use their skills in their community and society.

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Key Aspects of Critical Literacy (website)

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Key Aspects of Critical Literacy (website)

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Excerpt from our class reading "Critical Literacy as a Way of Being and Doing" by Vasquez, Janks, and Comber on key aspects that I really liked from our reading.

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This is an excerpt from "Critical Literacy as a Way of Being and Doing," a Research and Policy column written by Vivian Maria Vasquez, Hilary Janks, and Barbara Comber, from the May 2019 Language Arts. This article focuses on critical literacy as a way of being and doing around the globe. Orientations to critical literacy, models for instruction, key aspects, and new directions are shared.

In spite of the fact that critical literacy does not have a set definition or a normative history, the following key tenets have been described in the literature. It should be noted that such key tenets would likely take on a different shape depending on one's orientation to critical literacy, the level at which one is working, and one's social context.

Critical literacy should be viewed as a lens, frame, or perspective for teaching throughout the day, across the curriculum, and perhaps beyond, rather than as a topic to be covered or unit to be studied. What this means is that critical literacy involves having an ingrained critical perspective or way of being that provides us with an ongoing critical orientation to texts and practices. Inviting students to write down the messages that they see in public transport, to take photographs of graffiti or billboards, to cut out advertisements from magazines, or to collect sweet wrappers to bring to class helps them to read the everyday texts they encounter critically. Do it often enough and they will learn to "read" their worlds with a critical eye.

Diverse students' cultural knowledge (drawn from inside the classroom and the children's everyday worlds [homes and communities]), their funds of knowledge (Gonzalez, Moll, & Amanti, 2006), and multimodal and multilingual practices (Lau, 2012) should be used to build curriculum across the content areas and across space and place. Inviting children to bring culturally meaningful artifacts to school enables meaningful discussions about and understanding of things that matter to different communities.

Students learn best when what they are learning has importance in their lives; as such, using the topics, issues, and questions that they raise should be central to creating an inclusive critical curriculum. Listening to students' concerns or their responses to picturebooks enables teachers to know how they are reading and problematizing their worlds. It is our job to show them how to assume agency and act to make a difference, however small.

Texts are socially constructed from particular perspectives; they are never neutral. All texts are created from a particular perspective with the intention of conveying particular messages. Texts work to have us think about and believe certain things in specific ways, and as such they work to position readers in certain ways. We therefore need to question the perspectives conveyed by the writer. Even maps are social constructions based on selections of what to include and exclude, and whether to put north at the top and Europe at the center.

The ways we read text are never neutral. Each time we read, write, or create, we draw from our past experiences and understanding about how the world works. We therefore should also analyze our own readings of text and unpack the position(s) from which we engage in literacy work. If you agree with a text, it is easy to read it sympathetically and hard to read it critically. However, if you find a text offensive, it is hard to engage with it. But we have to do both; we have to engage with texts on their own terms-both to learn from them and to critique them-and we have to recognize that our identities shape how we consume and produce texts. For example, engaging with colonial texts helps us to understand colonialism and prepares us to produce texts that argue for decoloniality.

From a critical literacy perspective, the world is seen as a socially constructed text that can be read. The earlier students are introduced to this idea, the sooner they are able to understand what it means to be researchers of language, image, gesture, spaces, and objects, exploring such issues as what counts as language, whose language counts, and who decides, as well as exploring ways texts can be revised, rewritten, or reconstructed to shift or reframe the message(s) conveyed. Classroom work (Vasquez, 2014b; Vasquez & Felderman, 2012) has included the social construction of maps, language policies, construction of the child, classroom spaces, and how the furniture in them is arranged.

Critical literacy involves making sense of the sociopolitical systems through which we live our lives and questioning these systems. This means critical literacy work needs to focus on social issues, including inequities of race, class, gender, or disability and the ways in which we use language and other semiotic resources to shape our understanding of these issues. The discourses we use to take up such issues work to shape how people are able to-or not able to-live their lives in more or less powerful ways. For instance, in O'Brien's (2001) study, children worked with a catalogue promoting Mother's Day and discovered that the mothers in the photographs were all youthful (age), White (race), well-dressed and wearing makeup (class), good looking (gender), and able bodied. In addition, the goods advertised were normatively gendered (washing machines, perfume, jewelry) and often pricey (class).

Critical literacy practices can be transformative. They can contribute to changing inequitable ways of being and problematic social practices. This means students who engage in critical literacy from a young age are prepared 1) to make informed decisions regarding issues such as power and control, 2) to engage in the practice of democratic citizenship, and 3) to develop an ability to think and act ethically. As such, they would be better able to contribute to making the world a more equitable and socially just place.

Text design and production, which are essential to critical literacy work, can provide opportunities for transformation. Text design and production refer to the creation or construction of multimodal texts and the decisions that are part of that process, including the notion that it is not sufficient to simply create texts for the sake of "practicing a skill." If students are to create texts, they should be able to let those texts do the work intended; for instance, if students are creating petitions, they should address an existing issue rather than an imagined one, and if they are writing surveys, they should conduct them and analyze the data.

Finally, "critical literacy is about imagining thoughtful ways of thinking about reconstructing and redesigning texts, images, and practices to convey different and more socially just and equitable messages and ways of being that have real-life effects and real-world impact" (Vasquez, 2017b, para. 19). For example, critically reading a bottle of water as a text could include examining the practice of drinking bottled water and changing that practice in support of creating a more sustainable world.
Vivian Maria Vasquez, NCTE member since 2000, is a professor of education at American University whose research interests include critical literacy, early literacy and information communication technologies, and teacher education. She can be contacted at clippodcast@gmail.com. Hilary Janks is professor emerita in the school of education at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa. Her teaching and research are committed to a search for equity and social justice in contexts of poverty. She can be contacted at hilary.janks@wits.ac.za. Barbara Comber is a research professor in the school of education at the University of South Australia. She can be contacted at Barbara.Comber@unisa.edu.au.

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Key Aspects of Critical Literacy: An Excerpt

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This is an excerpt from "Critical Literacy as a Way of Being and Doing," a Research and Policy column written ...

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This word cloud includes words that represent aspects of critical literacy as a framework.

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Using Read Alouds as a Critical Literacy Tool (website)

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Using Read Alouds as a Critical Literacy Tool (website)

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This website explains why read alouds are vital to literacy instruction by developing children's background knowledge, stimulate their interest in high-quality literature, increase their comprehension skills, and foster critical thinking. Literature includes high-quality children's books that prompt children to think and talk about social issues that impact their daily lives.

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Chafel, J.A., A.S. Flint, J. Hammel, & K.H. Pomeroy. 2007. Young children, social issues, and critical literacy: Stories of teachers and researchers. Young Children 62 (1): 73-81.

Cunningham, P. 2005. Struggling readers: "If they don't read much, how they ever gonna get good?" The Reading Teacher 59 (1): 88-90.

Harste, J.C. 2000. Supporting critical conversations in classrooms. In Adventuring with books: A booklist for pre-K-grade 6, 12th ed., ed. K.M. Pierce, 507-54. Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English.

Pressley, M. 2006. Reading instruction that works: The case for balanced teaching, 3rd ed. New York: Guilford.

Simpson, A. 1996. Critical questions: Whose questions? The Reading Teacher 50 (2): 118-27.

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Using Read Alouds with Critical Literacy Literature in K-3 Classrooms

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Teacher read alouds are a vital part of literacy instruction in primary classrooms. Learn how to conduct read alouds that feature high-quality children's books which will prompt children to think and talk about social issues that impact their daily lives.

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Looking at all medias in our lives through a critical lens. This presentation was a critical analysis of different texts and literacies found in text/medias in our children's lives done for Dr. Nathaniel Bryan's course on language & literacy.

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Teacher Candidates use of Critical Literacy (peer reviewed article)

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Teacher Candidates use of Critical Literacy (peer reviewed article)

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This article supports teacher candidates in becoming more culturally responsive and using critical literacy.
Reference: Papola-Ellis, A. (2020). Teacher Candidates’ Use of Critical Literacy to Shift Thinking About Texts and Social Justice. Reading Horizons, 59(2), 43–58.

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Children as Changemakers in the World (video)

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Children as Changemakers in the World (video)

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This video is an overview on the potential of critical literacy as an inclusive pedagogical approach that welcomes children’s funds of knowledge; supports them to seek out diverse, non-dominant and absent perspectives; and empowers children to see themselves as changemakers. Teachers cover topics of inequality, power, and social justice and how to use their tools to make change of these things in their community and world.

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Rewriting the Wor(l)d (peer reviewed article)

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Rewriting the Wor(l)d (peer reviewed article)

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This article discusses the strategy of using quick writes in the classroom to support students' critical literacy skills and understanding as well as addressing important social justice issues.
Reference: Driessens, S., & Parr, M. (2020). Rewriting the Wor(l)d: Quick Writes as a Space for Critical Literacy. Reading Teacher, 73(4), 415–426.

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The importance of diverse critical literacy libraries in the classroom and how it encourages critical thinkers. Children need to see themselves and their experiences represented in their classroom libraries as well as critical consciousness of those who may not be in the classroom but in the world.

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Reading the Wor(l)d Critical Literacy and Culturally Responsive Classroom Libraries

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Critical Literacy in Early Childhood Education (website)

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Critical Literacy in Early Childhood Education (website)

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This website shares a nine-day critical literacy and drama framework for students to be involved in action where students are engaged in literacy activities beyond the basic knowledge of literacy.

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Using a form of literary criticism in tandem with drama activities helps young students think deeply about how stories are constructed.

From the back of her class, I watched as one of my favorite colleagues read to her second-grade students. While reading, she paused, allowed for turn and talks, and asked students to make predictions.

When she had finished reading, my colleague asked questions about the plot, setting, and character traits. In many respects, the lesson was a success-the students had participated eagerly. However, my colleague told me that she wanted more from her read-aloud time. Having seen my students engage in drama-related literacy activities, she was curious about how she could weave those ideas into her literacy lessons, so I shared the nine-day critical literacy and drama framework described below.

What Is Critical literacy?

Although there is no set definition of critical literacy, it essentially involves examining the relationship between language and power in a text. This work is responsive and thoughtful in nature. The chosen text, students' comfort and familiarity with the text, and the lesson goals all have an effect on what happens in the classroom.

Using the four dimensions of critical literacy -disrupting the commonplace, considering multiple viewpoints, focusing on the sociopolitical, and taking action-as a springboard, I focus on how purposeful questioning, discussion, and improvised drama might influence how students engage with literacy lessons.

Setting the Stage

The first step is selecting a strong mentor text, one with multiple narratives, in which alternate stories are told between the lines and within the illustrations. A worthwhile text should serve to launch counternarratives or conversations about identity and social issues, or about differences in power and privilege. Children should be able to see themselves and learn about the lives of others through the text. Examples include: A Chair for My Mother by Vera Williams, Islandborn by Junot Díaz, Each Kindness by Jacqueline Woodson, The Remember Balloons by Jessie Oliveros, and Another by Christian Robinson.

Here is my nine-day plan for discussing the text Boy by Phil Cummings.

Whose voice do you notice most in this story? Whose voice is missing?

What do you think Boy wished the villagers knew about him?

Can you tell the story of what the villagers thought as Boy approached the battle?

How did the dragon discover the village? Does the dragon have a family?

How is your life like or different from Boy's life? How can we use this story to see our world differently?

Day 1. Introduce and discuss: First I reveal the cover and ask students to make predictions and share reflections. Then I read the book to the students, pausing for partner discussions. After the reading and discussion, I ask questions such as:

Days 2 and 3. Review and set up the drama activities: The intention of drama activities is to draw deeper meaning from a story. The drama offers more than a performance-it's a way of learning. In each drama activity, students volunteer to become characters from the text.

If the class is focused on giving a voice to an oppressed character or uncovering motive, I may choose to hot seat, meaning that students interview a character. With Boy, my students chose to interview the dragon, Boy, and the townspeople.

Perhaps students want to encourage a character at a pivotal moment. If so, I might carry out a corridor of voices, where students line a hallway and express what was left unsaid in the text. Sometimes, student opinions are clearly divided-in these situations, a town hall meeting allows deliberation on important issues from the book. While exploring Boy, for instance, students participated in a town hall meeting to decide if the dragon should stay in the town.

Finally, when we speculate about a character's history, I sometimes have students create flashbacks to shed new light on the story, or imagine future scenes to push the focus beyond the end of the book.

Day 4. Shared writing: As a group, we author a piece of writing. I bring in linked texts, model my thinking, and ask for student input. The piece can be a letter to a community member, the author, or a character from the story. It might also take on the form of a journal entry as a character or a part of the story told from an alternate perspective.

Based on the reading, discussion, and drama activities, students discuss the possible writing forms (e.g., poem, letter, comic, diary entry), and participate in peer conferences so they can brainstorm and gain feedback.

Days 5, 6, and 7. Writing: Students need time to create meaningful works. Throughout, they write and then revise their work. I engage in writing conferences with students (one-to-one or small group) to support and nudge each of them.

Days 8 and 9. Sharing their work: Sharing writing and creating action plans are integral to this process. The action plans are student-led and ongoing.

Examples include arranging fundraisers, partnering with community organizations, or engaging in service projects. Over the years, I've seen this action take on many forms including, performing skits at senior citizen homes, volunteering to stock shelves at shelters, and supporting local Special Olympics groups. Making space and time to support action plans makes a difference in the type and quality of work students engage in.

Later in the semester, I found myself at the back of my colleague's classroom again. This time, I watched as she hosted a talk show to interview characters. The student input had come a long way, and when I asked how she felt about the lesson, she said, "Now that I've done it this way, I can never go back!"

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Critical Literacy in Early Elementary Grades

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Using a form of literary criticism in tandem with drama activities helps young students think deeply about how stories are constructed. From the back of her class, I watched as one of my favorite colleagues read to her second-grade students. While reading, she paused, allowed for turn and talks, and asked students to make predictions.