Literacy for All Students

An Instructional Framework for Closing the Gap

Rebecca Powell, Elizabeth Rightmyer, Rebecca Powell, Elizabeth Rightmyer

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9780415885867
• eBook ISBN: 9781136879692
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

The Culturally Responsive Instruction Observation Protocol (CRIOP) is a framework for implementing culturally relevant literacy instruction and classroom observation. Drawing on research and theory reflecting a range of perspectives ? multicultural instruction, literacy theory, equity pedagogy, language and discourse models, sheltered instruction, critical pedagogy ? it provides a means for assessing the many variables of classroom literacy instruction and for guiding practitioners in their development as multicultural educators.

Literacy for All Students

• Discusses issues in multicultural literacy instruction within the context of various essential instructional components (such as assessment, curriculum, parent collaboration)
• Provides a protocol for observing features of literacy instruction for culturally and linguistically diverse students
• Presents vignettes from real classrooms, written by elementary and middle school teachers, showing their victories and struggles as they attempt to implement a pedagogy that is culturally responsive within a climate of high stakes testing

A highly effective instrument for assessing culturally responsive literacy instruction in schools, the CRIOP serves as a model for realizing a literacy that is both relevant and transformative.

Chapter 1

Introduction

Rebecca Powell

Recently I received an invitation to an expensive meal, compliments of a company that was aiming to sell its products to our institution. Upon exploring the company on the internet, I discovered that the “products” they sell are actually college and graduate-level courses. For a certain price, you can pick your course and they will “deliver” it to you. College classes have now become a commodity to be bought and sold on the open market.

What does this have to do with literacy instruction, and more specifically, with culturally responsive literacy instruction? Consider that literacy, too, has become a commodity. If your students aren’t achieving, there’s sure to be a “new” program right around the corner that will “fix” the problem. The thinking goes something like this: If we only had enough research, and if we could design a program that precisely matched that research, we could discover that elusive panacea that would lead to reading proficiency for all students.

The problem with this perspective is that learning is more than receiving the delivery of a prepackaged program. Rather, learning occurs through entering into dialogue with others. It is a social activity. As Vygotsky (1978) pointed out in his seminal theory of learning, learning is innately social; that is, it is a socially mediated activity whereby the teacher supports and guides the meaning-making process within the learner’s “zone of proximal development.” Because learning is fundamentally social, teaching and learning are completely tied to the social context within which they occur.

The commodification of literacy and learning ignores this social context. In so doing, it also ignores the critical importance of the learning environment. Relationships between teachers and students, teachers and families, students and students can either support or hinder the social dynamics of the classroom and the quality of learning that takes place there. Conceptualizing literacy as a set of seemingly neutral “skills” that can be packaged and delivered using research-based “best practices” denies the vital importance of the social dimension of literacy learning and the role that the teacher plays in creating and sustaining the social environment in which learning transpires.

In this book, we present a decidedly different view of literacy instruction. Because literacy is fundamentally a social process, we believe that teachers, students and their families are the most important variables in instruction. We must begin with what students and families know, and what teachers bring in terms of their understanding of literacy, learning, and their role as educators. In this framework, our ideological perspectives matter. As teachers, we must begin the difficult process of questioning who we are, how we view our task, and the lenses through which we view the students and families that we serve.

These lenses are shaped by who we are—our race, social class, gender, age, religion, sexual orientation. The semiotic space within which learning occurs requires that we break down barriers created through human differences and enter into a relationship with “the Other.” Teaching is fundamentally about relationship; indeed, we suggest that learning is sabotaged in classrooms that are not characterized by care and mutual respect. Trusting and supportive relationships are essential for learning to occur.

Thus, we begin this book with a fundamental principle: relationships matter. Far too often educators perceive students from underrepresented populations as deficient, thereby undermining the teacher–student relationship. Students who live in poverty or who speak a language or vernacular that differs from Standard English are often viewed as “difficult to teach,” coming from families who simply “don’t value education.” What is important here is that the way we view students and their families makes a huge difference in students’ learning, for our pedagogical practices largely emerge from our ideas about teaching and the assumptions that we have of our students and their families/communities (Kagan, 1992; McKown & Weinstein, 2008; Monzó & Rueda, 2001; Tenenbaum & Ruck, 2007). Research shows that teachers’ negative beliefs about students have resulted in lowered expectations and decreased opportunities for learning (Crawford, 2007; Harry & Klingner, 2006; Rubie-Davis, Hattie, & Hamilton, 2006; Waxman & Tellez, 2002).

I invite you to think about the assumptions that you have about the students that you teach. Which of your students might you predict to be a potential heart surgeon? Scientist? College professor? Author? President of the United States? For most of us, if we are honest, the students we have in mind would typically be White (or perhaps Asian—particularly in the area of science), middle- to upper-class, and from “professional” homes. How would our teaching change if we saw each one of our students as future surgeons, famous poets, or CEOs of major corporations? If you believe this to be an impossible scenario for the students that you teach, then consider that in all of these categories, persons from disadvantaged homes and communities have excelled, and oftentimes it was their teachers that made a difference—teachers who believed that despite the odds, their students would succeed. In essence, they saw their students as capable learners, and they worked hard to make learning meaningful and relevant and to establish a culture of learning in their classrooms.

Unfortunately, however, far too often we hear teachers make comments such as the following:

I’m really worried about next year, because they’re closing XYZ school [in a high poverty neighborhood] and they’ll all be coming to our school.

The problem is that so many parents just don’t care about their child’s education.

It’s just impossible to control these kids. I can’t imagine what their homes must be like.

When I first began teaching at this school, students were more disciplined. Our demographics have changed, and the students we have now just don’t care about learning.

Most of my students know that they’ll be able to make more money on the streets selling drugs, so they’re not really motivated to learn.

While there may, indeed, be a few genuinely unmotivated students and parents, the vast majority of our students do want to learn, and they want their teachers to treat them as learners. We contend that the essence of culturally responsive instruction is validating our students as learners. This requires that we sincerely believe that they can think critically and creatively, and that they have valuable resources that they bring to learning that can be leveraged to mediate their understanding. In other words, it requires eliminating the deficit thinking that so often colors our perspectives of our students and their families.

In fact, we would go so far as to suggest that if you hold a deficit perspective toward the students and families you serve, you will be unable to respond in culturally appropriate ways and thus you will undoubtedly perpetuate the achievement gap, despite using “best instructional practices.” Ladson-Billings (1994) notes that “culturally relevant teaching is a pedagogy that empowers students intellectually, socially, emotionally, and politically by using cultural referents to impart knowledge, skills, and attitudes” (pp. 17–18). A basic premise of culturally responsive instruction (CRI) is that we must learn from our students and discover the resources they bring to the classroom so that we can provide supportive environments and guide their learning. A second premise is that CRI can only occur in a democratic environment in which teachers, families, and students become partners and work together to promote students’ academic, social, and emotional development.

Developing relationships with students and their families allows us to unveil their intellectual, social, linguistic and emotional assets. Teachers find that when they get to know students and parents/caregivers on a personal basis, their perspectives change. They learn about families’ hopes and visions for the future, and discover that they have rich experiences that can be used as a foundation for learning. Such discoveries dispel previously held negative stereotypes grounded in deficit thinking (Compton-Lilly, 2003; González et al., 2005).

One of my favorite “teacher stories” is shared by Richard Meyer (1996) in his book entitled, Stories from the Heart. He tells of Tami, an 8-year-old student who was totally disengaged and would periodically “disappear” in the classroom. One day, Meyer decided to visit her farm to learn about the new bull that the family had purchased. During the visit, he learned that Tami had “pulled a calf” and knew a great deal about farming. He writes:

I realized how little I knew about where I was teaching . . . So I started to ask Tami lots of questions about farming. I asked her about manure and how it gets taken out of the barn, and if she ate the animals she raised (she did). I asked her about growing corn and also learned about bulk tanks and electric fences. (“Don’t ever pee on one, Mr. Meyer”). Tami and I formed a relationship.

She still went under the desk to suck her fingers, and occasionally to work. But I became a visitor she could tolerate under there. I visited her there and at home and she taught me a lot. I thanked her a lot. I thanked her for every bit of information she gave me. She helped me talk to the other parents of the children in my class and to the other children, too . . . She never became a lover of school, but she did become a credible and reliable resource. It was a role that made her important to me, through me, to others. I think she sensed her importance.

School became okay for Tami. I became okay for Tami. And she became okay for me . . . I was finding myself—finding that, in spite of my own education, I was a learner. The rural context in which I was teaching brought with it an urgency to learn in order to teach. I was inventing myself as a teacher in a context that was new to me in many ways. I was learning the children’s ways with words.

(pp. 50–51)

As teachers, we possess important pedagogical knowledge. We have been educated in “best practices” in curriculum, instruction, assessment, classroom management. What can be missing, however, is how to connect those practices to students’ lives. As Meyer suggests, to become truly effective educators, we must “re-invent” ourselves as teachers. We must value the cultural knowledge of our students and families, and learn from those we serve.

About the Book

Each chapter examines a specific component of the Culturally Responsive Instruction Observation Protocol (CRIOP), which was designed as a classroom observation tool to guide and assess teachers’ growth in implementing culturally responsive practices. Acknowledging that literacy instruction is inherently social, we have chosen to begin this book on culturally responsive literacy practices with a discussion of relationships, both within and outside the classroom. Chapter 2 by Elizabeth Campbell Rightmyer examines the critical importance of trusting and caring student–teacher relationships in literacy learning. A great deal of research supports the notion that students must believe that teachers truly care about them as learners, and that their teachers believe that they can learn. This theme is woven throughout several other chapters in the book, as it drives the decisions we make in terms of curriculum, pedagogy, and assessment.

Rebecca Powell in Chapter 3 addresses the classroom environment and the ways in which we can structure our classrooms to support the learning of every student. A culturally responsive environment is one that affirms students’ cultural identities and nurtures a climate of collaboration and mutual respect. In Chapter 4, Kelly A. Seitz builds on these ideas by examining the ways in which we can invite parents to become true partners in teaching their children. Culturally responsive literacy practices are embedded in an environment that values the resources that students and families bring to learning, and that uses these resources to mediate the language and literacy growth of students.

The next four chapters target specific aspects of instruction. In Chapter 5, Rebecca Powell examines assessment practices. In this chapter, we argue that because literacy is a social practice, valid literacy assessment must occur as students are engaged in meaningful uses of written and oral language. We also suggest that our assessment practices ought to create a culture of learning versus a culture of evaluation, in that assessment should tap into students’ potential for learning, versus merely measuring what they already know.

Chapters 6 and 7 examine curriculum and instruction. In these chapters, Angela Cox and Susan Chambers Cantrell and Tiffany Wheeler make the point that culturally responsive literacy instruction is grounded in “best practices.” However, while best practices are necessary, they are not sufficient for closing the achievement gap. Rather, for optimal learning to occur, teachers must use instructional materials and practices that provide the necessary support for students within their “zone of proximal development”—materials and practices that use students’ “cultural data sets” (Lee, 2007) and families’ “funds of knowledge” (González, Moll, & Amanti, 2005) to scaffold students’ learning. Hence, no prepackaged instructional program can be culturally responsive. Uncovering the resources of our students and families and planning instruction that utilizes those resources ought to be an important part of the assessment/instruction cycle.

In Chapter 8, Sherry Wilson Powers examines the conversational patterns (discourse structures) that we use in our classrooms. Classroom discourse practices can reveal much about how we perceive our students and their linguistic competence, and our preferences for a more democratic or authoritarian environment. In this chapter, we examine the basic tenets of language acquisition and use and suggest that, to develop language proficiency, students must be given opportunities to use both oral and written language in a variety of social contexts. Language is power; it is also an integral part of our identities. Thus, it is important to affirm students’ native languages and give them a voice while simultaneously teaching the “language of power.”

The final chapter by Yolanda Gallardo Carter examines literacy from a critical perspective. Critical literacy suggests that no text is neutral; rather, every text can be deconstructed to illuminate its ideological perspective. “Text,” in this sense, is anything that can be “read” for its inherent meaning: films, bumper stickers, billboards, toys, websites, video games, and so on, as well as more conventional written texts. Critical literacy brings together all of the elements of culturally responsive literacy instruction, in that it both builds on and extends the world of our students. The ultimate goal of critical literacy is “reconstruction”—re-figuring the text to encourage social transformation.

To assist the reader, the chapters are similarly structured. Each begins with a brief introduction, followed by a review of the professional literature and a discussion of how the ideas can be applied in practice. Within each chapter, we have included vignettes from teachers that serve to illustrate the particular component of the CRIOP. Finally, every chapter includes reflective activities that are designed to extend the concepts presented, as well as a table that summarizes the essential elements of the CRIOP component.

About the Criop

This volume evolved from a statewide research study that examined literacy practices in schools that participated in a state-funded reading intervention initiative in primary classrooms. Student achievement data gathered over a three-year period revealed that, while early intervention led to positive student achievement gains in literacy for all students, the achievement gap persisted between midd...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• 1 Introduction
• Part I The Sociocultural Context of Literacy Instruction
• Part II Core Instructional Practices
• Part III Becoming Critical
• Notes on Contributors
• Index