Literacy Research, Practice and Evaluation – serie

Using Informative Assessments towards Effective Literacy Practices offers research driven solutions to improving student literacy success through the exploration of advancements in literacy assessment and instruction. As the first volume in the series, Literacy Research, Practice, and Evaluation, distinguished authors share a comprehensive portrayal of why assessments are necessary, how to select appropriate assessments, and how to effectively use data for curricular planning and instruction. By addressing concerns before, during, and after literacy instruction with research-based instructional techniques embedded within the chapters, readers garner rich perspectives on literacy assessment that can immediately impact their effective teacher practices. This text is founded on the principle that praxis, or the combination of research with practice, should be the ultimate goal of educational missions and visions alike. It provides a fresh examination of current issues and trends in literacy assessment salient to novice and experienced educators alike.

Advanced Literacy Practices: From the Clinic to the Classroom includes salient information about clinical literacy practices that transfer to other settings. From historical perspectives to cutting edge instructional techniques, this edited text includes elements of designing literacy clinics, models of reading and writing practices, technology-based instruction, and frameworks for meeting the diverse needs of students. As the second volume in the series, Literacy Research, Practice, and Evaluation, notable authors share their perspectives as effective literacy clinic directors of how to enhance the literacy achievement of students. These first-hand accounts are critical as readers glean from their career-long devotion and decades of research, practice, and experimentation. Readers garner rich perspectives on literacy improvement through this research-based practical guide. It provides a current examination of issues and trends in clinical literacy practices appropriate for novice and experienced educators and researchers alike.

The volume highlights best practices of literacy instruction for students who have difficulties in reading. From components of effective pedagogy to instruction for specific populations, this text offers an array of expert perspectives on how to engage, scaffold, and prepare students to meet the multimodal demands of schools today. Renowned authors promote the notion that with thoughtful literacy and purposeful approaches to reading instruction, all children have the ability to improve their reading proficiencies. Core literacy instruction targeting comprehension, fluency, vocabulary, and writing development among others is of particular focus while supplementary discussions of factors such as native language, diversity, inclusion, and learning disabilities fully characterize issues related to struggling readers for which evidence-based approaches are presented to foster lasting success. It conveys a current portrayal of issues and trends of school-based literacy practices appropriate for novice and experienced educators and researchers alike.

This text provides rich discussions of learning processes and subsequent pedagogical approaches to the implementation of these new theories in practice. Section One emphasizes how students learn, retain, and synthesize new information from print and digital literacies using cognitive and social psychology lenses. Section Two presents models for deep, contextualized learning needed to obtain content mastery. Section Three focuses on revised learning, or adjusting previously held misconceptions within educational development. This text not only contributes substantially to understanding the mental constructs involved in the reading and writing process but also offers novel perspectives on how to optimize instruction using current theoretical lenses to bolster literacy achievement. Theoretical Models of Literacy Development serves as an invaluable resource for researchers, teacher educators, curriculum directors, and graduate students in their efforts to help individuals learn to read and understand information in the global information age.

Within the field of education there is a growing body of research focused on the use of video as a mediational tool for reflection. The purpose of this volume is to bring together research and research-based practices from wide array of literacy scholars and practitioners who are using video in educational research and/or teaching and for the purposes of reflection. This volume will recruit authors internationally to provide a cutting edge treatment of video reflection as pertaining to literacy education. We seek educators including individuals involved with: teacher education, professional development, classroom teaching, evaluation, literacy practicums, centers and clinics or other educational settings. Inter-disciplinary chapters (e.g., science and literacy, the arts and literacy) are also welcome.

This edited volume provides a collection of research-based chapters that reflect the state of the art for video reflection in literacy settings. The volume foregrounds explorations of disciplinary literacies and discourses in teacher education and pre-K-12 classrooms. Authors explore literacy and use of video in relation to English Language Arts, math, science, social studies, and educational administration across a variety of contexts ranging from a preschool classroom, to a high school, to preservice and inservice teacher education and development. In their research-based studies, authors address topics of disciplinary literacy, identity, discourses or multimodality. Some chapters present research findings while others are specifically devoted to methodological concerns and addresses how researchers who wish to carry out literacy investigations using video can work through challenges in research, design, or analysis.

For the last five years or so, there has been a universal increase in expectations for academic writing alongside high-stakes tests, as students must master writing for pragmatic purposes including argumentative papers, dialogic narratives, and even research reports. All the while, research related to how to effectively prepare these students for success has been stymied with an over emphasis on other areas of literacy. This volume will feature prominent researchers sharing their evidence-based successes partnering with teachers in K-12 classrooms. It will have 3 sub-sections according to grade level appropriate instruction: K-3, 4-8, 9-12. As a result of this design, the book will have wide readership amongst educators in the early childhood, elementary, middle, and high school years.

This book presents recent research related to how issues of diversity are addressed within literacy instruction for K-12 learners. Over the last decade, issues of diversity have promulgated within the field of literacy. Recent revisions to teacher education standards call for new approaches to professional development to ensure that educators are positioned to view and utilize diversity as an advantage within their classrooms and notions of what constitutes diversity are expanding. As the population of learners continues to diversify, literacy teachers must be equipped with knowledge of who their learners are and how to effectively build upon their individual experiences, lifestyles, and ways of seeing the world. A systematic change is needed and this volume is directed at advancing research within the intersectionality between literacy and diversity to contribute towards this important mission. This volume features prominent literacy researchers sharing their evidence-based successes that are founded upon longstanding and newfound theoretical frameworks. It is suitable for both educators in K-12 and university classroom contexts for teachers, administrators, graduate students, and professors alike.

The almost universal reliance upon digitaltools for social, academic, and career development will only become morepronounced in the years to come. Teacher education programs remain ill-equippedto adequately prepare educators with the pedagogies needed to foster digitalliteracies. What is needed is a set of best practices towards teaching digitalliteracies so that teachers can better meet the emerging needs of theirstudents in today’s classrooms. Where should teachers begin? What are theessentials of digital literacies within K-12 contexts? And how might wereimagine teacher education programs to optimally prepare teachers for workingwith technologically connected youth, whose literacies are more complex,interconnected, and diverse than ever?This volume provides a practicalframework for teacher education programs to develop K-12 students’ digitalliteracies. It offers a set of best practices in teaching digitalliteracies that promote access to research-based pedagogies for immediateimplementation in classrooms.

Educators are always in search of approaches that promote student development and academic achievement. Engaging learners in purposeful instruction in skills and strategies is a cornerstone in every classroom. The gradual release of responsibility (GRR) model requires the responsibility of learning to shift from being teacher-centric towards students gradually assuming responsibility as independent learners. In the last 35 years, the gradual release of responsibility model of instruction has become synonymous with some of the most effective approaches to teach both skills and content to students of all ages. Evidence-based practices have been documented across the globe not only in literacy but also in most disciplines across the curriculum. While the GRR model is a well-established theory, its implementations have not been researched. This edited volume discusses how the GRR model evolved and has been applied, how it benefits learners and teachers, and how it can be utilised for years to come.  By looking not only at the gradual release of responsibility model from a theoretical standpoint but also the research and practice of this approach, this book will prove invaluable for educational leaders and researchers alike.