Structured Word Inquiry: A Critical Literacy Framework for Educators

Interchange - In this essay, we reinterpret critical literacy through our engagement with structured word inquiry (SWI). By reflecting upon our experiences within a literacy practicum for educators...     

Implementing co-teaching with paraprofessionals to provide pre-Kindergarten students with special rights access to dual language

The purpose of this study was to examine how paraprofessionals and other service providers participate in co-teaching with a certified special education pre-Kindergarten teacher during dual language (DL) instruction. The study took place in two DL special education preschool classrooms located in an urban public school district in the southwestern US. The district enlisted paraprofessionals as lead Spanish instructors when the lead teacher was not bilingual in Spanish and English to implement the DL programme effectively. Participants were one special education teacher, two paraprofessionals and one teaching artist, who participated in a year-long professional development programme to employ drama strategies to develop children's Spanish and English literacy skills and promote inclusion. Findings indicated that the participants utilised multiple co-teaching models to collaborate and meet the needs of their students during English and Spanish instruction. Through co-teaching, all educators had opportunities to take lead and supporting roles in instruction.     

The atmosphere vibrated with triumphant joy

Abstract

This article critiques the Indian material culture located in present-day Pakistan pertaining to the inaugural Australian cricket tour to colonial India in 1935/36. The historical voice of the Indians is evident in the images and it is over the shoulders of the hosts of the tour that new perspectives emerge. It is culturally inappropriate to assume and evaluate how the locals felt about the visit of the Australian cricketers and the raison d’être of the tour. However, archives located in Pakistan provide a deeply subjective perspective. Goodwill and amicability reverberate through the photographs challenging conventional scholarship, which argues that Australian-Indian cricket is based on acrimony. The article concludes that despite the obvious and significant differences between the competing teams the tour experience minimized the racial divide between the Australian and the Indian cricketers.     

Who are these Australian fellows with ‘Grim determination and astounding stamina’?

Abstract

In light of the absence of living participants, this article extrapolates what the Australian cricketers departing on the inaugural cricket tour of India in 1935 may have known about late colonial-era India. This article argues that the depiction of India by the British Empire was a consciously evoked and celebrated construct perpetuated by orthodox ideology and popular culture. Through a close analysis of press reportage it is determined that the Australian public, and the departing cricketers, were ignorant of accurate knowledge of Indian culture and politics. The Australian media’s portrayal of Kipling’s writings, Indian religious practices and Indian cinema is compared with the cricketers’ response to these themes. Correspondingly, the Indian communities’ knowledge of Australia through evaluating the, at times, propagandistic promotional material generated for the tour is also critiqued. It is argued that representations of the Australian cricketers and the populist depiction of Indian culture are correspondingly implausible and driven by idealized expectations and stereotypes of national identity.     

Development and initial validation of the institutional child abuse processes and coping inventory among a sample of Irish adult survivors of institutional abuse

ObjectiveTo develop a psychometric instrument to evaluate psychological processes associated with institutional abuse and coping strategies used to deal with such abuse.MethodsAs part of a comprehensive assessment protocol, an inventory containing theoretically derived multi-item rational scales which assessed institutional abuse-related psychological processes and coping strategies were administered to 247 Irish adult survivors of institutional child abuse. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were used to derive 6-factor scales, the reliability and validity of which were assessed.ResultsFactor scales to assess the following constructs were developed (1) traumatization, (2) re-enactment, (3) spiritual disengagement, (4) positive coping, (5) coping by complying, and (6) avoidant coping. There were varying degrees of support for the validity of the scales with most support for the traumatization and re-enactment scales.ConclusionsThe Institutional Child Abuse Processes and Coping Inventory (ICAPCI), particularly its traumatization and re-enactment scales, may be used in future research on adult survivors of institutional child abuse because they are currently the only scales that have been developed with this population to provide reliable and valid assessments of these constructs.Practice implicationsThe ICAPCI may be used, cautiously, to assess adult survivors of institutional child abuse.     

Exploring library service models at Fudan University and Appalachian State University: Experiences from an International Librarian Exchange program

In 2008, Fudan University Library (FDUL) in Shanghai and Belk Library and Information Commons at Appalachian State University (ASU) in Boone, North Carolina created a three-year librarian exchange program. The first pair of librarian exchanges occurred during the 2009–2010 academic year, with the Appalachian State librarian traveling to Fudan for five weeks during the Fall of 2009, and the first librarian from Fudan traveling to Appalachian State for five months in the spring and summer of 2010. This paper documents how the first exchanges revealed interesting similarities and differences in the academic library service models between the two universities which are illustrative of general similarities and differences between Chinese and American academic library services. The paper also discusses how any academic library can benefit from the experience of a librarian exchange program with a partner library in another country.The experience gained from these first exchanges confirms on an international level the basic assertion that a major role of an academic library is to support the university’s curriculum.Moreover it can be extrapolated from discussions held between librarians of the two institutions that in both the United States and China the curriculum evolves in response to reforms on campus and to changing trends within the country’s education system. It was also determined that the modes of library services in both cultures change as new technologies arise and that the pace of technological change within academic libraries is rapid and ongoing. Participants in the exchange discovered that there are strengths and weaknesses in both the ASU and FDUL service models and that the librarians from both systems can learn from one another and absorb best practices from their exchange partners. This paper reflects the views and experiences of the exchange librarians (Shi and Johnson) and also author Shao, who is a Chinese national working as a faculty fellow librarian at Appalachian State University.