Ciencia en Nepantla: the journey of Nepantler@s in science learning and teaching

This paper presents a new approach to science education that takes a path through sociocultural theory and into the ideas of Gloria Anzaldúa. We apply Anzaldúan theory to science education by illustrating it in action through various examples which explore the multidimensionality of teaching science with Latin@ students in various contexts including dual language settings. We present what it is to journey through transformation using examples from educators at various levels of science within the world of teaching science with Latin@ students in the U.S. Our examples illustrate how Latin@ students cross many cultural borders in Spanish, English, Latin@ home culture, school culture, and the world of scientific dialogue and content, and in doing so, go through tensions and transformations between dominant and non-dominant worlds, which should be acknowledged and better understood through Anzaldúan theory. Fundamentally, we present a transformative notion of Latin@ science learning as “living on the bridges” of many dialogic and cultural practices, and having to negotiate these in-between spaces, or “nepantla” (Anzaldu´a and Keating in Interviews, Psychology Press, London, 2000), where Latin@ students must contend with the fragmented and sometimes painful struggle of living in racialized reality amidst the demands of a dominant culture, and where transformation and healing are possible through the path of conocimiento. We advocate for teachers to become science teacher nepantler@s, who guide their students through nepantla, and into a new mestiz@ consciousness of science education.     

Sensitivity to rime unit frequency and children's early word‐reading strategies

The current work examines children's sensitivity to rime unit spelling–sound correspondences within the context of early word reading as a way of assessing word‐specific influences on early word‐reading strategies. Sixty 6–7‐year‐olds participated in an experimental reading task that comprised word items that shared either frequent or infrequent rime unit correspondences. Retrospective self‐reports were taken as measures of strategy choice. The results showed that the children were more accurate in identifying word items that shared a common rime unit (consistent items) when compared with those containing infrequent rime units (unique and exception items). Moreover, while nonlexical (phonological) attempts were most frequently applied across all word types, these resulted in lower levels of accuracy, especially for the exception word items. The current data support the argument that children are increasingly sensitive to rime unit sound–spelling correspondences during the early stages of their word reading and the nature of these word‐specific orthographic representations shape their reliance on using particular lexical or non‐lexical‐based word‐reading strategies.     

Refuting Myths,Making Electronic Links with the World: writing in secondary schools in the Eastern Province,South Africa

Older pedagogies that separate learning English in South African schools into LI and L2 inevitably bring in their train judgements of ESL achievements as relatively fixed in quality and as less good in kind than those of L1 users. New curriculum emphases on the dynamic creativity of human language‐learning potential entail more positive and success‐oriented criteria for assessing additional language learning. Electronic links with students in Canberra, Australia and with a Californian Professor of Writing showed Standard 7 students from the Eastern Province as already competent in writing communicatively in English. However, disabling myths still threaten to impede progress towards equity of educational outcomes in South Africa.     

Educational policy for citizenship in the early years in Australia

Understandings of young children as active and capable citizens, while evident in discourses of early childhood education and research, are not widely reflected in the policy for the early years of schooling in Australia. This paper makes an analysis of the gaps and tensions between discourses of young children as active citizens and policy for citizenship education at the national level in Australia and at the Queensland State level. There is a widespread discourse within early childhood that regards young children as citizens and democratic participants in their own lives, as a reflection of the oft-cited Article 12 in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. However, educational policy and curriculum for citizenship in Australia, by and large, adheres to age and stage understandings of children that deem young children unable to conceptualise and/or articulate ideas of what it means to ‘be a good citizen’. We ask which discourses are being harnessed in educational policy for citizenship in Australia, what discourses are silenced or ignored and what this tells us about how young children are thought about in Australian politics and education.     

Pathways to Parental Engagement: Contributions of Parents,Teachers, and Schools in Cultural Context

Research Findings: This study examined correlates of parents’ reported school engagement in an ethnically diverse, rural sample (N = 346) of parents and teachers in kindergarten through Grade 2. Of particular interest were role expectations and family–school relationships in American Indian families, who historically have been marginalized by schools. In terms of role expectations, parents and teachers agreed that they should support each other’s roles, parents should have more responsibility than schools for teaching social skills, and families and schools should have shared responsibility for children’s academic success. Teachers had higher expectations than parents for parent engagement, which in turn was greater when parent–teacher communication was more frequent and the school climate was more welcoming. American Indian parents more strongly endorsed a separation of family and school roles and felt less welcomed at school; ethnicity moderated correlates of reported parent engagement. Practice or Policy: These findings have practical promise given that parent–teacher communication, school climate, and role expectations are more easily altered than are structural barriers that also may hinder parents’ involvement in supporting their children’s early education.