Using Everyday Language to Support Students in Constructing Thematic Interpretations

Research in literary response indicates that in classroom contexts, high school students have difficulty constructing thematic interpretations of literary texts, tending instead to summarize or build happiness-bound morals that ignore a text’s potentially negative tones. However, studies in out-of-school contexts show students building thematic interpretations that include positive and negative elements. These conflicting findings suggest that some challenges of thematic interpretation lie not in students’ interpretive limitations but in school-based discourses that define thematic interpretation. In this study, students constructed thematic interpretations with sentence stems using everyday interpretive language, such as “Reading this story suggests the world can be a place where _____.” With no additional instruction, experimental groups constructed more thematic interpretations and made fewer happiness-bound interpretations than a comparison group. Results suggest that students are more capable of thematic interpretation than some research indicates and that everyday interpretive language may help disrupt students’ school-based framing of thematic interpretation.     

Prior Sexual Victimization and Disclosure of Campus Sexual Violence Among College Students

Using survey data from a large, public university, the authors examined the relationships of precollege sexual violence experience to revictimization and disclosure. Among victims of campus sexual violence, those with prior sexual victimization were no more or less likely to disclose to campus resources and were less likely to disclose to peers. Results suggest that institutions need to be prepared to support students with a range of victimization experiences. There is also a need for earlier and expanded sexual violence education and awareness efforts.     

Drunkorexia: An Exploratory Investigation of College Students With Alcohol‐Related Infractions

The construct of drunkorexia, caloric restriction prior to or during alcohol consumption, was examined in 411 college students who experienced alcohol‐related infractions. Analyses were conducted to examine differences in demographic prevalence distributions, alcohol‐related consequences, and alcohol consumption between a subsample of participants who reported drunkorexia behaviors and a subsample who did not.     

Man of Letters,Literary Lady,Journalist or Reporter?

The enormous changes wrought in the British newspaper industry during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries brought about a revolution in newspaper reading habits, financing and influence, all aspects of which have been well documented by historians of the press. But what of the contributor, particularly the freelance whose millions of words formed, mostly anonymously, the content of the new mass market press? How did writers negotiate changes in the literary marketplace during this time as editors demanded more ‘news’ and less in the way of whimsical paragraphing, and sketches, the traditional newspaper output of the professional man, or woman, of letters? Through the study of memoirs, correspondence and the fictional output of contributors to the press during this time, it is possible to discern the often fraught relations between writers and their most lucrative market.     

Kindergarten Scores,Storytelling, Executive Function,and Motivation Improved through Literacy-Rich Guided Play

This study explored the effects of literacy-rich sociodramatic guided play on kindergarten student literacy performance and behavior. Kindergarten students of varying socioeconomic status attending two elementary schools in the same school district participated in this repeated measures, counterbalanced design study. Students received the mandated grade-level literacy instruction with a supplemental 15 min block of time designated for play-based literacy integration during which the intervention took place. During this short time, students working in small groups were given materials (miniature items, toys, letter tiles) to practice initial letter sounds and consonant–vowel–consonant rhyming word families using either an assigned activity (control condition) or a student-invented game that practiced the same literacy concepts (experimental activity). Students instructed through the experimental condition scored significantly better on the Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS) assessment with a medium effect size. Additional positive academic results included practice in story-composing, sequencing ideas into a complex cause and effect chain of events; application of new vocabulary; repeated practice of phonics and phonemic awareness skills to new examples; self-regulation of emotions; communication and negotiation with peers; and imagination, fantasy, humor, and creativity. Students evidenced preference for the experimental condition, continuing to repeat their games during recess or free time and to record them in their journals. Examples of student-generated literacy games are provided.     

Science and religion on the blackboard: exploring schoolmasters’ beliefs and practices in Senegal

This article treats the various forms of adjustment between scientific and religious discourses at school. It aims to analyse the beliefs and practices of schoolmasters and to explore how the oppositions between the ‘dominant’ discourses of Western science and those of religion are addressed in secondary education in Senegal. The analysis leans on the Actor-Network-Theory and the concept of ‘apparatus’ from Foucault. The article shows that, in the secular Republic of Senegal, contradictory messages on some sensitive issues are conveyed to pupils, in the classroom, by the official schoolmaster himself. The schoolmasters, whatever their religion, teach for religion in public schools (in a devotional sense); they do not teach about religion (in an academic sense). An ‘enrolment’ work is in progress in the official schools whereby pupils adhere to the ‘true’ religious discourse, challenged by the ‘true’ scientific discourse. The schoolmasters do not want to exclude the official curriculum but wish to teach religious knowledge. The State cannot limit each discourse to its own sphere of relevance and fails to impose its criteria on some actors who prefer those offered by their own religious networks. A Senegalese ‘national religious apparatus’ produces effects on schoolmasters’ educational practices and curriculum.     

Sex or gender identity? Understanding children's reading choices and motivation

The extent to which children's reading choices could be predicted by their motivation and gender identity was examined. Two hundred and twenty‐three children (average age 9 years 11 months) completed questionnaires measuring book reading choices, reading motivation, gender identity (identification with masculine and feminine traits) and a standardised reading assessment. Sex differences were found in children's reading motivation and reading choices. In addition, feminine traits were more closely associated with reading motivation and engagement with neutral books compared to masculine traits. Whilst children's sex predicted their choice of reading male‐ or female‐orientated books, the extent to which they identified with feminine traits was a better predictor in choice of neutral books. Results are discussed in relation to previous research examining sex differences in children's reading choices. In addition, implications for reading activities and choice of books available at school are discussed.     

Improving Public Schools Through the Dissent of Parents: Opting Out of Tests,Demanding Alternative Curricula,Invoking Parent Trigger Laws,and Withdrawing Entirely

Some parents and caregivers, frustrated by low academic performance of their local school, emphasis on testing, or the content of the curriculum, have worked independently or formed parent groups to speak out and demand improvements. Parents and families enact solutions such as opting out of tests, developing alternative curricula, invoking parent trigger laws, and withdrawing their children from public schools. When engaged well, these outcries of family dissent can be used to improve public schools and to keep them truly public. In this article, I define good dissent and show how it keeps schools healthy. I examine the actions, publications, and web sites of major parent organizations and individual parents to argue that some parents are demonstrating good and admirable dissent that can help improve school quality, parent satisfaction with schools, and student experiences in them; others not only fail to employ good dissent, but may actually be hurting the viability of our public schools and the type of graduate they produce.