scholarly journals Teachers’ perceptions of their preparedness for supporting struggling literacy learners in secondary English classrooms

2020 ◽  
Vol 54 (3) ◽  
pp. 265-284 ◽  
Author(s):  
Margaret K. Merga ◽  
Sayidi Mat Roni ◽  
Shannon Mason
1944 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Janet McIntosh

Writing reader response journals during the act of reading provides ideal opportunities for secondary English students to deepen and expand their understanding of literature. Based on data from three case studies conducted by a former high school English teacher, currently an English educator, this article examines the effectiveness of students recording response entries as they read a novel. Excerpts from student journals illustrate the positive results of combining the acts of reading and writing. Student engagement with text leads to better comprehension and through writing reflective responses, students become more effective readers.


2018 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 456-475 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alastair Henry ◽  
Cecilia Thorsen

Demotivation (Dörnyei & Ushioda, 2011) and non-participation (Norton, 2001) characterize negative responses to classroom practice of a generally chronic nature. In this article, focus is directed to negativity that emerges within the context of a particular language developing activity, and which can be understood as a situated response to the activity’s demands. In conceptualizing negative responses at the activity level, disaffection – the negative face of engagement – is a construct of central importance. Drawing on data from a large-scale ethnographic project in secondary English classrooms in Sweden, in this exploratory case study disaffection (Skinner, 2016) is examined in the context of two language developing activities. Analyses reveal that disaffection can transform into active engagement, and that when called upon to perform an inauthentic identity, students can ‘redesign’ activities in ways that enable them to act authentically.


Author(s):  
Luke Rodesiler ◽  
Lauren Tripp

Given the potential of informal online learning via social networks for supporting the career-long professional growth of in-service teachers, research must be conducted to better understand the ways in which today’s future teachers are being prepared for and experiencing such practice. This chapter presents the authors’ efforts to move in that direction, a qualitative study describing six pre-service secondary English language arts teachers’ perceptions of self-directed networked learning during a teaching internship. Findings suggest that participants perceived networked learning as a viable and valuable approach to supplementing professional growth despite also perceiving challenges in the form of context, identity, and time.


Author(s):  
Chiew Yen Dwee ◽  
Elizabeth M. Anthony

While much has been written on the concept and development of learner autonomy, limited studies have investigated the perceptions and classroom practices of teachers in fostering learner autonomy. This paper sets out to examine what teachers think about learner autonomy as well as the strategies they use to develop autonomous learners in a university setting using a qualitative approach. Five English teachers were selected using purposive sampling and a semi-structured interview was conducted with each of them to obtain in-depth data on their perceptions and teaching practices revolving around autonomous learning. The findings revealed that although university teachers possessed a fair understanding of what learner autonomy involves, there was a lack of focus in terms of developing learner autonomy in the classroom due to a number of challenges such as lack of teacher readiness, passive student attitude as well as the relevance and timing of English courses within the university curriculum.Keywords: Learner autonomy, Teacher perception, Teaching practices, English classrooms


2000 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-52 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristina Love

Abstract Whole Class Text Response Discussions (WCTRD) are pervasive in secondary English and represent one site in which students can learn to adopt the habits of critical thought that are promoted in state and national Curriculum documents. In this study, the phasal structures (Gregory and Malcolm 1981) of a variety of such WCTRDs in Australian secondary English classrooms were examined. It was found that teachers in such WCTRDs regularly made limited selections from the available pool of phases, such selections regularly scaffolding a narrow range of literate and moral skills, but offering little support for the development of critical and analytical response. Such results suggest that despite a shift at an academic and professional development level towards more critically-oriented models of text response, day-to-day discursive practice in some secondary English classrooms in Australia is still very much grounded in Reader Response practices (Iser 1978) that contribute to the development of morally compliant citizens. One WCTRD was selected for closer analysis of how the textual, experiential and interpersonal meanings (Halliday 1994) operated to privilege students’ ‘personal response’ over critical response. Through the examination of Transitivity and Conversational Structural choices in particular, a picture was provided of how this WCTRD was structured to encourage students to rehearse previously appropriated ideologies, rather than to critically or analytically interrogate these ideologies.


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