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Affirming Students' Right to Their Own Language

Bridging Language Policies and Pedagogical Practices

• Edited by Jerrie Cobb Scott, Dolores Y. Straker, Laurie Katz

• Price: $145.00
• Binding: Hardback (also available in Paperback)
• Pages: 448
• Published by: Routledge
• Publication Date: 4th November 2008 (Available for Pre-order)
• ISBN: 978-0-8058-6348-2

About the Book

A Co-publication of the National Council of Teachers of English and Routledge

How can teachers make sound pedagogical decisions and advocate for educational policies that best serve the needs of students in today’s diverse classrooms? What is the pedagogical value of providing culturally and linguistically diverse students greater access to their own language and cultural orientations?

This landmark volume responds to the call to attend to the unfinished pedagogical business of the NCTE Conference on College Composition and Communication 1974 Students’ Right to Their Own Language resolution. Chronicling the interplay between legislated/litigated education policies and language and literacy teaching in diverse classrooms, it presents exemplary research-based practices that maximize students learning by utilizing their home-based cultural, language, and literacy practices to help them meet school expectations.

Pre-service teachers, practicing teachers, and teacher educators need both resources and knowledge, including global perspectives, about language variation in PreK-12 classrooms and hands-on strategies that enable teachers to promote students’ use their own language in the classroom while also addressing mandated content and performance standards. This book meets that need.

Visit http://www.ncte.org for more information about NCTE books, membership, and other services.

Table of Contents

Foreword, David Bloome

Preface, Jerrie Scott

1. Cross-Currents in Legislated, Litigated Educational Policies, Jerrie Scott, Dolores Straker, Laurie Katz

2. Conversations with Scholars: Joel Spring, Issues in Global and Local Language Policies; Geneva Smitherman, An Insider’s Take On African American Language Policies; Cristina M. Rodriguez, The Law of Language in the United States; Mary Carol Combs, What Teachers Need to Kon to Educate English Language Learners

Part I: EDUCATIONAL POLICIES, ATTITUDES, AND UNFULFILLED PROMISES

3. The Hidden Linguistic Legacies of Brown v. Board and No Child Left Behind, John Baugh and Aaron Welborn

4. Portraits, Counterportraits, and the Lives of Children: Language, Culture and Possibilities, Rick Meyer

5. Restore My Language and Treat me Justly: Indigenous Students’ Rights to Their Tribal Languages (40 pages), Dorothy Aguilera and Marguerite LeCompte

6. Power, Politics, and Pedagogies: Re-Imagining Students’ Right to Their Own Language Through Democratic Engagement, Valerie Kinloch

7. Exploring Attitudes Toward Language Differences: Implications for Teacher Education Programs, Laurie Katz, Jerrie Scott, and Xenia Hadjoiannou

8. Positionality: Using Self-Discovery to Enhance Pre-Service Teachers’ Understanding of Language Differences, Nancy Rankie Shelton

9. Instructional Approaches and Students’ Attitudes: Critical Perspectives on Code-Switching, David E. Kirkland and Austin Jackson

Part II. TOWARDS A PEDAGOGY OF SUCCESS IN CLASSROOMS

10. "We Have Our Own Language As Well As the Language We Bring:" Constructing Opportunities for Learning Through a Language of the Classroom, Beth V. Yeager and Judith L. Green

11. "Taylor cat is black": Code-Switch to Add Standard English to Students’ Linguistic Repertoires, Rebeccas S. Wheeler

12. There’s No "1" Way to Tell A Story, Laurie Katz and Tempii Champion

13. Culturally Responsive Read-Alouds in First Grade: Drawing Upon Children’s Language and Cultures to Facilitate Literary and Social Understandings, Jeane Copenhaver-Johnson, Joy Bowman, and Angela Johnson

14. Developing Culturally Responsive Teacher Practitioners Through Multicultural Literature, Tamara L. Jetton, Emma Savage-Davis, and Marianne Baker

15. Teaching the Whole Child: English Language Learners in a Middle School, Mari Haneda

16. New Chinese Immigrant Students: Literacy Development from Heritage Language to Bilingualism, Dangling Fu

17. High Stakes Testing and the Social Languages of Literature and Literate Achievement in Urban Classrooms, Dorothea Anagnostopoulos

Part III. GLOBAL PERSPECTIVES ON LANGUAGE DIVERSITY AND LEARNING

18. Possibilities for Non-Standard Dialects in American Classrooms: Lessons from the Greek Cypriot Class, Xenia Hadjioannou

19. The Writing on the Wall: Graffiti and Other Community School Practices in Brazil, Ana Christina DaSilva Iddings

20. The Social Construction of Literacy in A Mexican Community: Coming Soon to Your School?, Patrick H. Smith, Luz A. Murillo, and Robert T. Jimenez

21. Multilingualism in Classrooms: The Paritetci School System of the Ladin Valleys in South Tyrol (Italy), Videsott Gerda

22. Educational Policies and Practices in Post-Apartheid South Africa: The Case for Indigenous African Languages, Nkonko M. Kamwangamalu

23. Meaningful Literacy Learning for Children: Lessons from South Africa, Carole Bloch

24. India’s Multilingualism: Paradigm and Paradox, Zarina Manawwar Hock

Afterword: Reflections on Educational Policies and Pedagogical Practices: Talking Back, Jacqueline Jones Royster, Jerrie Cobb Scott, and Dolores Straker

About the Author(s)

Jerrie Cobb Scott is Professor of Urban Literacy and Director of the Reading is Power Reading Center at the University of Memphis.

Dolores Y. Straker (deceased) was Dean of the Raymond Walters College at the University of Cincinnati.

Laurie Katz is Associate Professor of Early Childhood Education at The Ohio State University.