We were delighted to have the opportunity to guest edit this special issue of JLR devoted to literacy education for preservice teachers. When editors David Reinking, Cyndie Hynd, and Donna Alvermann solicited suggestions for a themed issue at meetings of the JLR editorial reviewboard and the NRC publications committee, as well as on the NRC listserv, the topic of teacher education emerged far more than any other. Indeed, there are a number of reasons preservice teacher education is currently a hot topic. To situate this volume within a broad frame, we present two contexts for the recent interest in preservice teacher education.
The Educational ContextLiteracy is, by nature, an ever-evolving concept. What it means to be literate continues to expand as we move from one decade to the next. A quick look at the topics addressed by articles published in JLR in recent decades gives us a sense of how the field is redefining literate activity (Guzzetti, Anders, & Neuman, 1999). Such topics that have J LR
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