Abstract:The teacher readaloud is an instructional tool established in its ability to foster children's language and literacy development. Increasing cultural and linguistic diversity and changing standards place pressure on teachers to provide literacy and language instruction relevant to children's everyday lives and learning. This article presents a framework for conducting culturally and linguistically relevant readalouds within two essential components, talk and text, in terms of developing cultural competence, ma… Show more
“…As pub lishers respond to market trends, however, we also find it worthy to take a critical look so the urgency to respond does not undermine the original goal by reinforcing harmful ideologies in a different way (May, Holbrook, & Meyers, 2010). We encourage teachers to engage in critical, culturally relevant practices in both selecting texts and facilitating the classroom interactions that surround them (May & Bingham, 2015;May, Bingham, & Pendergast, 2014).…”
Section: Resultsmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…As publishers respond to market trends, however, we also find it worthy to take a critical look so the urgency to respond does not undermine the original goal by reinforcing harmful ideologies in a different way (May, Holbrook, & Meyers, ). We encourage teachers to engage in critical, culturally relevant practices in both selecting texts and facilitating the classroom interactions that surround them (May & Bingham, ; May, Bingham, & Pendergast, ).By identifying books and talking with students about what they notice, teachers can focus student attention on how Middle Eastern Muslims are portrayed and teach them to think critically about the books. Who benefits from the overrepresentation of some kinds of stories? Gather picture books about a particular group of people (e.g., Middle Eastern Muslims).Make a detailed map of the Middle East available to your students.…”
The authors describe how Middle Eastern Muslims are represented in a text set of award‐winning picture books. Most were written by authors with outsider perspectives who wrote about (a) antiquated times and practices and (b) war‐stricken countries and dangerous journeys. Although most of the books are not problematic on their own, the large number of the same two stories obstruct many other Middle Eastern Muslim representations, creating blind spots for readers. Authentic books about authors’ beliefs, stories remembered from childhood, and connections between the Middle East and the West are also present, although to a much smaller extent. These themes are described and titles listed for classroom use. Ultimately, although children's literature offers the potential to validate readers’ communities and teach about others, it can also create barriers to understanding by only sharing partial stories, obscuring some stories by overrepresenting others, and revealing information that should not be shared.
“…As pub lishers respond to market trends, however, we also find it worthy to take a critical look so the urgency to respond does not undermine the original goal by reinforcing harmful ideologies in a different way (May, Holbrook, & Meyers, 2010). We encourage teachers to engage in critical, culturally relevant practices in both selecting texts and facilitating the classroom interactions that surround them (May & Bingham, 2015;May, Bingham, & Pendergast, 2014).…”
Section: Resultsmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…As publishers respond to market trends, however, we also find it worthy to take a critical look so the urgency to respond does not undermine the original goal by reinforcing harmful ideologies in a different way (May, Holbrook, & Meyers, ). We encourage teachers to engage in critical, culturally relevant practices in both selecting texts and facilitating the classroom interactions that surround them (May & Bingham, ; May, Bingham, & Pendergast, ).By identifying books and talking with students about what they notice, teachers can focus student attention on how Middle Eastern Muslims are portrayed and teach them to think critically about the books. Who benefits from the overrepresentation of some kinds of stories? Gather picture books about a particular group of people (e.g., Middle Eastern Muslims).Make a detailed map of the Middle East available to your students.…”
The authors describe how Middle Eastern Muslims are represented in a text set of award‐winning picture books. Most were written by authors with outsider perspectives who wrote about (a) antiquated times and practices and (b) war‐stricken countries and dangerous journeys. Although most of the books are not problematic on their own, the large number of the same two stories obstruct many other Middle Eastern Muslim representations, creating blind spots for readers. Authentic books about authors’ beliefs, stories remembered from childhood, and connections between the Middle East and the West are also present, although to a much smaller extent. These themes are described and titles listed for classroom use. Ultimately, although children's literature offers the potential to validate readers’ communities and teach about others, it can also create barriers to understanding by only sharing partial stories, obscuring some stories by overrepresenting others, and revealing information that should not be shared.
“…To give some examples, Big Red Lollipop by Kahn (2010), Night of the Moon: A Muslim Holiday Story, Like the Moon Loves the Sky, Amina's Song by Khan (2008Khan ( , 2021aKhan ( , 2021b and In My Mosque by Yuksel (2021) can be used for the themes of culturally relevant pedagogy and healing of Middle Eastern Muslim students. The book I analyzed in this study can be highlighted with various educational methods in the classroom to advocate culturally and linguistically relevant read-aloud (May et al, 2014), to perform drama activities to act out the story (McMaster, 1998), to finish the story or to complete a particular part of the story (McKeown and Beck, 2003), to discuss the role of women in Islam to handle the misinformation about their empowerment, lack of agency, oppression and to bolster healing of Middle Eastern Muslim through authentic representation.…”
Purpose
In this paper, the author adapts the concept of culturally relevant pedagogy and the pedagogy of hope for Middle Eastern Muslim students' education. This paper aims to develop a new perspective for educating Middle Eastern Muslim students by focusing on Islam by considering being Muslim as a cultural way of being and living.
Design/methodology/approach
Pedagogy of hope (Hooks, 2003), particularly the concept of healing in education and culturally relevant pedagogy (Ladson-Billings, 1995), guided this study during the research process.
Findings
Three themes of culturally relevant pedagogy through a picturebook by Mobin-Uddin (2007) entitled The Best Eid Ever was examined to illustrate how this picturebook can be used as an example of culturally relevant pedagogy.
Research limitations/implications
The limitation is the researcher’s interpretation as a Middle Eastern Muslim who lived in a Western country. The Best Eid Ever (2007) can be used in the classroom for Middle Eastern Muslim students' education to discursively build a positive identity and educate students from different backgrounds. More studies may investigate other texts (e.g. novels) with Middle Eastern Muslim characters. Further research can also explore the use of this book in the classroom.
Originality/value
This study provides qualitative description of a picturebook from culturally relevant pedagogy and pedagogy of hope to guide teachers to bolster Middle Eastern Muslim students’ schooling experiences.
“…It is also important to incorporate urban literacies. Students should be provided opportunities where they are able to read and write for leisure about culturally relevant concepts (May, Bingham, & Pendergast, 2014). For instance, texts drawn from popular culture could be used such as school appropriate scripts from shows they watch, speeches by popular figures with whom they are familiar, and authentic literature with characters that resonate with them.…”
The purpose of this action research piece was to discuss my experience with teaching close reading in the urban classroom using autoethnographic methods. It explains ideas and challenges that I encountered when teaching close reading in conjunction with close reading strategies. I detail close reading strategies and explain how they can be used advantageously. The article closes with ideas on how I learned the importance of promoting student self-application of strategies, incorporating strategies so that they are not time consuming, differentiating strategies, and ultimately, the idea of promoting reading for enjoyment.
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