Metaphors of Literacy: Dialogues in Inclusive Settings

Abstract

This article discusses the importance of metaphors in education and in inclusive settings in particular. Metaphors are seen as the fabric of collaboration through dialogue across the curriculum. The article analyzes the dialogues among the Language Arts, Social Studies, and inclusion teacher in a large middle school in the Southwest of the United States in an effort to coordinate literacy planning and instruction in these content areas. From the analysis of the dialogues in the author's journal, metaphors emerge as a central component to make meaning in literacy instruction. Three main metaphors of literacy were recursive in the dialogues: (a) literacy as a multiple path for learning (b) literacy as a bridge for academic success and (c) literacy as a window to read the social and personal world of students in inclusive settings. The author of the article advocates for a qualitative research approach where metaphors are the core of methodology in the analysis of language data in teachers' discourses to refine our understanding on how language plays a crucial role in the planning and implementation of literacy instruction in K-12 schools.

Does One Stand to Gain by Combining Art with Philosophy? A Study of Fourth-Year College (13/14 Years of Age) Philosophical Writings Produced Within the PreCPhi/Philosophemes Corpus

“…Some associate it with personality (Gostoli, Cerini, Piolanti, & Rafanelli, 2017;Kim & Choi, 2017;Lennartsson, Horwitz, Theorell, & Ullén, 2017), while others insist on tying it to the way analogical reasoning, central in humans, works (Hofstadter & Sander, 2013). Production of metaphors is important to divergent thinking, and globally useful in education (Causarano, 2015).…”