Teacher’s Narration of Teaching Critical Literacy: It’s a KEY for Raising Students’ Awareness in Iran

Abstract

To be literate, students need to able to think critically and read between the lines to find the implicit meanings and ideologies. To help Iranian English language learners learn writing as a social action and not independent of social (in)justices and (in)equalities, we included critical literacy in a writing course at the University of [for anonymity]. We intend to illuminate teacher’s narration about raising students’ awareness towards (mal)practices, (in)justices, and (in)equalities of the society in their writings.To do so, all 52 undergraduate 3rd-year-EFL learners of English Literature and Translation participated in our writing class. The teacher was also an associate professor (50 years old) with critical literacy as his main area of research. Students were required to write essays as mid-term and final exams. The teacher’s reflection on the course in general and on the EFL learners’ reflective essays highlighted that teaching writing through critical literacy helped students realize that writing is a process dependent on different social and political issues.Students’ growth in critical consciousness through their writing reminds teaching practitioners, policy-makers, and teacher educators to provide innovation in their classrooms to empower language learners with teaching methodologies contrary to what they are accustomed to during their learning.

Inclusion of L2 (Basque) learners in Dialogic Literary Gatherings in a linguistically diverse context

“…The experiences and the way of thinking of the characters are discussed, so that participants understand the stories, get into the book, and analyse the fictional and their own personal narratives jointly and thoroughly. Hence, by sharing reflections and thoughts in the L2, in which students receive input and produce output, DLG become an optimal space for second language learning while using the target language as a tool to read the word and the world (Freire & Macedo, 1987) and to raise students' critical awareness (Tohidian & Taskoh, 2020). In this context, the L2 is the indispensable instrument that catalyses the synergies that originate in the DLG.…”

Urgent Changes to Be Made in Iran’s Primary Education: Voices From Teachers

“…We need to remind the higher order authorities that teaching and learning do not happen in a vacuum; rather, they are collaborative dialogic-based practices with teachers and students as the main stakeholders in the realm of education. Our extensive review of the relevant literature (e.g., Harrison, 2004;Lunn Brownlee, 2015;Mohamed, 2019;Pomeroy, 1993;Schutz et al, 2018;Tohidian, 2016;Tohidian et al, 2020;Tomlinson & Hodgson, 1992;Towers, 2020) illuminates the urgent need for reform, including the need to create an educational environment in which the voices of primary school teachers are heard and their concerns acknowledged, particularly with respect to the cultivation of student identities and characters. Accordingly, this study seeks to answer the following question: What education changes do Iranian teachers hope to witness in the primary school context?…”