English Journal
Vol. 108, No. 4, March 2019
HIGH SCHOOL MATTERS: The Courage to See Clearly [FREE ACCESS]
Members of the Secondary Section Steering Committee comment on topics of importance to English language arts educators.
SPEAKING MY MIND: To Dismantle Racism, We Must Discuss It
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“Speaking My Mind” invites readers to speak out about controversial issues relevant to the teaching of English language arts.
SPEAKING MY MIND: Starting with Students: A Framework for High School Reading
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“Speaking My Mind” invites readers to speak out about controversial issues relevant to the teaching of English language arts.
EVERYDAY COLORISM: READING IN THE LANGUAGE ARTS CLASSROOM [FREE ACCESS]
Sarah L. Webb provides an overview of colorism, addresses colorism in the English language arts classroom, and shares ideas for responding to colorism beyond the classroom.
COLOR BRAVERY: ON RACE FROM THE PAGE TO THE STAGE
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After attending a performance of Macbeth with ninth graders who questioned the director’s casting decisions, the authors revisited their assumptions about race and teaching the play.
AESTHETICS OF WHITENESS: RACIAL HIERARCHIES IN FITZGERALD, HURSTON, AND BEYOND
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In a comparative literature study, Claire Cothren guides students through notions of Whiteness by highlighting aesthetics associated with racially marginalized groups.
MILES MORALES: SPIDER-MAN AND REIMAGINING THE CANON FOR RACIAL JUSTICE [FREE ACCESS]
Mario Worlds and Cody Miller argue that to disrupt racial hierarchies we must purposefully disrupt the canon of literature.
CRITIQUING NEOLIBERALISM AND POSTRACE DISCOURSE IN NARRATIVES FOR YOUNG PEOPLE
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Using the dystopian novel Orleans as an example, the authors outline a framework for questioning the discourses students encounter in texts written for young adults.
“I DON’T LIKE HER”: UNCOMFORTABLE MOMENTS IN CROSS-CLASSROOM WRITING EXCHANGES [FREE ACCESS]
When two Ohio teachers updated the idea of pen pals, they experienced race-related challenges they did not foresee.
READING REPRESENTATIONS OF RACE: CRITICAL LITERACY AND FERGUSON
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Working as a team, three teachers created an interdisciplinary course for middle schoolers to examine issues of social justice.
STUDENT ACTIVISTS AND AUTHORS: CONTEMPORARY YOUTH VOICES AS CLASSROOM TEXTS
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The rash of school shootings across the United States instigated a spate of student activism and led the authors to consider how to showcase the voices of the activists as examples of persuasive writing.
THE POET AND ME, THE WRITER AND YOU
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A veteran teacher reflects on his career and his relationship with a poet that began in his second-period English class in 1967.
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POEM: TEACHER APPRECIATION WEEK
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POEM: the philosophy of gerunds (my mother is dying)
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BEYOND BINARY GENDER IDENTITIES: Welcoming Discussions of Gender Identity in Public Schools
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A theater arts teacher discovered that her students and colleagues were more accepting than she expected when she came out as transgender.
JOURNEYS INWARD: Choking on Teaching
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When a near-fatal classroom incident exposed the author’s vulnerability, it reinvigorated his teaching journey.
FROM CAMPUS TO CLASSROOM: An Other Story of Diversity and Identity
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A preservice teacher considers how her experiences as a woman of color have shaped her understandings of identity and diversity in the classroom.
BOOKS-IN-ACTION: New Possibilities for Antiracist Pedagogy [FREE ACCESS]
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Erin T. Miller reviews a recently published teacher narrative about spending a year examining race and racism with a group of mostly White high schoolers in Minnesota.
CRITICAL GLOBAL LITERACIES: Exploring the Global Landscape through Digital Poetry
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An author of books for young people that include poetry anthologies explains how “digital” poems help students develop global perspectives.
TEACHING SHAKESPEARE: Difficult Questions and Teaching The Merchant of Venice
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The column editors invited a teacher to share reading and teaching ideas for The Merchant of Venice and explain an analytical approach based on analogy, antithesis, and ambiguity in the play.
BOOKENDED: From Awkward to Still Awkward, but More Chill
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