Welcome…
…to the blog space for this project. OK, I’m new to the blog-o-sphere, but it can’t be too hard, right? It’s a text within a context, like any other, and has defining features that make it work ok and…the rest is up to you? Indulge me as I explore this new genre. :) I’m hot off the heels of getting my academic book out (squeal with delight) and now want to settle in to some more fire-side-chat-like communication.
If you’re a teacher or a teacher-in-the-making, a fellow researcher, PhD student, or a tutor working with migrant and refugee-background youth who are learning in and through English as an additional language (EAL) in high school, then you are the target audience. If you’re something else, enjoy the ride.
Each month, (around the first week), I’ll write a post to keep you abreast of how the project is evolving, provide some reflections on ideas, events and experiences, and also offer some juicy critical literacy research and teaching morsels that I have come across in my reading travels or have created. It’s all about sharing good work around and inspiring each other to keep “Making the Difference”….which is the title of a truly inspiring book that I read in my graduate diploma of Education year back in 1986 and encourage you to read. It doesn’t even mention ‘critical literacy’, but it set me on a path of exploring equitable options for school students who are not from mainstream backgrounds. It’s kind of like my “where it all began” book (along with Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed). It does mention other important, related concepts such as deficit theory, immigration, class, hegemony and inequality, and is just as relevant today as it was back then. I wonder what your ‘where it all began’ book is?
Connell, R., Ashenden, D., Kessler, S., & Dowsett, G. (1982). Making the Difference: Schools, Families and Social Division. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
Freire, P. (1972). Pedagogy of the oppressed (M. B. Ramos, Trans.). Middlesex, UK: Penguin.
Project update: (to be sung in a smooth Karen Carpenter voice….) “We’ve only just begun…..”* :) I’m awaiting approval to gain access to schools and young people to conduct the research.
[*My oldest daughter and I often break out in song when we hear/say lines that remind us of music. This won’t be the only time I’ll do this in this blog!]