Education Commons^™

Transacting With Characters: Teaching Children Perspective Taking With Authentic Literature, Tracey S. Hodges, Erin Mctigue, Katherine Landau Wright, Amanda D. Franks, Sharon D. Matthews

Faculty Publications

The present study builds upon established best practices in narrative comprehension instruction by redesigning a story map, to retain the benefits of text structure instruction, while also facilitating students to reach deeper levels of character-based comprehension. Framed in reader response theory, dual coding theory, and developmental theories of perspective taking, children increase their knowledge of text while becoming more capable of taking the perspective of unique characters through intentional transactions. Using an exploratory, single-subject design, the authors centered the reading intervention on comprehending children’s literature from two, conflicting character perspectives. The authors documented four 3rd-grade participants’ comprehension of plot-based and …

Living Among Guatemalan Mayans Is Fascinating Experience, Irene Scharf

Faculty Publications

I have just lived a dream. Five years ago I learned of a school where students of all ages could study Spanish intensively while living among the Guatemalan Mayans. Peace Accords had been signed in 1996, the government was encouraging tourism, and it was, finally, safe to visit.

Why a dream? Because, 25 years ago, when I traveled through Central and South America, I promised my family I would avoid Guatemala because of the perceived was dangers. During that trip, as I met my Europeans and other who had visited, remained safe, and found it a fascinating country, I vowed …