Language and Literacy Education Commons^™

Sudden Sky, Davide Trame

The Utah English Journal

No abstract provided.

Just Write, Steve Shilling

The Utah English Journal

No abstract provided.

English Teacher's Pay, Sharon Nauta Steele

The Utah English Journal

No abstract provided.

Reading Time, Stephanie B. Thompson

The Utah English Journal

No abstract provided.

An Exploratory Analysis Of The Use Of Multi-Word Units In National Secondary School Efl Textbooks In Egypt, Ahmed Abd-Allah Sallam

Archived Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Montclair State University’S Secondary English Education Program : Perceptions And Expectations Of Pre-Service And Beginning Teachers Of Writing, David B. Malter

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

No abstract provided.

Using Creative Writing Instruction In The Urban High School English Classroom To Promote Writing Skills In Remedial Level Students, Maureen Harrison

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

The purpose of this research is to investigate the value of creative writing instruction for increasing the literacy of remedial students in urban High School English classes. Students who are placed in remedial level classes often have preconceived negative feelings concerning their ability to produce academic writing. As I later discuss through the research of Debra Holmes Matthews, John A. Daly and Michael D. Miller, these preconceived notions impact the motivation and educational experience of remedial level students. In my research I will examine the ability of creative writing to motivate struggling student writers and help to improve specific writing …

The Effects Of Background Music On The Reading Performance Of Taiwanese Esl Students, Peter Chou

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to see what kinds of effects classical music and hip hop music have on the performance of a second language reading comprehension test in Taiwanese college students. According to Kahneman' s ( 1973) capacity model for attention, one may fail to perfonn an activity because the supply of attention needed for multiple tasks does not meet the demand needed to perfom1 each of the tasks. This explains why students perform better or worse on different cognitive tasks with certain types of background media. An experiment involving 123 participants from a medium size college in …

Class Indifference - A Divided Nation : Finding Common Ground Through American Pragmatism And Democratic Principles In The Composition Classroom, Stacey L. Morrison

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Social class plays a significant but often silent part in American politics, lives, and education. As the events of Hurricane Katrina clearly illustrate, the poor and working class often suffer discrimination that leaves them completely powerless. Their position in life shapes not only how they are seen and treated, but also how they see their world. Their cultures differ markedly from middle and upper class cultures, further alienating them from possible greater personal achievement in a system that champions middle-class values. Education, being a microcosm of our society, mirrors our class conflicts, often failing to teach working-class students in an …

Language Use And The Oral Tradition In Aaya (African American Young Adult) Literature, Kaavonia Hinton-Johnson

Teaching & Learning Faculty Publications

(First paragraph) In elementary school my favorite teachers taught me that the language used in my home was incorrect, incoherent, and inappropriate. My second grade teacher Ms. Hull, a tall, thin, dark-skinned woman, stands out among the others. I can still see her hovering over us. “Was!” Ms. Hull shouted, “not wuz. Your tongue is lazy.” “You be what?” she’d ask in disgust with one hand on her hip. When this happened, I was sure to get yelled at and lectured. To avoid such humiliation, I quickly learned to, as we said in my neighborhood, “talk proper.” Shame nagged at …

Attitudes Of Mexican Nationals Toward The Use Of Code Switching In The Rio Grande Valley, Jennifer M. Vojtko

Theses and Dissertations - UTB/UTPA

The purpose of this study is to establish the beliefs and attitudes of Mexican Nationals living in the Rio Grande Valley toward the use of code switching, or the use of two or more languages during a speech act. Because of the high influence of the Spanish language in the Rio Grande Valley, code switching is more commonly referred to as Spanglish. Researchers have been studying code switching since the early fifties; however, limited research has been conducted on attitudes toward code switching. The goal of this study is to offer a comprehensive look at the attitudes demonstrated by Mexican …

Book Review: Book Blurbs

The Utah English Journal

Resources for Teachers including:

- When Kids Can't Read, What Teachers Can Do: A Guide for Teachers 6-12 by Kylene Beers,

- Tools for Thought: Helping All Students Read, Write, Speak, and Think by Jim Burke,

- Investigating Texts: Analyzing Fiction and Nonfiction in High School by Bronwyn Mellor and Annette Patterson,

- The Drowning of Stephan Jones by Bette Green,

- Why America's Children Can't Think: Creating Independent Minds for the 21st Century by Peter Kline,

and

- Aloft by Chang-rae Lee.

Simple Ways To Include Jane Austen In High School, Elena Wilson

The Utah English Journal

While teaching composition courses on the Utah State University campus and completing my master's degree, I learned, through conversations with colleagues and students, that only a few of my associates were familiar with Jane Austen or the titles of her novels. Restless with my findings, I conducted a study through Utah State University on high school teachers' rationales and pedagogy for teaching Jane Austen's novels. I telephoned local English teachers, and I sent online inquiries to over 2000 English educators. Most of my results came from Utah teachers. These research results implied that the four most common rationales for including …

Bringing The Story To Your School, Sherry Meidell

The Utah English Journal

During the first day of the fifth grade, my teacher smiled and gave us graham crackers. The next day she put on a grim face which remained for most of the year. I do remember one day that I saw her smile again. The teacher announced that we were going to have a special visitor from a publishing company. She handed each of us a piece of manila paper and told us to do a drawing from one of the publisher's books. I drew the South Going Zak, which was a character created by Dr. Suess.

Letters Of Metacognition: Four Key Questions To Ask Of Student Writing By Student Writers, Robert H. Rempe

The Utah English Journal

The Essentials of the Writing Assignment Whenever I have students do any writing assignment, be it essay, research report or literary analysis, I require in addition to the assignment itself a separate essay which I refer to as the Letter of Metacognition. In this Letter of Metacognition each student must answer the following four essential questions:

1. What works in the PROCESS of my paper?

2. What does not work in the PROCESS of my paper?

3. What works in the PRODUCT of my paper?

4. What does not work in the PRODUCT of my paper?

My Students And English Literature, Ellen Mccaffrey

The Utah English Journal

It took me nearly thirty years to be assigned to teach English literature. Although my undergraduate and graduate training in English focused heavily on literature from Britain, my teaching assignments usually involved grammar and composition and literature from the United States. In my district, English literature is a twelfth grade elective course, and those who teach it usually teach it for as long as they can. My opportunity came when the usual English literature teacher became ill and had to retire. To my amazement no one else in the department wanted to teach the course. I willingly, happily, and enthusiastically …

Slam! Poetry As A Genre For Social Activism, Stacy Miller

The Utah English Journal

The roots of SLAM poetry are historically situated in traditional poetry, the poetry of the Beats, and in Hip-Hop music. SLAM taps into the rhyme scheme and versification of traditional poetry but also creates its own hybrid of convention and form that is based in modem poetry. SLAM reaches back into the poetry of the Beats and revives an unconventional use of rhyme scheme, syntax, and grammar. Hip-Hop, which arrived at the tail end of Disco in the late 70's, broke the musical and rhythmic beats in Disco music and birthed the notion of Hip-Hop as a subgenre of music. …

Abc Books: Connecting With Literature, Constructing Personal Learning, Deborah Dean

The Utah English Journal

"When do we get to make ABC books?"

"Yeah. I've seen those before, and I know the kids made them in your class."

It was the first day of school, but already the students were asking about an assignment that my ninth grade classes were well known for doing. The whole thing began early in my teaching career as I pondered some questions all teachers ask themselves from time to time: How do I help my students make learning personal? How do I help them own a novel, rather than simply parroting back my comments or what "Cliff' might have …

Utah Writing Project Summer Workshops, Debbie Davis

The Utah English Journal

"It was the best workshop I've ever attended. I will never teach writing the same way again!" Linda Simpson, President of the Utah Council of Teachers of English and Language Arts, told me at the UCTE/LA 2002 Conference. Her assessment of the Utah Writing Project's one-week writing workshop made me want that experience for myself. Last summer I attended the one-week workshop, and this summer I attended the four-week. Linda was right- I will never teach writing the same way again!

Engaging Reluctant Readers: Let's Try Nonfiction, Kathryn Fitzgerald

The Utah English Journal

"If it's not fiction, it's not reading." Starkly put, that was my concept of worthwhile literature until recently with, I think, good reason. Not only do we English teachers love reading good fiction, but we know that valuable lessons are taught through literature: students learn about themselves and their own life choices through reading about recognizable fictional characters; they experience cultures and times other than their own by reading diverse current and classical fiction; they learn to think critically about the beliefs and values they are exposed to through fiction (and to reflect on their own beliefs); they learn empathy …

The Aesthetic Mask: Cinematic And Musical Icons In Ellison's Invisible Man, Gary Lemco

The Utah English Journal

Critics of Invisible Man seem to have been blind to the fact that Ralph Waldo Ellison was both music major and filmgoer. While struggling to create a seminal novel of Afro-American identity, Ellison was the cultural inheritor of a vast system of sounds and visual icons making up the national and - I daresay - the international tradition of aesthetic values. If the narrator of Juneteenth comes to claim a movie actress as his mother, so too does the unnamed narrator of Invisible Man seize upon music and film as possible sources of his being, as stable representatives of our …

Doing It For The Love Of It: Weaving Lives In A Community Of Learners, Maryann Felps

The Utah English Journal

Robert Frost said that "what is done is done for the love of it - or not really done at all." This past school year at the non-public school where I work something was done for "the love of it" and served to create a community of learners whose lives became successfully interwoven. What follows is a description of this community, how it was originally developed, how it progressed, and what resulted at the conclusion of its ten-month existence.

"What Do I Do With This One?": Teaching Esl Writers Who Have Been Mainstreamed, Todd Heyden

The Utah English Journal

With the addition of non-native speakers in their courses, teachers may find that their job description also includes the teaching of ESL writing. "What do I do with this one?" is a question I commonly hear from concerned colleagues. Understandably, they want to know how to best meet the needs of the ESL writers who have been mainstreamed into their Pope John XXIII courses. At the top of the list of their concerns is error correction. An ESL writer's essay can contain a myriad of errors, even in just a single sentence. Where does one begin to address so many …

Imagine Lunch, Susan Grandfield

The Utah English Journal

The high school where I teach houses many vending machines. A vending machine resides in every comer of the school known to me, and I think there are some machines in areas that I don't frequent. It's a big school, after all. Kids can buy candy, hot and spicy chips that tum their tongues red, Pop-Tarts, Pepsi (not Coke, though) and a variety of other so-called foods, none of which have nutritional value. Kids without much money have discovered a machine with a large pastry called a "Big Texas" (as in "I got me my Big Texas") for 65 cents. …

Bullies, Brenda Mcneill

The Utah English Journal

Bob blusters into my room. He's a large boy - square in the way football players often are - stocky legs and broad across the shoulders. He is from all accounts a very talented athlete. English though confuses him; the nuances of language and thought frustrate him and he deals with his frustration through anger. Though he may be agile in his body, he is not agile in his mind - and he is angry about it and uses his size to intimidate other students and short female English teachers. However, he needs English in order to graduate from high …

Socrates Does Shakespeare, Victor Moeller

The Utah English Journal

Robert Benchley once remarked that "There are two kinds of people, those who classify things and those who don't." Since I belong to the first group, I tend to classify teachers according to those who still employ the little-red-school-house model of learning (lecture) and those who daily engage their students in active learning. I do so not only because most of my former teachers assumed that they were the most important part of the learning process but also because the lecture method continues to dominate in too many classrooms even today. In contrast, the genuine Socratic teacher knows that the …

Click, Jayne Marek

The Utah English Journal

"It didn't feel like anything special," Perry said. A fine winter night outside, meaning the frost had sharpened the stars. It was colder in Urbana than it had been in Madison when Sis had left that morning. "But all of a sudden I was flat on the library floor. Face hurt like hell."

"Yeah, well, no surprise, with that face," Sis said.

"Shut up."

"So are seizures hereditary?" Sis asked.

"Nah, it's stress. Studying your ass off. As if you would know."

Getting Students Off To A Good Start, Debbie Davis

The Utah English Journal

I wouldn't want to trade places with a secondary student the first days of school, would you? Can you imagine coping with new schedules and new routines - and higher academic demands? On top of that, don't forget tracking all the information we teachers and administrators deluge them with. I wonder how students can remember expectations, rules, and assignments announced by seven or eight teachers, when all they really want to know is "Will I be accepted by my peers?" and "Can I survive this grade level?" I want my students to feel positively about the answers to both questions, …

From "Freshman Friday" To Interior Design: Inside The First Week Of A Ninth Grade English Class, Robert Petrone

The Utah English Journal

As I prepared for my third year of teaching ninth-grade English, I focused my attention on what I would do with the students during the first week of the year. At that point in my career, I felt, for the first time, comfortable with the content-a short story unit, the personal narrative, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Odyssey, and Romeo and Juliet-and so felt at ease to put more energy into some other aspects of my teaching. As I brainstormed ideas of how to go about the first week of the year, an image from my student teaching experience flashed …

Lord Hamlet's Lesson, Harlan Underhill

The Utah English Journal

No abstract provided.