DEVELOPING CRITICAL LITERACY THROUGH DIALOGIC PEDAGOGY IN MIDDLE SCHOOL: A PRACTITIONER EXPERIENCE

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to examine the development of critical literacy through dialogic pedagogy in an integrated humanities course at a charter middle school. This is important because critical lenses allow students to identify inequitable situations as they exist in the world. Critical literacy can help provide the framework of language and perspectives necessary to challenge these situations. In this study, grade 7 students engaged in book clubs that centered issues related to social systems and structures. Students were given time and space to discuss their selected book and the real-world issues they saw as related to ideas in the text. This research is a practitioner inquiry case study. I engaged deeply with the curriculum and instruction in my own classroom, with my students. This study focuses on the experience of one book club with five members who read Free Lunch, a memoir by Rex Ogle. The students in this group engaged with the practices of critical literacy discussed their ideas, questioned others, and created new shared understandings. Data from book club meetings and student reflections was collected and analyzed. The findings of this study suggest that students engage deeply with ideas and practices of critical literacy when they are able to participate in learning that creates these conditions. Through dialogue and grounded in a shared text, students negotiated their understanding of complex issues and perspectives. Using an analytical framework adapted from the Four Dimensions of Critical Literacy (Lewison, Flint, & Van Sluys, 2002), this study found that students 1) interrogated multiple viewpoints in the process of discussing and critically understanding the text, 2) focused on sociopolitical issues including domestic violence, socioeconomic disparity, discrimination, and mental health, and 3) used a variety of comprehension strategies when engaged in dialogic learning to share their ideas and opinions and prompt their peers to share ideas and opinions.