Disciplinary Literacy
Pedagogy as Cognitive Literacy Process
And
Disciplinary
Literacy Pedagogy as Navigation Across Cultural Boundaries
In Developing Socially
Just Subject-Matter Instruction: A Review of the Literature on Disciplinary
Literacy Teaching, Moje dissects different approaches and perspectives
of Disciplinary Literacy towards social justice. The two teaching practices of disciplinary literacy
that stood out to me were “Cognitive Literacy Process” and “Navigation Across
Cultural Boundaries” because in class we’ve discussed about teaching students
to be mini experts (authors, researchers, scientists, mathematicians,
historians, etc.) in all subject areas as
a means of providing equal opportunities, access, and making connections to the
real world.
Cognitive Literacy Process
This pedagogy
focuses on teaching cognitive strategies that supports comprehension of texts
while also drawing from what students might be interested in as they read. The aim
for this model is to provide opportunities for youth to learn to independently access
and evaluate different types of text that they need in order to be socially involved
in society. Mainstream schooling has always revolved around Euro-centric perspectives
and culture which are not relatable to our diverse group of youth.
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How can we use this type of pedagogy to support
students in being actively involved in social justice?
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What kinds of texts or resources do we need in
order to do so?
Navigation Across Cultural Boundaries
This pedagogy focuses on teaching subject-matter
beginning with students’ interests, knowledge and practice as a way for them to
learn content knowledge. This advocates “teach the student not the subject”
through practice of navigating across the different cultural, discursive, or linguistic
communities. In other words, students learn interactively through critical
action projects, community projects, and human interaction. Even though this pedagogy
focuses on documenting and analyzing youth text and cultural practices, it
leaves text practices of the disciplines more vague.
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How does navigation across cultural boundaries
support social justice?
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How can we incorporate more subject/content
based practices into this pedagogy?
For me, combinations of both pedagogies are important
because in order for our youth to be active participants for social justice
they need to have the content knowledge, evidence, socially interactive skills,
and community awareness.
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What do you guys think? Agree or disagree?
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Or what were your favorite pedagogies for social
justice?
Thanks for reading J
Hallie, I absolutely love this post and all the effort put into it with the pictures and explanations. You make some very interesting points and I will do my best to answer all the questions you posed.
ReplyDeleteHow can we use this type of pedagogy to support students in being actively involved in social justice?
-I feel we need to give all students access and knowledge about what interests them, in the context in which they can read and discuss the meaning of it. In doing this, we would need to set up an explanation as to why what they are reading has the effect that it does.
What kinds of texts or resources do we need in order to do so?
-Books of all types of genres, including historical texts to as far as fictional texts.
How does navigation across cultural boundaries support social justice?
-This allows all students to feel that connection with their education in the sense that they are directly involved and seen as important. This is so critical for all students to feel, especially in such racialized systems that we see in education & curriculum.
How can we incorporate more subject/content based practices into this pedagogy?
-Planning lessons with them in mind, incorporating different aspects into your individual curriculum.
Andrea,
DeleteI really appreciate you trying to answer the questions! They were definitely really loaded. I completely agree with what you said about giving an explanation to why we are reading a certain text. It is so important to have a PURPOSE of the tasks we ask our students to do, especially when it has to do with their community, environmental factors, and issues that play a major role in their lives. Texts that speak directly to them will not only make it more engaging for them, but it also makes them more knowledgeable about the world around them. Then this knowledge can be used to question, critique, and participate in social justice.
Hallie,
ReplyDeleteYour blog post is my favorite and this lens is so critical! It is important to look at these literacies through a social justice lens and to evaluate how we can use these ideas to create a more just society. Cultural literacy starts with students knowledge and what they know. This is a form of cultural relevant pedagogy where you start were the student is at. They know the things that are going on around them. dURING THIS STAGE i would start with books that relate to their daily struggles and injustices they face in their communities or if they don't they can read and reflect on their own privilege. Cognitive literacy allows them to draw from what they learn, evaluate it, and critique it. This can also be done with text! After students read they should not only apply what they read to daily life but be critical of what they read. This will make for powerful readings and discussions.
Whitney,
DeleteYes. 100% yes. Cultural and intellectual knowledge is so critical when it comes to social justice because youth need to know the different roles of institutional systems and kinds of oppressions that directly affect their lives in order to fight against societal structures. Through disciplinary literacy, we can provide the tools for youth to examine the different factors that affects their lives.
Hallie,
ReplyDeleteThis is so well put together and I love what you chose to focus in on because it's so important. Social Justice literacy as a discipline is not something I thought of as it's own discipline prior to reading this article but it makes sense that it would be. We talk a lot about activating students' prior knowledge and the first half of your post speaks to something that I think is overlooked when people consider prior knowledge. Students that are seen as other are marginalized by their lack of shared "mainstream " experiences. I think especially when students are part of a culture that is pathologized (I'm thinking of Black culture Hip Hop culture in particular) the knowledge that they have is ignored and the focus is on things that they don't know that people feel they should. Focusing on what students bring to the table not only makes for more relevant instruction but makes students view their experiences as valid and valuable. This type of pedagogy requires us to pay attention to our student and the things that interest them. as far as text I think there are a lot of things that could be used for this kind of teaching, especially different forms of media whether print, visual o auditory. Things like music, movies, TV, articles on current events are all good materials to use to develop Social Justice literacy. I think things that are immediately relevant and/or historically relevant would lend itself most to this kind of work.
To answer your last question; In the Moje reading the section "Disciplinary Literacy Pedagogy as Teaching Epistemological Processes of the Disciplines" stood out to me because I believe critical literacy is so essential to social justice work. Epistemology is the creation of knowledge or looking at how we know what we know. Students must be critical readers, listeners, writers and speakers to develop Social Justice literacy.
Hallie,
ReplyDeleteI really loved your blog post because it focuses on social justice and why we should be implementing it across disciplines and begins to address how it could be done. I really liked how you wrote about advocating to "teach the students not the subject". I think that is very powerful in itself; I remember being in a PD meeting and they had a guest speaker talking about creating an environment that addresses social justice and racial issues. She posed the question of whether or not race should be talked about in the classroom, most believed it should be but a few said no. One man shared that the reason why he didn't believe it shouldn't be taught is his subject was math and there was no way for him to address it nor did he believe it necessary for what he was doing. Now we have all seen social justice taught in math thanks to Rico and I feel like it is definitely possible. I think teachers just need more support and to just take the time to figure it out.