Abstract
This participatory action research study was based on the tenets of critical literacy as well as the philosophy of phenomenology. The goal was to determine if a critical pedagogy would foster the development of critical consciousness in students. The class studied was a group of ten at-risk students in tenth grade in a small school district in upstate New York. The yearlong interactions of students and teachers were presented as a descriptive portraiture. Teachers and students collaborated in the construction of understandings through continual dialogue based on fictional works as well as through news articles. Both students and the researcher journaled their personal beliefs and reactions. Criteria for both the dialogues and journaling were used to determine if critical consciousness was developing. The findings of the current study show that each student developed critical consciousness, and praxis, or social action, was evidenced in the students’ creation of a blog designed to help parents and young people deal with bullying. Critical literacy’s applicability to the Common Core is discussed as implications.
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Pescatore, C. (2015). Developing Critical Literacy in a Tenth Grade English Class. In: Yoon, B., Sharif, R. (eds) Critical Literacy Practice. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-287-567-9_8
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