Ramirez 1 Alex Ramirez Professor Williams English 1102 October 16, 2012 Brice-Heath, Shirley.

"What No Bedtime Story Means: Narrative Skills at Home and School." Cambridge University Press 11.1 (1982): pp. 49-76. JSTOR. Web. 27 Sep 2012. This article reports on a study of preschoolers in the Southeastern United States, and how they learn to understand the meaning in text. The key aspect of the study is how literacy events, both at home and at school effect young childrens learning. The study defines a literacy event as, an occasion in which written language is integral to the nature of participants interactions and interpretations(Brice-Heath 50). Some examples of literacy events are bedtime stories, classroom readings, and television advertisements. In the study three cities are examined, and are found to have different teaching styles that affect the childrens comprehension levels. Maintown, a city were the adults focus on learning the skills needed to comprehend text at a young age both at home and school, had the children who could most easily comprehend written text. Roadville is the second city identified in the study. The study shows that the teaching style at school is similar to that of Mainville, but has a different home-life. At home children are encouraged to learn the morale aspect of the piece. Trackton, a city that had little focus on childrens need for learning comprehension skills, had students who were not as well prepared to comprehend the meaning in text at such a young age. I believe this article does well to show how childrens diverse backgrounds effect the way they learn from an early stage. Children who have more help from both home and school learn to comprehend written text at a faster rate then the children who had less or no influence from the household. The article shows that it is hard to incorporate a universal English in school due to the household aspect of a childs learning. Casteel, Clifton. "TeacherStudent Interactions and Race in Integrated Classrooms." Journal of Educational Research. 92.2 (1998): 115-120. Print. In TeacherStudent Interactions and Race in Integrated Classrooms" the problem of unfair treatment to African American students, as compared to Caucasian students by Caucasian teachers is addressed. The article draws from a study in which 417 students of different races were broken up into sixteen classrooms, each with a Caucasian teacher. The behavior of the teachers towards the students were recorded based on the way they reacted with students of the different races. The study showed that the African American students received less attention and more negative interactions with the teacher then the Caucasian students. The Caucasian students in the classroom, which equated for 48% of the students received much more attention and praise, plenty of feedback and were given more clues by the teachers then the African American students which made up 43% of the group, and had a more diverse background then the other students. The article indicates that factors are accounted for that may skew the data. The article does well to show how students may be at a disadvantage because of the way they look, speak, or write. After reading the article, I believe it is appropriate to ask the question, how would teachers like this be able to teach a Standard English to students with a different culture and background?

Ramirez 2 Crotteau, Michelle. "Honoring Dialect and Culture: Pathways to Student Success on High-Stakes Writing Assessments." The English Journal. 96.4 (2007): 27-32. Print. This article addresses the standard writing test administered in Virginia, and the fact that recently it became mandatory to pass in order to graduate. The school that is in question in the study has a 95% passing rate, with many of those who failed belonging to a mountain suburb community, that has a drastically different dialect then those who live in the city. The school system formed a new program to help remediate the failing students, and help them pass the test the next time they choose to take it. The teacher selected to run the program was the head of the English department, and was allowed to create an independent curriculum that allowed her to fit the individual needs of her students. The curriculum she created taught the students to incorporate their interest into their writing, this way it would be easier for them to address a prompt on the standard test. The teacher determined that a key factor for nonstandard English speakers to acquire Standard English is peer approval(Crotteau 29). The teacher formed the curriculum to allow the students to work together to improve each others writing skills through peer editing, and presenting in front of each other at the beginning of class. Through the use of this teaching style in the remediation program, all the students went on to pass the standard writing test and graduate with their fellow classmates. The school has incorporated the peer aspect of the curriculum into all English classes, and has since had a 100% pass rate. This article shows how some teachers choose to work with students diverse background and different dialects when writing for a standard test, rather then to simply ignore their needs. Programs and curriculums like this address the problem stated in SRTOL of incorporating universal English into classrooms across the country. Johnson, Douglas, and Susan Green. "I Ain't Thinkin' 'Bout No ... : The Development of Two Parallel Diversity-Related Case Studies for Higher Education."College Teaching. 51.4 (2003): 148-152. Print. In the article, two case studies are cross-examined and show how group work in diverse classrooms is a very effective teaching tactic. Group work provides a clear avenue for students of different backgrounds and cultures to get to know each other and deconstruct stereotypes that they may have about other students. Other points made for group work are that it increases participation in the class and creates deeper discussions, both of which lead to higher grades for the course. The article sites two case studies, one for an educational psychology course and the other for a human recourses management course. In the first study, a prompt is issued regarding a teacher and an African American student of low economic status. The students must read the situation then answer questions in their groups. It resulted in a discussion in which students learned about others they worked with, who had different backgrounds and were of different races. The second study was similar but had a human resources manager and a group of Latino workers, also of low economic status. Students again had to read the prompt and answer questions first in small groups then as a whole class. The result was a similar discussion as the first, in which the students continued to learn more about others culture and gained respect for some they knew nothing about. This article shows how learning tactics, such as group work, are already in place to help deal with cultural and dialect diversity in classrooms around the country.