Literacy is a socially constructed ideology (Barton & Hamilton, 1998; Street, 1995). Current representations reduce literacy to standards, skill testing, and the five components of reading (NICHD, 2000). This view of literacy discounts the knowledge and skills of many students. This article examines the oral story of Aisha, an African American first grader, through traditional and nontraditional measures. The findings highlight two contrasting perspectives of Aisha’s story: One that views the story as weak and below grade level and another that highlights her rich literacy abilities. This study argues that it is important to consider the social and historical features that may influence children’s stories. A definition of literacy that recognizes and values the continuum of literacy experiences is advocated in this article.
BarthesR. (1974). S/Z: An essay (MillerR., Trans.). New York, NY: Hill & Wang. (Original work published 1970)
2.
BartonD.HamiltonM. (1998). Local literacies: Reading and writing in one community. New York, NY: Routledge.
3.
BlissL. S.McCabeA. (2008). Personal narratives: Cultural differences and clinical implications. Topics in Language Disorders, 28, 162-177.
4.
CazdenC. (1998). Classroom discourse: The language of teaching and learning. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
5.
ChampionT. (1997). Tell me somethin’ good: A description of narrative structures among African American children. Linguistics and Education, 9, 251-286.
6.
CliattM. J. P.ShawJ. M. (1988). The storytime exchange: Ways to enhance it. Childhood Education, 64, 293-298.
7.
Couper-KuhlenE. (2003). Intonation and discourse: Current views from within. In SchiffrinD.TannenD.HamiltonH. E. (Eds.), The handbook of discourses analysis (pp. 13-34). Malden, MA: Blackwell.
8.
CraigH. K.WashingtonJ. A. (2006). Recent research on the language and literacy skills of African American students in the early years. In DickinsonD. K.NeumanS. B. (Eds.), Handbook of early literacy research (Vol. 2, pp. 198-210). New York, NY: Guilford Press.
9.
DysonA. H. (1993). Social worlds of children learning to write in an urban primary school. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
10.
DysonA. H. (2001). Where are the childhoods in childhood literacy? An exploration in outer (school) space. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, 1(1), 9-39.
11.
DysonA. H. (2003) Welcome to the jam: Popular culture, school literacy, and the making of childhoods. Harvard Educational Review, 73, 328-361.
12.
FairbanksC. (1996). Telling stories: Reading and writing research narratives. Journal of Curriculum and Supervision, 11, 320-340.
13.
GeeJ. P. (1996). Social linguistics and literacies: Ideology in discourse. (2nd ed.). London, UK: Falmer Press.
14.
HeathS. B. (1983). Ways with words. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
15.
HeathS. B. (2000). What no bedtime story means: Narrative skills at home and school. In LevinsonB. A. U.BormanK. M.EisenhartM.FosterM.FoxA. E.SuttonM. (Eds.), Schooling the symbolic animal: Social and cultural dimensions of education, (pp. 169-189). Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
16.
HughesD.McGillivrayL.SchmidekM. (1997). Guide to narrative language: Procedures for assessment. Eau Claire, WI: Thinking Publications.
17.
InvernizzM. A.AbouzeidM. P (1995). One story map does not fit all: A cross cultural analysis of children’s written story retellings. Journal of Narrative and Life History, 5(1), 1-19.
18.
KalyanpurM.HarryB. (1999). Culture in special education: Building reciprocal Family-professional relationships. Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes.
19.
LabovW. (1972). Language in the inner city: Studies in Black English Vernacular. Oxford, UK: Basil Blackwell.
20.
LeeC.D. (2001). Is October Brown Chinese? A cultural modeling activity system for underachieving students. American Educational Research Journal, 38, 97-141.
21.
LeeC.D. (2006). Every good-bye ain’t gone: Analyzing the cultural underpinnings of classroom talk. Qualitative Studies in Education, 19, 305-327.
22.
MainessK. J.ChampionT. B.McCabeA. (2002). Telling the unknown story complex and explicit narration by African American preadolescents: Preliminary Examination of gender and socioeconomic issues. Linguistics and Education, 13, 151-173.
23.
McCabeA. (1997). Cultural background and storytelling: A review and implications for schooling. The Elementary School Journal. 97, 453-473.
24.
McCabeA.BlissL. S. (2003). Patterns of narrative discourse: A multicultural, life span approach. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
25.
McClureE.MasonJ.WilliamsJ. (1983). Sociocultural variables in children’s’ sequence of stories. Discourse Processes, 6, 131-143.
26.
MehanH. (2000). Beneath the skin and between the ears: A case study in the politics of representation. In LevinsonB. A. U.BormanK. M.EisenhartM.FosterM.FoxA. E.SuttonM. (Eds.), Schooling the symbolic animal: Social and cultural dimensions of education (pp. 259-279). Lanham, MD: Rowan & Littlefield.
27.
MichaelsS. (1981). “Sharing time”: Children’s narrative styles and differential access to literacy. Language in Society, 10, 423-442.
28.
MichaelsS. (1991). The dismantling of narrative. In McCabeA.PetersonC. (Eds.), Developing narrative structure (pp. 303-351). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
29.
MichaelsS. (2005). Can the intellectual affordances of working class storytelling be leveraged in school?Human Development, 48, 136-145.
30.
MillerP. J.GraceE. CBraceyJ. R. (2005). Working-class children’s experience through the prism of personal storytelling. Human Development, 48, 115-135.
31.
MollL. C.GonzálezN. (1994). Lessons from research with language-minority children. Journal of Literacy Research, 26, 439-456.
32.
MollL. C.GreenbergJ. B. (1990). Creating zones of possibilities: Combining social contexts for instruction. In MollL. C. (Ed.), Vygotsky and education: Instructional implications and applications of sociocultural psychology. (pp. 319-348). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
33.
National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. (2000). Report of the National Reading Panel. Teaching children to read: An evidence-based assessment of the scientific research literature on reading and its implications for reading instruction. (NIH Publication No. 00-4769). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.
34.
PalmerB. C.HarshbargerS. J.KochC. A. (2001). Storytelling as a constructivist model for developing language and literacy. Journal of Poetry Therapy, 14, 199-212.
35.
SmithermanG. (1994). “The blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice”: African American student writers. In DysonA. H.GenishiC. (Eds.), The need for story: Cultural diversity in classroom and community. (pp. 80-101). Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English.
36.
SpradleyJ. P. (1980). Participant observation. New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
37.
StakeR. E. (1995). The art of case study research. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
38.
SteinN.GlennC. G. (1979). An analysis of story comprehension in elementary school children. In FreedleR. (Ed.), Advances in discourse processing: Vol. 2 New directions in discourse processing (pp. 53-119). Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
39.
StreetB. (1995). Social literacies: Critical approaches to literacy in development, ethnography, and education. London, UK: Longman.
40.
UrbachJ. (2006). The door into Narnia: Orchestrating a broader view of literacy. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Colorado, Boulder
