1. Critical Literacy (Making Literacy Real - Chapter 3) Elizabeth Harrison, Liisa Kleemola, Chelsea Nielsen, Drew Erickson, Miranda Newton

2. Critical Literacy Decoding what the text is communicating and accepting at face value. Appreciate the author without questioning his or her motivations. Literacy is not a mode for social action, but rather a system for delivering information that is consistently accurate.

3. Any Questions or Comments?

4. Essential Question What is the importance of critical literacy and how does one imbed these strategies into one’s day-to-day activities?

5. Critical Literacy… - brings a critical perspective towards a text - uncovers the underlying messages - applies literacy to personal experience - judges the validity and ethical use of the text - analyzes the author’s motivation

6. Critical literacy has been influenced by work in the fields of feminism, racism, and queer theory and has extended from there. Literacy education should be concerned with raising the critical consciousness of learners. Critical Literacy

7. Key Tenets of Critical Literacy 1. Literacy is not a neutral technology, it is always ideologically situated. It is shaped by power and, in turns, shapes subjects and discourses. 2.Learners are differently positioned in relation to access to dominant literacy discourses through aspects such as ‘race’, class, culture, gender, language, sexual orientation, and physical abilities.

8. Key Tenets of Critical Literacy 3. Critical literacy can foster political awareness and social change. 4. Critical literacy is having a critical perspective on language and literacy itself, on particular texts, and on wider social practices.

9. Key Tenets of Critical Literacy 5. A learner should critically assess his or her culture. 6. Text production can provide opportunities to transform discourses of power.

10. Students make sense of newly learned information by fitting it into past experiences. Critical literacy expands this process by making students self-aware of this natural inclination. Students can then consider how others interpret texts and information differently based on their different past experiences. Critical Literacy and Students

11. Key Questions for Practice What is happening around me? Who is saying it? How are they saying it? Why are they saying it? This reminds me of… What can I do with this information? How can I challenge the authority in this text?

12. Division 3 - Newspaper Activity Form groups of six. Read through the article as a group. Discuss. Describe the motivations and perspectives the article presents.

13. Assessment Student/Teacher Checklist: Identify the perspective. Identify the views this perspective is presenting. Provide at least three examples from the text that support your discoveries Identify other possible perspectives of this article. What is the writer’s purpose in creating this text?

14. Division 4 A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift “I shall now therefore humbly propose my own thoughts, which I hope will not be liable to the least objection. I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee or a ragout.”

15. Division 4 Imagine you want to create a lesson from this text where high school students satirize injustices they see in the world. How would you foster the critical attitude they would need to identify contemporary injustices? How would you scaffold the necessary skills to write satire?

16. Division 2 Read “The Three Little Pigs” and “The True Story of the Little Pigs” or “Jack and the Beanstalk” and “Giants Have Feelings Too.” Compare and contrast the ideas in the text. In groups, students argue for or against the two perspectives in small groups Students write a defense of their position. This can be peer reviewed.

17. Vasquez “Critical Literacy does not necessarily involve taking a negative stance, rather it means looking at an issue or topic in different ways, analyzing it and hopefully being able to suggest possibilities for change or improvement.”- pg. 51

18. Division 1 Students write letters to Santa and prepare a classroom visit with him. Santa of a different nationality comes and surprises the students Students respond after the visit with discussion about the visit, their expectations of what Santa looks like, and other view-based preconceptions that were affected during this visit. Present other visuals of multi-cultural Santa figures to expand student conceptions of what Santa could look like in different cultures and countries.

19. Questions?

20. Exit Slip What is the importance of critical literacy? List one strategy to include critical literacy into the classroom. (These will be posted on Moodle)