Collaborative Learning Communities in Middle School Literacy Education: Increasing Student Engagement with Authentic Literacy

Offering research on afterschool literacy programs designed around teacher-student collaborative inquiry groups, this book demonstrates how adolescent learning is uniquely successful when grounded in dialogic conversation. By providing a robust theoretical framework for this approach in the middle school, Malavasic showcases how developing a learning community which focuses on mutual respect and attention to students’ personal academic literacy histories can become the catalyst for the overall success of teaching and learning in the classroom.

Centered on building quality teacher-student relationships and creating a classroom learning community, this book highlights essential topics such as:

• The impact of talk-based critical thinking
• The augmentation on students’ motivation, engagement, and identity construction
• Research, theory, and pedagogy
• Celebrating literacy learning

Collaborative Learning Communities in Middle School Literacy Education is the perfect addition for researchers, academics, and postgraduate students in the fields of literacy and those on Teacher Education programs. This volume positions collaborative inquiry learning as an effective way forward for teaching and learning in the middle school and is essential for those wanting to explore this further.

Jolene T. Malavasic is a faculty member in the Department of Literacy Teaching and Learning at the University at Albany. She received her PhD in Reading from Syracuse University. Jolene previously worked as an Assistant Professor in the Literacy Department at SUNY Cortland and as a middle school reading specialist. Her current research explores how teacher-student relationships in collaborative teaching spaces shape and are shaped by adolescents’ literate identities and literacy practices in and outside of school.