Inviting Dissent: Classroom Practices for Nurturing Communities of Readers in the Early School Years
RIS ID
3342
Abstract
In the context of the early school years, this paper examines established classroom practices that focus on engaging young readers with texts. The lens used for this exploration is provided by transtextuality theory that accounts for ways in which texts build networks of meaning for readers to negotiate. Transtextuality theory originated in and serves literary criticism. However, this paper demonstrates how this theory provides teachers and researchers with tools for interrogating classroom practices that seek to develop young readers as meaning makers. Examples of teaching strategies and learning experiences are shared. These examples sometimes see dissent over interpretation arise among children or between teacher and children. This paper identifies ways that this creative dissent may be constructively managed as a positive resource for making meaning from texts. These classroom examples are explored in terms of how they nurture readers as navigators of meanings in the texts they read, view, share, recollect and talk about at school.
Publication Details
Harris, P. J. & McKenzie, B. (2005). Inviting Dissent: Classroom Practices for Nurturing Communities of Readers in the Early School Years. In P. Jeffery (Eds.), Australian Association for Research in Education - International Research Conference, Sydney, November 28 - December 1, 2005 Coldstream, Victoria: Australian Association for Research in Education.