Stirring Up Justice: Adolescents Reading, Writing, and Changing the World

© 2005 INTERNATIONAL READING ASSOCIATION (pp. 318–339) doi:10.1598/JAAL.49.4.5

J O U R N A L O F A D O L E S C E N T & A D U L T L I T E R A C Y 4 9 : 4 D E C E M B E R 2 0 0 5 / J A N U A R Y 2 0 0 6318

Jessica Singer, Ruth Shagoury

Stirring Up Justice: Adolescents reading, writing,and changing the world

Stirring Up Justice: Adolescents reading, writing,and changing the world

Students read and wrote about an issue for

which they had passion, and the resulting

projects were shared with the

community.

We are what we do, especially what wedo to change what we are.... A literatureborn in the process of crisis and change,and deeply immersed in the risks andevents of its time, can indeed help to cre-ate the symbols of the new reality, andperhaps—if talent and courage are notlacking—throw light on the signs alongthe road.... To claim that literature on its own is goingto change reality would be an act of madness or arro-gance. It seems to me no less foolish to deny that itcan aid in making this change.

(E. Galeano, as cited in Espada, 2000, p. 9)

Teaching a diverse population of adolescents to bewriters, readers, and active citizens requires funda-mental changes in how we approach curriculumdevelopment, teaching strategies, and student rolesin the classroom. Our goal as educators is to createclassrooms where students learn to ask criticalquestions, support one another, and work towardpositive social change. These kinds of learningcommunities form when students are taught di-rect skills and strategies and when they are provid-ed with creative invitations to become educatedand actively participating citizens. Literacy and in-dividual action are at the heart of this curriculum;as Christensen (2000) wrote, “reading and writingare ultimately political acts” (p. vi). When the rele-

vance of reading and writing is demystified forstudents, they begin to understand its power intheir lives.

Jessie Singer (first author) taughtadolescent writers at a public urbanhigh school located in the heart ofsoutheast Portland, Oregon, in theUnited States. The high school’s stu-dent population is just under 1,400,and 20% of the student body qualifiesfor free or reduced-cost lunch. Jessie’sstudents drew from a mostly workingclass population, with about 25%

speaking a language other than English as theirfirst language. The school’s student makeup, muchlike the state of Oregon, is predominatelyCaucasian (77%). In her English classes, Jessieworks to teach her students literacy skills so thatthey may begin to see themselves as serious writ-ers and readers (e.g., Christensen, 2000; Fletcher,1993; Harvey, 2002; Zemelman & Daniels, 1998).Students do not just write to complete tests or tofill pages; instead, they engage in the pursuit ofwriting for authentic purposes and public audi-ences. For two years (2000–2002), Ruth Shagoury(second author) from Lewis & Clark College was aresident researcher in Jessie’s class for one to twomornings each week. Ruth participated in the ac-tivities of the classroom and assisted in creatingthe curriculum. She took field notes, interviewedstudents, and collected samples of their work. Ascoresearchers and coauthors, we (Jessie and Ruth)collaborated on this project with two ninth-grade

Singer is a student in theGevirtz Graduate School of

Education, University ofCalifornia at Santa Barbara,Santa Barbara, CA 93106-

9490, USA. E-mail [email protected]. Shagoury teaches atLewis & Clark College inPortland, Oregon, USA.

classes to study how the creation and completionof a unit on social activism could become a studyof literacy in action. Students were key informantsin this process.

In order to take a close look at studentsworking toward positive change, we framedresearch questions to help document our findingsand notice patterns in student outcomes. The fol-lowing were our research questions:

• How can adolescents use literacy practices to haveagency in their world?

• How do students define social activism?

• What teaching practices support a diverse studentpopulation to expand their reading and writing abilities?

• How do we differentiate instruction while keepinghigh expectations for all students?

This article describes a high school curricu-lum that encourages students to explore issues ofactivism and progressive social change. We shareour work with a reading and writing communitythat used skills, creativity, rigor, and communitybuilding to create meaningful and relevant out-comes. The names of all students in this articleare pseudonyms.

Planning and implementation ofcurriculum“As educators, we need to root our struggles forsocial justice in the work we do on an everydaylevel in a particular community with a particulargroup of students” (Kohl, 1998, p. 286). As an ed-ucator working at a diverse urban school, Jessiebegan the year creating a curriculum and learningopportunities for her students to connect literacyto issues of equity. As an active member ofPortland Area Rethinking Schools, a progressiveactivist group in Portland, Oregon, Jessie wascommitted to creating a curriculum that askedstudents to explore issues of equity. Jessie takes asociopolitical stance in her work as an educator,meaning that she “sees literacy not as neutral but

as bound up with ethnicity, gender, social class,disability and so on. Its purpose is social justice,equality and democracy” (Hall, 2003, p. 189).Jessie believes that teaching social justice can be atthe forefront of a secondary English curriculumthat simultaneously incorporates traditional skilldevelopment and critical analysis. She choreo-graphed her yearlong global literature curriculumaround one central theme: social activism. In thebeginning of the school year, she taught literatureand short stories from South Africa, along withthe history of political efforts to abolishapartheid. Students read Mark Mathabane’s(1995) autobiography, Kaffir Boy, along withshort stories from other South African writerssuch as Peter Abrahams, Nadine Gordimer, andDoris Lessing. Jessie taught Latin American litera-ture in which students explored issues of family,identity, and immigration. Along with interna-tional literature, students read multiple textsabout traditionally marginalized groups in theUnited States. Throughout the year, students ex-plored literature and history from a variety ofcultures while simultaneously participating inwriting and reading workshops that providedskills for understanding difficult texts and forwriting in multiple genres.

Each project, text, and area of study duringthe initial months of the school year built up tothe final three-month unit on social activism de-scribed in this article. Before students participat-ed in this final unit on activism, they wereexposed to a variety of stories about people com-mitted to effecting positive social change.Creating a curriculum throughout the year thathighlighted political or inspirational activists wasnot difficult. Much of the required literature inhigh schools includes rich stories of people de-voted to making a difference in other people’slives. Jessie included texts such as Kaffir Boy,Sandra Cisneros’s The House on Mango Street(1991), Gail Tsukiyama’s The Samurai’s Garden(1996), and Melba Beals’s Warriors Don’t Cry(1995). The reading curriculum alternated be-tween required texts that the whole class read to-gether and books students chose revolving

Stirring Up Justice: Adolescents reading, writing, and changing the world

J O U R N A L O F A D O L E S C E N T & A D U L T L I T E R A C Y 4 9 : 4 D E C E M B E R 2 0 0 5 / J A N U A R Y 2 0 0 6 319

around specific themes such as immigration,apartheid South Africa, and social activism. Thetwo classes read a total of five required booksduring the year and at least four books of choice.As students read, they also worked with Jessie andone another to improve as writers. The continualintegration and scaffolding of reading and writ-ing instruction provided a foundation for stu-dents to succeed in the last three months of thespring term with the culminating social activismunit. Jessie’s hope was that her students wouldnot only learn that they may effect positivechange in their lives, but also that they would ac-quire and practice the literacy skills necessary tosupport future choices in their work, studies, andpersonal lives.

The activism unit was titled Stirring UpJustice. The classes in which it was implementedwere made up of a truly diverse population ofstudents who had not been sorted into separatehonors or remedial classes based on test scores orprevious academic successes and failures.Students in these classes came from a cross sec-tion of southeastern Portland that includesneighborhoods with extreme wealth and extremepoverty. These students arrived in Jessie’s classeswith a wide array of literacy skills. The Englishdepartment had worked during the previousthree years to “untrack” the ninth-grade year sothat students would not begin their high schoolcareers sorted by predetermined ability groupings(Singer, 2002). The department is committed toproviding students with a rigorous and equitablestart to their high school studies.

Teaching a truly diverse community is bothchallenging and rewarding. There is Danika, whoat 15 is five feet, seven inches tall and a varsitysoccer player. Her writing is often poetic and fullof voice. She rarely misplaces a comma or a quo-tation mark. She writes notes at the end of papersasking for book recommendations, “preferablyclassics.” Then there is Nate. He signs his name“N8,” is 14 years old, and is obsessed with skate-boarding. Nate reads and writes well below gradelevel. He rarely writes complete sentences and of-

ten looks distracted and worried. Jeff is six feet,two inches tall and wears jeans that sag below hiships. He loves hip-hop music and looking cool.He often refuses to carry his books and leavesthem in a cupboard in the classroom. His writingseems natural and confident, though sometimesscattered. He is usually the first to have his handup and the last to put it down. Jeff says, “I hate torevise and I hate to write details. I’m always in ahurry.” There is shy Paul who reads poetry andlistens to music on his portable CD player. He of-ten arrives late because he cares for his youngerbrother in the mornings. Erik has AspergerSyndrome. He methodically draws ships and hall-ways on blank paper before class. He listens topop music and has befriended Emma. Emmaloves to paint canvases full of bright flowers andwrite letters to her pen pal in Argentina.

These ninth graders do not easily fit into neatcategories or definitions. They do not all clearly fitinto a particular “level” or benchmark. What thesestudents need in their learning is complicated andwithout easy explanation. They are in differentplaces in their literacy development and in theirlives. One of the never-ending challenges in teach-ing is to find ways to meet students where they arein their learning and to then help them developtheir skills and practices further. The challenge ofteaching a diverse range of students became a fo-cus point for our classroom research. As we createdand implemented the curriculum, we continuallyasked ourselves how we could successfully differen-tiate instruction while keeping high expectationsfor all students. Harste (2003) argued that we mustredesign curriculum with our students’ inquiryquestions at the center. He urged teachers to “beginwith what is on students’ minds; with what makesthem itch; with what questions they have.Disciplines can and should be introduced as per-spectives that students can take in unpacking andunderstanding issues” (p. 11). An important andchallenging part of teaching is to understandwhere students are in their learning developmentand then, through a process of critical reflection,introduce ways of learning that provide expandedways of thinking, seeing, and understanding.



Through weekly meetings, e-mail correspondence,and telephone calls, Jessie and Ruth forged an on-going critical dialogue regarding their classroompractices in order to create a rigorous, reflective,and inclusive learning community.

Understanding what students know and inwhat directions to take them in their literacypractices comes with time, conversation, observa-tion, and reflection. Daily structure and routinehelped create clear expectations for this class-room community. Students were provided withchoice in their reading and writing along withchallenging requirements and clear structure. Anever-present reality in these classes was the diver-sity of student ideas, skills, interests, and ap-proaches. Jessie and Ruth worked diligently toestablish and maintain a classroom where differ-ence did not exclude, silence, or derail learning.Instead, difference in thinking, experience, andapproach became the focus for the final unit onactivism. In Lorde’s (1984) words, “Differencemust be not merely tolerated, but seen as a fundof necessary polarities between which our creativ-ity can spark like a dialectic. Only then does thenecessity for interdependency become unthreat-ening” (p. 112). This diverse group of adolescentsapproached their reading and writing projectsand discussions in different ways that were ac-cepted, interrogated, and respected. In their re-search on issues of equity in teaching practicesand schools, Fine, Weis, and Powell (1997) rein-forced this kind of learning and teaching:

If schools are to produce engaged, critical citizens whoare willing to imagine and build multiracial and multi-ethnic communities, then we presume schools must[accept the task of] fostering...group life that ensuresequal status, but within a context that takes community-building as its task. The process of sustaining a commu-nity must include a critical interrogation of difference asthe rich substance of community life and an invitationfor engagement that is relentlessly democratic, diverse,participatory, and always attentive to equity and parity.(p. 253)

Through practice and hard work, Jessie’s class-room became a place where students shared their

ideas, stories, and questions. As students articu-lated their learning, they also practiced listeningto one another. Students were continually pre-sented with opportunities to form and re-formtheir own ideas. Jessie offered ongoing feedbackto students to provide a foundation and supportfor their learning and risk taking. She hoped thatthe final unit on activism would provide alaunching pad for students to expand their un-derstandings about issues that resonated for themin their lives and futures. Jessie wanted her stu-dents to begin their high school careers by takingrisks in their learning, learning new literacystrategies, expressing their ideas through writingin multiple genres, and transferring their writinginto an activist project of their own.

We created Stirring Up Justice to providemultiple perspectives for students to understandand define activism (Singer, 2006). In thinkingabout the unit, we began with high hopes. Jessie isan idealist. In naming her desired outcomes forthe unit, she had visions of her ninth graders outin the community creating social change, plant-ing community gardens, holding up picket signs,protesting budget cuts, refurbishing skateboardparks, and writing letters to protest animal test-ing. She believes that all of her students are pas-sionate about particular ideas and about theircommunities. However, this belief is temperedwith realism. As a social justice educator, Jessie isaware that she teaches within a system that de-fines success and failure according to particularvalues, skills, and practices (McDermott &Varenne, 1998). As an English teacher, she worksto teach students literacy skills that are valued inthe larger social world, knowing that some typesof literacies are valued more than others. Jessieworked to create lessons and teach skills in writ-ing to provide students with opportunities tomake their words public. She knows that to trulyteach writing is not to say, “Write a three-pagenarrative for Monday. Have a good weekend.”Instead, she knows it is important to give all ofher students access to writing strategies and tech-niques. She taught traditional literacy skills, likehow to write clear leads, titles, dialogues, setting



descriptions, and endings. Students learned howto use imagery and metaphor. They learned to re-vise and edit and to give one another feedback.Good work emerged as students acquired literacyskills, practiced reading and writing strategies,and shared projects.

Leading campaigns for change does not justcome from an assignment. True leaders and ac-tivists have skills they have honed—they have pas-sions that stem from life experience and guidance.Jessie went on a walk with a friend early in Octoberand shared her plans to teach a unit at the end ofthe school year on activism. Her friend suggestedthat the entire class work toward an issue “like therecent janitor cuts in Oregon or the school fundingcrisis.” Something in this conversation did not sitright with Jessie. She wanted her curriculum tocreate opportunities for her students’ interests andmultiple perspectives to enter the classroom dis-course rather than forcing her own agenda. Freire(1970) explained this distinction for educators elo-quently: “A humane educator’s fundamental objec-tive is to fight alongside the people for the recoveryof the people’s humanity, not to ‘win people over’to their side” (p. 84). Jessie asked herself, “How canI set the agenda for what my students should careabout? I want my role to be as a guide and to givemy students a backdrop to begin to explore issuesthat matter to them.”

We designed multiple workshops over thecourse of three months (see Table 1) to guide stu-dents in their learning about activism. We createdworkshops for students using a range of genressuch as poetic, narrative, persuasive, imaginative,and expository. We incorporated music, film, art,reading, and writing into workshops, discussions,and reflection activities (Eisner, 1998). The goalof each of these workshops was to provide a widecontext and a variety of examples of people whohave created change using literacy as an impor-tant tool. These workshops incorporated creativechoice, time to work and ask questions, and directskill development. Our focus in this article is onthe kind of teaching choices that made this finalsocial justice unit successful. We found that one

of the keys to this unit’s success was in the teach-ing decision to provide students with ownershipof their learning while also providing high expec-tations, clear limits, and support.

In the beginning of April, Jessie began the ac-tivism unit. The first week, students were assignedto read an autobiography, biography, or memoir oftheir choice about an activist they admired. Whilereading these books of choice, students also tookpart in a series of writing workshops to help themread the books critically and carefully. The purposefor reading these books was to cull informationabout successful activists and to understand, ques-tion, and reflect upon the actions of these famousindividuals. Through multiple reading and writingworkshops, students critically examined the notionof social activist work constructed in these stories.Jessie established a schedule where, for the mostpart, reading workshops and skill developmenttook place on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, andwriting workshops and skill development tookplace on Tuesday and Thursday. The school oper-ates on a partial block schedule, meaning that onTuesdays and Thursdays classes are 90 minuteslong, while the other days they are 48 minuteslong. A typical day began with Jessie teaching ormodeling a reading or writing strategy such asrereading difficult passages for improved under-standing (Blau, 2003). A whole-class reading orwriting activity followed these minilessons for stu-dents to practice the specific strategy taught thatday. Students often shared their work in groups oras a whole class. Setting up a routine schedule forthe week helped students arrive in class aware ofthe day’s focus. A series of short writing workshopsin the beginning of the unit connected to students’assigned reading provided scaffolding for studentsto later write articles about the activists they hadstudied. Jessie informed students from the begin-ning of the unit and reminded them throughoutthe course that the work they were doing in Apriland May would help them succeed in creatingtheir own activism projects in June. Studentsshared their final activism projects in a gallery for-mat during the last week of the school year (seeTable 1).





Ta b l e 1S t i r r i n g U p J u s t i c e u n i t t i m e l i n e

Week Curriculum presented Student tasks

1 Children’s books on activism (see Table 2) Read and respond to children’s books in children’sbook workshop

Write a reflection about children’s book workshop

Famous activist quotes Respond to quotes in a short writing warm-up

Sample narratives Write a rough draft of a narrative about an experiencewith injustice

2 Models of children’s book illustrations Illustration workshop—students create illustrations fortheir stories of injustice

Minilesson: Audience Revise narratives in small groups

Minilesson: Leads Revise lead for narrative

Articles about activists Read the collection of articles as an introduction to ac-tivist work

3 Minilesson on descriptive language Revise narratives to add description

Deadline Turn in working draft of narrative for teacher feedback

Social activism booklist Read list and browse through sample books in class

Minilesson on revision Receive narratives with teacher’s comments and workon revising with editing suggestions

4 Deadline Arrive in class with activism book of choice (if un-prepared there are books available in the classroom)

Revise narratives and work on illustrations

Share books and write about selection process

Text-to-self minilesson Read books in class (2–3 times a week for 31⁄2 weeks)and for homework

Write about first impressions of the books

5 Deadline Turn in edited narratives and illustrations

Share pieces of final narratives and illustrations with theclass

Sample timeline Create a timeline of major events in activism book ofchoice

Turning point workshop (collection of Short essay on a turning point in the life of the activistwriting about turning points) in book of choice

6 Minilesson: Inner voice Read silently in class and record questions and reac-tions to text

Write rough draft of activist article

Minilesson: Background information Collect background info about activist for article

7 Minilesson: Embedding quotes Collect quotes to include in article

Minilesson: Successful endings Write multiple endings and choose one for activism article

(continued)

Book choice“Books can make a difference in dispelling

prejudice and building community: not with rolemodels and literal recipes, not with noble mes-sages about the human family, but with en-thralling stories that make us imagine the lives ofothers” (Rochman, 1993, p. 19). One of Jessie’sgoals throughout the Stirring Up Justice unit wasto try to demystify for her students the steps thataccomplished activists take to succeed in theirwork. Too often, students are left assuming thatpeople acquire enormous success due to luck,wealth, and popularity. Rarely do they under-stand the stories and sacrifices of these talentedpeople. Young adults are often overexposed to

sound bites in film and television that dangle suc-cess and fame in front of them like candy just outof reach. They rarely learn how people make re-markable choices and effect incredible change inother people’s lives through hard work and sup-port. To help them learn, students were assignedto read a text about an activist they admired.

We spent months seeking out autobiogra-phies, biographies, and memoirs about peoplewho have worked to create positive social change.The reason for having students read these booksabout and by activists was to provide studentswith a new way of understanding heroes. Carlson(2003) wrote about the importance of allowing“heroes to be understood or appreciated for what



Ta b l e 1 ( c o n t i n u e d )S t i r r i n g U p J u s t i c e u n i t t i m e l i n e

Week Curriculum presented Student tasks

Deadline Finish activism books of choice

Minilesson: Giving good feedback Peer review for activism articles

Book hunt and book hunt reflection letter

8 Deadline Turn in activism articles

Minilesson: Brainstorming Brainstorm topic for personal activism projects

Write a game plan for activism project

Model activism projects Work on final activism projects in class (2–3 times aweek for 2 weeks)

Minilesson: Writing a proposal Write a rough draft of a proposal for activism project

9 Songs of protest workshop Students listen to and write responses to songs ofprotest

Minilesson: Library search Go to library to research activism topic

Deadline Students bring in lyrics for songs of protest and share asa class

10 Share collection of artist statements Write rough draft of artist statement and share

Organize unit portfolio

Deadline Turn in artist statement for teacher feedback

11 Deadline Final activism gallery—share and turn in projects

Deadline Write a final reflection letter and turn in with finalportfolio

they are, as useful icons and characters used toadvance democratic projects in ways that [stu-dents] themselves could not [previously] envi-sion” (p. 186). We wanted to create a list thatincluded a diverse and eclectic collection of writ-ers and subjects. A main goal in collecting titleswas to include a wide variety of books so that thelist would be accessible to all of our students. Thisis a strategy we used as teachers to differentiateinstruction and curriculum to try to meet theneeds of a diverse group of learners. We inten-tionally included books on the list that were avail-able in the school library, public library, and localbookstores. We also purchased multiple copies ofsome of the texts from the list to have available inthe classroom. We did not want access to books toexclude any student from participation or successin this unit.

The idea behind the booklist was that stu-dents would have parameters and guidance in theirbook choice. It is important to provide this kind ofsupport when working with a diverse classroom ofreaders with varying skills and interests (Blau,2003; Rief, 1992; Romano, 2000). We wanted tofind a range of books that the students would love.We created a list of children’s books to introducethe unit through a children’s literature workshop,and a bibliography of “good reads” for adolescentswith a range of reading abilities (see Tables 2 and3). We found these books in bookstores, throughrecommendations, and by researching on theInternet. We also added books that the ninth-graders sought out themselves. The activism booksof choice exposed students to familiar heroes likeLance Armstrong and Muhammad Ali, but the sto-ries of these stars are complex and unveil interestsand passions that include projects like a cancerfoundation and work to abolish racial prejudice.These books also describe activists with whomadolescents may be less familiar, such as JaneGoodall, an animal rights activist; and JuliaButterfly Hill, an environmentalist and writer.Students read about dedicated activists of all ages.

A few of the books we brought into the classimmediately grabbed students’ attention, so we

purchased multiple copies. In My Hands(Opdyke, 1999), an autobiography by aHolocaust rescuer, was a popular choice that wealso loved. Life in Prison (Williams, 1998) was an-other book that many students chose. This is ariveting story by a former gang member whosework against gangs earned him a Nobel Prize. Itwas an appropriate choice for some of the strug-gling readers. Gangs were a popular subject, andAlways Running: La Vida Loca (Rodriguez, 1993)was another title that was often chosen.

We learned of new titles that students rec-ommended. A biography of Muhammad Ali, Kingof the World (Remnick, 1998), spread quicklythrough the classes, because some students werespurred on to read more than one book whenthey talked about their choices with friends. Onestudent wrote the following in her reflection:“Matt says King of the World is the best book he’sread since The Cat in the Hat (Dr. Seuss, 1957).I’m going to read it next!” Student responses tobook choice were overwhelmingly positive. In herreflection, “What’s working for me?” one of thestudents, Jenna, highlighted a key finding for us:

What’s working for me in this unit is the fact that Igot to choose my own book because it’s something Iwant to read. It’s kind of weird, though, because I en-joyed Kaffir Boy (Mathabane, 1995). Yet there issomething different about choosing your own book.

There are definitely times when we want toexpose students to books they would not other-wise find on their own, such as Kaffir Boy, whichJessie taught as a class novel during the SouthAfrica unit early in the year. Often, unfamiliarand seemingly distant texts lead to important,challenging, and unexpected learning. Preparingstudents to be informed and critical readers re-quires guidance (Tovani, 2004). This approach toteaching includes a balanced curriculum wherestudents read required texts and books of choice.We found that if we wanted to work from stu-dents’ genuine interests and bring their worldperceptions and ideas for change into the class-room, then we needed to support a variety of





Ta b l e 2C h i l d r e n ’ s l i t e r a t u r e : M e m o i r s , b i o g r a p h i e s ,

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Dalai Lama. (1997). My land, my people: The original autobiography of His Holiness the Dalai Lama of Tibet.

New York: Warner.

Dalai Lama. (1990). Freedom in exile: The autobiography of the Dalai Lama. San Francisco: Harper.

Del Castello, R.G., & Garcia, R.A. (1995). César Chávez: A triumph of spirit. Norman, OK: University of

Oklahoma Press.

Drucker, M. (1991). Frida Kahlo: Torment and triumph in her life and art. New York: Bantam.

Eagles, C.W. (2000). Outside agitator: Jon Daniels and the Civil Rights movement in Alabama. Tuscaloosa:

University of Alabama Press.

Feldman, R.T. (2001). Thurgood Marshall. Minneapolis, MN: Lerner.

Fradin, D.B., & Fradin, J.B. (2000). Ida B. Wells: Mother of the Civil Rights movement. New York: Clarion.

Fry, V. (1968). Assignment: Rescue. New York: Scholastic.

García, F.D. & Sola, O. (2000). Che: Images of a revolutionary. New York: Pluto.

Goodall, J. (2000). Africa in my blood: An autobiography in letters. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin.

Goodnough, D. (1996). José Martí: Cuban patriot and poet. Berkeley Heights, NJ: Enslow.

Gottfried, T. (2001). Heroes of the Holocaust. Brookfield, CT: Millbrook/Twenty First Century.

Halasa, M. (1989). Mary McLeod Bethune: Educator. New York: Chelsea House.

Hatfield, M.O. (2000). Against the grain: Reflections of a rebel Republican. Ashland, OR: White Cloud Press.

Hildebrandt, Z. (2001). Marina Silva: Defending rainforest communities in Brazil. New York: The Feminist

Press at City University of New York.

Hill, J.B. (2001). The legacy of Luna: The story of a tree, a woman, and the struggle to save the redwoods. San

Francisco: Harper.

Hill, J.B. (2002). One makes the difference: Inspiring actions that change our world. San Francisco: Harper.

Hook, J. (2001). Muhammad Ali: The Greatest. Austin, TX: Raintree Steck-Vaughn.

Hoose, P. (1993). It’s our world, too!: Young people who are making a difference. Boston: Little, Brown.

Hoose, P. (2001). We were there, too!: Young people in U.S. history. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux.

Horton, M. (1998). The long haul: An autobiography. New York: Teachers College Press.

Kozol, J. (1991). Savage inequalities: Children in America’s schools. New York: Harper Perennial.

Lawlor, L. (2001). Helen Keller: Rebellious spirit. New York: Holiday House.

Ling, B. (1999). Aung San Suu Kyi: Standing up for democracy in Burma. New York: The Feminist Press at the

City University of New York. (continued)

reading experiences, including personal book

choice. Students led us to books and areas of in-

terests that we would not find on our own. We

discovered early in the unit how important book

choice was in engaging the students’ interest, in-

volvement, and commitment to the work. As

Danika wrote,

The key part of this entire unit has been the book we

chose. I am thrilled with my book choice. It is one of

those small miracles that I happened to pick, out of

hundreds of options, a story with which I am so fasci-

nated. Because I love my book, I can easily write de-tailed pieces about one part or another.

Though there were class favorites, it was alsocrucial that individual choices were honored.Danika read Where Rag Dolls Hide Their Faces: AStory of Troubled Children (Koplow, 1990), a storyabout a child psychotherapist. Margo chose ThisSide of Peace (Ashwari, 1996), a challenging auto-biography that Jessie and Ruth found fascinatingbut quite difficult in parts. We would not have



Ta b l e 3 ( c o n t i n u e d )B i o g r a p h i e s o f p e o p l e c h a n g i n g t h e w o r l d :

G o o d r e a d s f o r a d o l e s c e n t s

McCall, N. (1994). Makes me wanna holler: A young black man in America. New York: Random House.Michener, A. (1998). Becoming Anna: The autobiography of a sixteen-year-old. Chicago: The University of

Chicago Press.Milio, N. (2000). 9226 Kercheval: The storefront that did not burn. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

(Original work published 1970)Myers, W.D. (1993). Malcolm X: By any means necessary. New York: Scholastic. Myers, W.D. (2001). The Greatest: Muhammad Ali. New York: Scholastic.Neal, S. (1977). Tom McCall: Maverick. Portland, OR: Thomas Binford.Opdyke, I.G. (1999). In my hands: Memories of a Holocaust rescuer. New York: Anchor.Parks, R. (1992). Rosa Parks: My story. New York: Dial.Partridge, E. (2002). This land was made for you and me: The life and songs of Woody Guthrie. New York: Viking.Pinkney, A.D. (2000). Let it shine: Stories of black women freedom fighters. New York: Harcourt. Reef, C. (2001). A. Philip Randolph: Union leader and Civil Rights crusader. Berkeley Heights, NJ: Enslow. Remnick, D. (1998). King of the world. New York: Random House.Rodriguez, L.J. (1993). Always running: La vida loca: Gang days in L.A. New York: Simon & Schuster.Silverstone, M. (2001). Winona LaDuke: Restoring land and culture in Native America. New York: The

Feminist Press at the City University of New York.Sinnott, S. (1999). Lorraine Hansberry: Award-winning playwright and Civil Rights activist. Berkeley, CA:

Conari Press.Sterling, D. (1999). Lucretia Mott. New York: The Feminist Press at the City University of New York.Swain, G. (2001). President of the Underground Railroad: A story about Levi Coffin. Ill. R.L. Ramstad.

Minneapolis, MN: Lerner. Thomas, P. (1974). Down these mean streets: The unforgettable autobiography of an American of Puerto Rican

descent. New York: Random House.Tijerina, R.L. (2000). They called me “King Tiger”: My struggle for the land and our rights. Houston, TX: Arte

Publico.Weidt, M.N. (2001). Voice of Freedom: A story about Frederick Douglass. Minneapolis, MN: Lerner. Williams, G.H. (1995). Life on the color line: The true story of a white boy who discovered he was black. New

York: Penguin/Plume.Williams, S.T. (1998). Life in prison. New York: Sea Star Books.

guessed that this dense text would resonate withMargo. Paul made an equally surprising choice: abiography of José Martí (Goodnough, 1996), theCuban patriot, poet, and activist. This was a dryand complicated text. Paul often struggled withhis reading; however, as a Latino poet himself, hewas drawn to learn more about this intriguingman who shared his love for words. The students’booklist shows the range of choices they made(see Table 4).

Besides reading their books of choice andhaving many workshops devoted to reading andengagement with them, students had multipleopportunities to share their books and to learnabout one another’s choices. For example, towardthe end of the unit, after students had ample timeto finish or come close to finishing their books ofchoice, we designed a book hunt, which was a listof questions for students to ask one anotherabout their books. The book hunt was a way forstudents to meet with one another and share theirexpertise about a specific activist’s story. Theseexchanges were important in spurring studentsforward in their reading, in exposing them to awide range of activists, and in inviting them tothink about options for their own social actionprojects.

Making choices as activists

Schools need to provide the opportunity for literateoccasions for students to share their experiences, workin social relations that emphasize care and concern forothers, to take risks, and to fight for a quality of life inwhich all human beings benefit. (Giroux, 1987, p. 181)

As the project progressed, students began to thinkabout the issues that mattered to them. Not onlydid students become committed to particular in-terests, but they also clearly articulated these in-terests through writing, conversation, and art.Students wrote expository articles about the ac-tivists they studied. They used creative leads, his-torical timelines, personal connections, dialogue,and powerful conclusions to express and teachhow these activists created and inspired change.



Ta b l e 4S t u d e n t s ’ b o o k l i s t

Student name Book title

Jenna In My Hands

Matt King of the World

Margo This Side of Peace

Jeff Makes Me Wanna Holler

Emma In My Hands

Lisa In My Hands

Danika Where Rag Dolls Hide Their

Faces

Sam In My Hands

Jose Becoming Anna

Justin Always Running

Erik Rosa Parks: My Story

Paul Helen Keller

Ken Makes Me Wanna Holler

Amanda Always Running

Veronica Always Running

Caron In My Hands

Taylor King of the World

Koko Freedom in Exile

Jeremy Freedom in Exile

Sarah Makes Me Wanna Holler

Sean Tom McCall: Maverick

Leigh Savage Inequalities

Mary Warriors Don’t Cry

Liz I Know Why the Caged Bird

Sings

Justin Legacy of Luna

Eric King of the World

Joe Life in Prison

Rachel Down These Mean Streets

Brandon Malcolm X

John King of the World

Carson César Chávez

Chelsea It’s Our World, Too!

Danny Malcolm X

Ben Malcolm X

Students participated in poetry workshops wherethey wrote poetry of protest giving voice to peo-ple in their communities who often go unnoticed(Christensen, 2000). Students studied songs ofprotest from historical and contemporary musi-cians. These different kinds of writing, thinking,and discovery laid a foundation for the studentsto begin thinking about the kinds of issues thattouched their own lives and how they wanted toinfluence change.

We gave students time through writing andconversations to brainstorm their own interests aspotential activists. Jose is committed to cleaningup the Columbia River. Amy is passionate aboutreducing gang violence. Laurie and Carlos careabout the severe budget cuts in Oregon and howthis will affect school funding. Mary is passionateabout finding more support for libraries. Johnand Liz are concerned about unlawful and unjustlabor practices. Clear-cutting and deforestationthroughout Oregon enrage Kelly. The range of in-terests and issues in the classes was broad and sophisticated.

Students had time to choose and learnabout an issue that mattered to them with the

aim of finding a topic for their own activismprojects. We asked students to use the final proj-ect to teach others about how to make positivechange in their area of concern. Jessie explainedthat she wanted students to go beyond a presenta-tion that said only, “This issue bothers me.” Shewanted students to explore their issue in depththrough interdisciplinary research. Jessie askedstudents to create projects that shared their issuein an accessible way with others and to offer solu-tions or suggestions for change. Students had agreat deal of freedom in the creation of this proj-ect (see Table 5). They could use any media, suchas drawing, as long as they accomplished the goalof educating others about their issue. We told stu-dents that these final projects would be shared ina gallery format, where their work would be dis-played along with an artist statement.

Jessie’s closest friend from college, Eve, is anartist. She often calls Jessie to share the descrip-tion statements posted with her latest work dis-played in galleries. Jessie realized this would be anauthentic and creative writing genre to share withher students. Eve sent Jessie a collection of artiststatements to use as models for students. Laurie’s



Ta b l e 5Te a c h i n g t o p r o m o t e c h a n g e

Based on your observations, what is something you want to help people see differently (e.g., stereotypes about

teens, incorrect information about the homeless, faulty images of schools, mistaken beliefs about skateboard-

ers)? In other words, in what ways can you teach and inform others about an issue that matters to you?

How can you teach a new way of seeing this issue that can promote change?

You will create a visual, oral, written, or musical statement. This statement will redefine or teach your message

for an audience.

You will also create an artist’s statement to explain your final project that you will display in a final gallery setting.

remarkable final project and her artist’s statementabout the need for increased school funding ap-pear in Figure 1.

Teaching literacy skills“Literature provides a vehicle for inquiry-basedteaching that can encourage reflective teachingand ‘teach students that reading and writing areways to inquire into serious human issues’”(Kroll, 1992, p. 14). As we have just discussed,book choice was the catalyst and inspiration forstudents’ identifying their personal interests insocial change and for motivating their study ofthese issues in depth. Our research echoesHarvey’s (2002) findings:

Time and choice support students to enhance theirunderstanding and acquire knowledge. When webuild in time to share our passions and encourage sin-cere questions, surround our kids with compellingnonfiction, match the reading to the writing, modelhow we learn, and give students long blocks of time todelve into and practice with texts of their choice, kidscome alive and learning explodes. (p. 22)

Like Harvey, Jessie is committed to the integrated,direct instruction of reading, writing, and reflec-tion skills related to the work in progress. Threeclasses each week included 10-minute mini-lessons on specific skills, which matched the skillsneeded to accomplish the work in progress andfuture work for the final projects. Table 6 pro-vides a list and short description of each ofJessie’s minilessons broken into the categories ofreading, writing, and reflection.

Fluent reading, writing, and reflection arenaturally integrated. Instructional curriculumand delivery in these areas must also be integrat-ed (Friedman, 2002; Harvey, 2002). For example,in the writing minilesson on leads, Jessie gave stu-dents a definition and examples of a variety ofleads (Fletcher, 1993). Students then read in theirbooks of choice and labeled the kinds of leadsused by their authors. Jessie had students practicewriting several kinds of leads. She then asked stu-

dents to reflect on what kind of lead would bestsuit their essays in progress on the social activiststhey studied from their books of choice. One ofthe students, Jose, chose to use a lead from thisworkshop in his essay on Muhammad Ali:

“Draft Beer, Not Ali”

The paperwork was all filled out. The physical waspassed. There was only one more step before thearmed forces. The young men were lined up before ayoung lieutenant, and instructed to step forward whentheir name was called. They would then become anofficial member of the United States Army. As thelieutenant made his way down the line, each manstepped forward.

“Cassius Clay.”

Ali remained silent.

“Ali.”

Again, no response.

Minilessons may emphasize one area more thananother, but they all integrate reading, writing,and reflection. Each of the minilessons individu-ally and collectively integrate reading, writing,and reflection skill building (see Table 6).

Learning to define socialactivismAt the onset of this unit we decided to allow stu-dents to choose an issue they cared about andwork toward creating positive social change sur-rounding this interest. In this decision to havestudents choose individual projects, we wonderedwhether students would also see that activism isnot a solo process and that influencing changegrows with support and camaraderie (Bigelow &Peterson, 2002; Christensen, 2000). As the unitprogressed, we learned through writing, discus-sions, and self-chosen topics that students did in-deed learn that successful activism happens in acommunity, as the following statements show.“To be a social activist, you need support fromyour community, you need to be determined, andmost importantly, what you do needs to come





F i g u r e 1B u d g e t C u t s

from your heart.”“You need to ask for help whenyou are helping someone else. No one can be anactivist by themselves.”

To help students experience the benefits of asupportive community, Jessie had the studentsparticipate in peer-editing workshops, continualclass and small-group discussions about theirbooks, and workshops to share strategies in creat-ing and planning their final projects. Every classprovided multiple opportunities for students toparticipate in supportive dialogue with theirpeers and teacher.

Safe and trustworthy spacesAs a resident researcher in Jessie’s class, Ruthlooked closely beneath the surface of the activitiesin the classroom. She kept track of the littlethings that added up to a successful learningcommunity. Through field notes and discussionswith Jessie, she became intrigued with how Jessiecreates a “safe space” in her classroom.

Community is not spontaneously created.Ruth’s field notes recorded daily examples ofJessie scanning the room, noting who to draw

Ta b l e 6M i n i l e s s o n s f o r S t i r r i n g U p J u s t i c e

Reading minilessons

1. Comprehension constructor—a useful strategy for slowing down student reading in order to formulate

questions about the reading material (Tovani, 2000).

2. Think-mark reading strategy—A bookmark to take note of challenging words, ideas, or questions that may

arise.

3. Text-to-self connections—Note when a text reminds the reader of personal experiences.

4. Inner voice—How present are you for your reading? Is your mind wandering or staying focused on the

text?

5. Activist’s movement toward change—Finding places in books of choice that describe how the activist was

inspired to make social change.

Writing minilessons

1. Leads—The introduction of a piece of writing.

2. Endings—The conclusion of a piece of writing.

3. Artist statements—Short pieces describing artist’s purpose and process for creating a work of art.

4. Students’ movement toward change—Student writing about what inspired the choice of a particular ac-

tivism project.

5. Students’ artist statement plan—Students’ written description of their own social action plans.

6. Game plan—Writing a schedule of tasks to complete final project and supports and resources needed to

succeed.

Reflection skills: Helping students become more aware of their planning and thinking processes

1. First impressions—Writing first impressions (reflections) of student’s book of choice.

2. Songs of protest workshop—Students bring in songs from activists to reflect on how lyrics and music can

inspire an emotional reaction to issues and motivate social change.

Self-evaluation letters

1. A final letter to the teacher reflecting on the experiences and learning throughout this project.



into the class, showing her expectations that theybe a part of the learning community. Jessie evenpresented minilessons on “the posture of respect”as well as on how to give helpful feedback.Creating a safe space in teaching means makingsure that everyone is part of a listening audience,but, more important, it also means that studentsare free to take risks in their learning and think-ing. We saw a powerful example of such riskwhen Erik told the class about an incident wherehe was discriminated against by students and ateacher because of his “difference”—his AspergerSyndrome. Erik’s courage in sharing this experi-ence prompted a discussion of the range of differ-ences in a school community and the need forunderstanding. Emma, Laurie, and other studentsoffered support and suggestions.

Safe space is created over time through criti-cal reflection and practice as a teacher (Sapon-Shevin, 1999). Jessie’s daily teaching exhibitedactive and intentional work to include all studentsin conversations through writing, art, reading,discussions, rigor, and reinforcement. This class-room mirrors the kind of teaching and creationof safe spaces described by Fine et al. (1997),

The work these educators are performing is the workof decentering—assuring that no race, no ethnicity, noposition, no gender, no stance has hegemonic authori-ty, silencing power, or monopoly on truth. They invitewriters, speakers, and readers to emerge. (p. 274)

Creating a rigorous and trusting classroomenvironment requires active intervention on thepart of the teacher to include all students and toestablish expectations for participation within thecommunity. Jessie regularly reminded students ofthe importance of listening and active participa-tion. She continually provided positive reinforce-ment to students when they demonstrated theirunderstanding of what it takes to be an activemember of the class through listening, writing,questioning, speaking, organizing, waiting, andlaughing. At the beginning of the year, Jessie’sclassroom walls were bare and the bulletin boardswere blank. As the weeks and months passed and

students created essays, poetry, letters, paintings,mobiles, posters, and photographs, the classroomtransitioned into a colorful and cluttered celebra-tion of student work. Jessie chose to highlight allof her students’ projects, rather than selectingonly a few “exceptional” or “unique” ones for dis-play. The message Jessie continually sent her stu-dents was that they are all exceptional.

Jessie showed how creating a challenging,safe, and creative learning environment alsocomes through modeling and clear expectations.In daily lessons, Jessie shared examples of herown writing and revision process. She brought inbooks from her home collection to share herhabits as a reader and writer. Jessie continuallyshared her enthusiasm and passion for literacy.She told students stories of poetry readings, au-thor events, and writing classes she attended.Simple practices, like typing out clear directionson the top of assignment handouts, posting re-minders on the chalkboard, and keeping a largecalendar of the month’s activities and due dateson the wall helped students understand Jessie’sexpectations and requirements. Jessie often con-tacted parents by phone to communicate withthem about students’ struggles as well as theirsuccesses. When students did not participate, orforgot requirements for the class, Jessie remindedthem of her expectations. For example, in oneclass, Matsu leaned over his backpack, eyesclosed, paying no attention as Jessie described theagenda for the morning. Ruth recorded that,without missing a beat, Jessie turned to Matsuand said in an invitational, but firm, voice,“Matsu, join us.” There was a pause as he sat up.Then Jessie continued, “Put your backpack underyour seat so we can see you. You need to get yourpen and paper out so you can join us.” Anotherpause happened as he complied, and then Jessiecontinued addressing the class. These small, butintentional, interventions were critical.

Jessie does not require uniformity in stu-dent responses. The rule in her class is that every-one needs to participate, but that each studentmay choose how to share in a way that feels safe.



During the songs of protest workshop, Jennacompiled an audio CD with several songs. Whenit was her turn to share either a song or the lyrics,she described her collection of protest songs butdid not feel comfortable playing the songs for theclass. She gave the CD to Jessie and asked her toplay the songs later, not in class. Instead of push-ing Jenna to choose one of the songs to play asthe other students had, Jessie said, “Fine, I’ll lookforward to hearing it.” Jessie acted as Jenna’s ad-vocate when one of the more vocal students be-gan to insist that Jenna play the music. Jessiestressed that Jenna was sharing in a different wayand that was fine. As the unit progressed, Jenna’sapprehensiveness changed as she started to feelsafer in the community that was built over theterm. In the final gallery, she stood in front of theclass and proudly read a poem she had writtenabout unfair labor practices.

Seeing many of these small incidents recurhelped to convince us that Jessie’s active interven-tion and vigilance create the kind of safe spacethat allows students to share their views honestly,knowing they will be heard with respect. Theseare not separate “community-building activities”but a natural outgrowth of Jessie’s daily consis-tency in creating a safe community through hermodeling and guidelines for students. Having asafe space allows the classroom community to ex-amine controversial issues that emerge (Palmer,1998). There are clear expectations for studentsthat let Jessie step back, acting more as a guide.The students learned to take the lead. Their voicesbecome central instead of hers.

The final galleryRather than assigning a uniform task, such as aterm paper or exam on activism, students wereable to design and present projects representingtheir area of interest using their own choice of ex-pression. On the last class of the school year, stu-dents arrived at Jessie’s door 45 minutes before thebell with posters, paintings, collages, mobiles, au-dio CDs and tapes, photographs, slides, poetry,

political cartoons, and other creative activismprojects. We set up the room with tables andchairs in a circle and asked students to find a spaceto display their activism projects as if the roomwere transformed into an art gallery. Jessie re-minded students to post their artists’ statementsnext to their projects. Students were beaming withexcitement. Paul said, “Ms. Singer, I worked onthis for two days and two nights. I haven’t slept atall. I think it’s going to be good.” Students gath-ered around one another’s gallery spaces to sharetheir work. When the bell rang, Jessie told the classthe plan for their final day together. All studentshad time to share their projects, read artists’ state-ments aloud, and provide details about their pas-sion for the particular activism issue.

Kelly began her gallery presentation byholding up her watercolor paintings contrastingtwo forests: one that had been clear-cut and an-other that had been preserved. She read from herartist’s statement:

For this project, I wanted to make paintings thatwould be easily recognizable while also having a mes-sage that registered inside the viewer. Although log-ging and deforestation are worldwide problems, Ihope to get a simpler idea across that strikes closer tohome. In these two pictures, I want people to see im-ages that remind them of things they have alreadyseen just a few hours from Portland. I hope I canmake an impact in the way one views the state of theirown surroundings. From this project, I hope you theviewer will walk away at least a little more thoughtfuland a little more observant.

Erik shared a poster of his photographs tak-en from around the school showing the effect ofbudget cuts on the school environment. In hisstatement, he explained,

I took these pictures to show the damage thatthoughtless people can do to a building. All the dam-age and mess that people do have to be cleaned up orrepaired, both of which cost money that the schooldistrict doesn’t have.... With the decrease in fundingfor schools, we as students need to look around andtake care of what we have. Without the custodiansworking, this place will quickly turn into a dump, and



we need to do our part to keep our school as clean aswe can.

Mary wrote a narrative from her own lifetelling of her connection to the public libraries inPortland and how they sparked her interest inreading. She read her narrative and her artist’sstatement as her gallery presentation. This ex-cerpt from her artist’s statement shows her com-mitment to public support for libraries:

Everyone has been to the library. Everyone has hadthe chance to get a high of sorts from the smell of oldand new books. Everyone has the right to a librarycard. Reading has always been one of my favoritethings to do, and of course one of my favorite places isthe library. Whenever my parents propose moving toa new city, I first must see the size of the public librarybefore giving my approval. Libraries are in trouble.They are under-funded and are slowly slipping into astate of not being the wonderful places they oncewere. I hope that seeing my piece helps people under-stand why we must fight to fund libraries.

In the last part of the class, students hadtime to circle around the room as they would inan art gallery and observe the projects. Jessie laidout blank pieces of paper next to each project sothat students could give each other positive feed-back. The gallery format and artists’ statementsemphasized the individual creativity in studentwork and the community. When people go to anart gallery they often interact with the art and re-flect on what it means to them. This was not a fi-nal presentation for the teacher, but rather it wasa celebration of the three-month unit for the stu-dents to share together.

Lingering questions: Teachingan untracked classThere are conversations that would not have hap-pened in the same way if this class had been des-ignated as an “honors” class or “regular” class.The range of experiences and opinions variedenough in our learning community that we

taught one another. When we taught a workshopon songs of protest and studied Woody Guthrie’ssong, “Plane Wreck at Los Gatos (Deportee)”(lyrics available at www.woodyguthrie.org/Lyrics/Plane_Wreck_at_Los_Gatos.htm), Jessie askedstudents what it meant to be deported. Manuel,who is Latino and recently transferred to Oregonfrom San Diego, California, changed the course ofthis conversation. At first, students shared theiropinions surrounding Guthrie’s lyrics. One stu-dent shared that she thought there was notenough land for everyone and that is why it is im-portant to send migrant workers back home.Manuel quickly raised his hand. He said, “Theseare people without social security. They getkicked out.” This was the first time Manuel hadspoken up in class. He is often shy and introvert-ed. No other students knew what social securitywas other than a number they had to memorize,and Manuel explained its meaning.

Teaching an untracked class provided chal-lenges. We always had to keep in mind the widerange of skills, interests, and experiences in theclasses as we created the curriculum. We wantedthe students to feel successful and pushed for-ward in their learning. Still, we are left with somelingering questions about students who struggled.Out of 45 students in the first and second peri-ods, two boys did not complete the final projectand one girl completed no work throughout theunit until the gallery project. Nate, the strugglingreader and writer, made progress over the courseof the year in his fluency. He read his book ofchoice, Life in Prison (Williams, 1998), and par-ticipated in our reading and writing workshops.He often shared stories from the text with otherstudents. However, when it came time for him towrite the article about an activist, he plagiarizedthe paper. He chose not to rewrite this piece anddid not do the final gallery project. Bo has severeattention-deficit disorder and is unmedicated. Heis developmentally delayed in reading and writingdue to his inability to focus. He did not completeany work throughout the project; he often beganpieces of writing and then could not get past anopening sentence. As educators, we often fixate



on the students who are not succeeding. Jessieasked herself,

What could I do to modify curriculum and supportmy students’ learning needs? I have reflected on myteaching choices to understand how I could havereached these students. I have also learned that stu-dents are complex and that their home lives and yearsof falling through the cracks influence what happensin my classroom. Still, if I could live this year of teach-ing over again, I would have fought for more supportfor these students through counselors, theEducational Resource Center, and their parents.

Looking back on the unit and thinking ofways to strengthen it for future years, we dis-cussed ways to include parents. Most parentswould have been impressed with their child andsupportive of their child’s efforts if we had invitedthem to the gallery event. If we were to do itagain, we would invite parents to attend. Thiswould provide important “ears” to hear the stu-dents and support their learning. It will be won-derful to have parents witness the remarkablework of these young adults.

As social justice educators, critical self-reflection surrounding our teaching and curricu-lum choices is an integral part of our practice(Fecho, 1998). In looking back over our curricu-lum and teaching, there are aspects we will reviseand revisit in future years. In retrospect, Jessie’schoice to focus on particular genres of writingand specific kinds of literacies provided an oppor-tunity to examine how and why certain ways ofreading and writing are valued more than others.By making teaching choices more transparent,Jessie could have pointed to ways that the skillsshe chose to teach are not objectively the things allstudents need to learn, but rather they are theskills that are valued in schools and society today.Another aspect of our teaching practice that weplan to make more transparent in future years isin the decision to focus on positive social change.At the beginning of the unit when Jessie intro-duced examples of social activists who had creat-ed positive social change in their communities,Brandon asked, “Why do we have to learn about

people who make positive change? Why can’t westudy people who create negative change? Aren’tthese changes important, too?” Jessie explained toBrandon and the class that the focus in our cul-ture and in schools is often negative, and that thework in this class is to understand the skills, tools,questions, and work of individuals and groupscreating positive change. In retrospect, this expla-nation worked at the time to move the curricu-lum forward, but it was insufficient in explainingan important teaching and political stance. In future years, we will work from the onset of the unit to thoroughly explain and demystify ourchoices as educators in ways that our students canunderstand.

Teachers as writers andactivistsJessie is a writer and, throughout this unit, shecontinually shared her own writing and processwith her students. For example, she was workingon an article at the time she taught the mini-lesson on leads. She shared her “first draft” lead,and the experience of her editor saying hethought she needed to go in a different direction.Students were invited into Jessie’s process of let-ting go of a lead that was well written but notperfectly suited to the direction of the article.Students learned that revision is part of theprocess of clarifying how you express yourself inwriting and not a sign of failure. Knowing thatrevision is a helpful process supports students’ability to reflect openly and in depth about theirown writing.

We feel that our role as writers and activistswas a crucial element in the teaching of this unit.As members of the classroom community, in ad-dition to sharing our processes as writers, it wasequally important that we shared our own lives asactivists. Students could see this work was not an“activity” for us but an integral part of how welive. Students understood how we used our read-ing and writing to work toward influencing oth-ers. Jessie had worked with her department to



untrack freshman English and she wrote an arti-cle about this process. Ruth shared excerpts fromher article on the way children’s books aboutHelen Keller distort her life by leaving out herradical activism. Our work modeled for studentsauthentic ways of using literacy skills to promotechange (Hubbard, 2002; Singer, 2002)

Stirring up changeStirring Up Justice created the foundation and thetools necessary for students to step into the worldof activism. Students explored an issue in depththat resonated with their own experience and in-terests. This teaching and curricular choice wasintentional and connected to our pedagogy asteachers committed to teaching for social justice.Dolby (2003) wrote, “Democracy cannot be im-posed as a set of principles coming from above towhich individuals must subscribe. It must startwithin the core of people’s dreams and desiresand from where people are” (p. 276).

The class provided bridges from one stu-dent to another. They learned compassion for oneanother, not just for causes outside of themselves.One of the most articulate students, Emma, be-came an ally for one of her peers, Spencer, whostruggled with communication. Spencer, a shyand introverted student, gained confidencethrough the support and respect of his class-mates. He ended the year with a slide show pres-entation about school funding that received anovation and numerous written accolades from hisclassmates. Students supported one another’sideas, edited one another’s pieces, and witnessedone another’s challenges and successes.

Jenna’s words, taken from her final self-evaluation of the project, show the continuing ef-fect of Stirring Up Justice:

After reading about this wonderful person it reallymakes me see the world differently. It makes me thinkof what I want to do that will have positive socialchange on the world. Irene [Opdyke] taught me thatyou really don’t have to listen and follow the rules all

the time. She taught me that you have to follow yourheart and let it take you to that special place of being asocial activist.

Jenna’s quote reinforces how social justiceteaching does not end with the school bell inJune. Students began projects that will continue.For example, Max created a website on stem-cellresearch, which he plans to expand and continueto update. Margo’s gallery project was a paintingthat will become part of a larger mural design forthe school. She plans to write a proposal to the artdepartment and administration to design andcomplete her mural by the end of her senior year.After creating a poster and a wealth of talkingpoints on the issue of animal testing and mis-treatment, Erin has become part of the larger ani-mal rights movement, taking part in teach-insand political rallies.

The students’ passion and commitment totheir ongoing projects demonstrated both politi-cal imagination and ability to use literacy to exer-cise agency in the world. Not only did thestudents have grounded definitions of social ac-tivism, but they also grew to see themselves as in-dividuals capable of influencing real and effectivechange in their lives. By being a part of a class-room community that treated reading and writ-ing as political acts, students experiencedfundamental changes in themselves that are re-flected in their work. Students show the “talentand courage” that E. Galeano spoke to in thequote that opens this article. They have the powerto be a part of a generation that uses reading andwriting to help “throw light on the signs along theroad” (as cited in Espada, 2000, p. 9).

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Documents

Stirring Up Justice: Adolescents Reading, Writing, and Changing the World