At a time when reading scores are at historic lows, middle and high school educators may look to increasing rigor with texts that are complex and dense, or actively teaching to state tests. Perhaps it’s a self defeating prophecy: these methods rob the joy from reading, which further discourages students from becoming avid readers. Deborah Dean presents a surprising alternative for the secondary classroom: the picturebook. While this may seem counterintuitive for teachers who are trying to raise the bar, Dean successfully proves through research and narrative that picture books can engage all learners and add a layer of interest to ELA instruction that makes learning stick. Dean, a long time educator at both the secondary level as well as university, has used picturebooks in her teaching practice for most of her career. From this position of expertise, she details learning strategies, tools for engagement, curated book recommendations, and techniques for implementation.
Structure and Organization
Power in Pictures is separated into nine chapters, each with a different focus. While the first chapter serves as an introduction to the practice of using picturebooks for ELA instruction, the subsequent chapters expand on how this practice supports different areas of instruction such as engaging English Language Learners or teaching literary elements.
Each chapter features the front covers of the picturebooks that Dean references, so flipping through the book is a colorful experience. Additionally, the chapters are further divided into sections with their own titles. These features help readers easily find a strategy or book they may want to return to later. Towards the end of each chapter, Dean lists 2-3 principles for that strategy or element, and then provides a brief explanation of each one. This guides educators who are new to using picturebooks and serves as a quick reference for best practices.
Chapter Highlights
Chapter 1: Dean begins the first chapter by addressing potential reservations about using picturebooks beyond elementary years. She acknowledges that we are conditioned to believe picturebooks are for young children, but through research and her own teaching practices she has set out to prove that is a misconception. Dean has used picture books in the classroom and found it effective. For teachers, that is often enough reason to continue the practice. However, throughout the chapter Dean draws upon the work of many researchers to support her own reasons for using this method. Some of the main reasons she details in this chapter are that picturebooks are efficient, engaging, and accessible. She closes the chapter with the image of her high school aged students rapt and intrigued when she pulls out a picturebook: “Picturebooks make magic,” Dean writes (8).
In Chapter 3, “Using Picturebooks to Invite Informal Writing,” Dean provides examples of using picturebooks as jumping off points for notebook entries, bellringers, or other daily writing that might occur in an ELA classroom. For example, Dean suggests the books “Crystanthemum” or “My Name is Elizabeth” for an informal writing prompt about students’ names and how they feel about them. She notes that the book she chooses (a feisty vs. a thoughtful protagonist) affects the tone of students’ responses. Informal writing responses seem like a very user-friendly way to implement picturebooks as part of the classroom routine, and the possibilities are endless.
In Chapter 5, “Using Picturebooks to Teach Reading and Literature,” Dean explores ways to use picturebooks to teach literary elements and reading strategies. For example, she suggests using “The Last Stop on Market Street,” to help students practice making inferences about text. Teachers might ask students about Abuela’s character, prompting them to think about what kind of person she is and how the text supports this. Dean also recommends using “The Important Book,” to help students think about summarizing. She has a multitude of ideas for books that allow students to explore themes, which can be a particularly hard concept for even older students to grasp.
One of the book’s strengths is its immediacy. Dean provides many examples of picturebooks and strategies that teachers can try the next day, especially if they have easy access to picturebooks. Dean also describes how she has adjusted prompts or activities for different grade levels. Dean has used picturebooks at all levels. This practice seems particularly appropriate for middle school or for reluctant readers, though Dean would argue that picturebooks are rich texts for deep and complex interpretation even for older high schoolers. Students of multilingual learners may find this text particularly useful given the multimodal approach, and Dean devotes an entire chapter to strategies for English Language Learners. Teachers with reservations about using picturebooks at the secondary level will find reassurance in Dean’s detailed approach. Through examples from her own teaching practice, she shows us how to bring picturebooks into the secondary classroom without sacrificing rigor.
My Experience
As a teacher in a high performing, achievement focused middle school, I am always wary of strategies that may be viewed as lacking in rigor. However, many of my students are reluctant readers, or simply have trouble finding time to read, so I am always searching for ways to ignite their passion for reading. Students love to be read to, and picturebooks call back a time when reading was fun and free of stress and expectation. I hope to add picturebooks to my instruction next year, as inspiration for writing prompts, ways to introduce thematic concepts, and for exploration of literary elements.
Recommendation
Power in Pictures is a great read for any ELA teacher who is looking for a new and unexpected approach, one that requires no technology whatsoever. Using picture books can engage secondary learners and ask them to think about reading and writing in new ways. Dean’s approach makes us wonder: can we ask students to rewind? To go back to the kind of reading they used to know and love, this time with heightened skills and understanding?
Deborah Dean’s book made me want to go to the library and spend hours in the children’s aisle, leafing through beautiful illustrations. Maybe tomorrow I’ll grab one of Dean’s recommended picturebooks and ask my 7th graders to join me on the rug.
Alexa Gutter (Bio) Alexa Gutter is a graduate student, poet, and 7th Grade English teacher. She teaches at Charles F. Patton Middle School in Chester County, Pennsylvania.
In September of 2015, Antero Garcia and Cindy O’Donnell-Allen released the first edition of Pose, Wobble, and Flow, providing a fresh liberatory framework for deconstructing the idea that there is a “best” way to teach. They concluded that first edition by stating “By various measures, we are in a cultural, social crisis today. Radical persecution, the stratification and thinning of the middle class, and salient examples of violence- symbolic and physical- toward nonheterosexual or transgender members of society run rampant today. This is not a hyperbole” (2015, p. 133). They then open this second edition affirming “We take no joy in the accuracy of these predictions, but we could not have imagined the breathtaking scale, scope, and speed with which the social, cultural, and global fabric of the world would unravel” (2026, p. 2). Garcia and O’Donnell’s methods and pedagogy around teaching are not only, and unfortunately, extremely relevant, but more important than ever. This second edition further expands on the significance and impact it has to ensure that children and young adults from all backgrounds have the same opportunities for success and that educators, parents, and administrators feel empowered by the work they’re doing rather than dehumanized.
Overview:
Adapting the pose, wobble, and flow method of yoga as a pedagogical model, they encourage readers to move through the challenges of teaching rather than striving for impossible perfection. The book presents six different “poses” of teaching in order to guide teachers through the numerous challenges that teachers face in this current climate as well as presenting ways to promote equity, social change, and vulnerable learning. What it means to pose in teaching is to take up a “liberatory stance” toward your practice (Garcia and O’Donnell, 2024, p.7). Garcia and O’Donnell make it very clear that this is not a “foolproof” method to teaching, but rather “touchstones” as a way to guide teachers through different settings (Garcia and O’Donnell, 2024, p.8). The book introduces the idea of wobbling when Teachers will always be presented with unexpected challenges and complex situations that will test their limits and push them into an area of uncomfortability. Garcia and O’Donnell argue that this push is not meant to be a breaking point, but rather a point of transition. That transition and nonlinear process is how teachers strengthen their practice and learn how to move through dynamic circumstances. Garcia and O’Donnell refer to “flow” as “the moments of psychological well-being one experiences in singular moments during the everyday course of teaching” as well as “the complementary poses together over the span of one’s teaching career” (Garcia and O’Donnell, 2024, p.10). They maintain that the ambiguity of teaching can make it difficult to feel as though you are hitting goals or climbing new peaks in your career. The objective of the “flow” phase as a teacher is to enter a flow state that incorporates both different poses as well as wobbling to be constantly growing as an educator.
Garcia and O’Donnell set the foundation for the book with their pose of “teaching for liberation” which is recognizing the inequities, identities, and backgrounds of different students as a way to not only be an active advocate for social change, but to encourage students to recognize those nuances as well. Rather than striving for perfection, they foster the idea that a liberatory pedagogy is a “process of becoming” that requires necessary transformation in order to move through the challenges that educators will inevitably face. While this may seem like a daunting task, they urge for small but meaningful moments that will work towards a collective shift in the way institutions and classrooms operate. They then highlight the importance of being a “vulnerable learner” which can help “retain a sense of agency in your work and, even on darker days, can consistently infuse it with meaning” (Garcia and O’Donnell, 2024, p.37). The significance of this pose is to encourage teachers to see themselves and their students as continual learners rather than a part of a larger systemic machine. Instead of referring to the individual experience of vulnerability, Garcia and O’Donnell also emphasize that a lot of the challenges that students face are a part of a collective problem that requires vulnerability in order to broach and change. Garcia and O’Donnell’s third pose is a push for literacy for civic engagement and how teachers can both acknowledge the different civic identities of students in their classroom, but also how to purposefully tie those identities into literacy activities and classroom practices. Even though conversations about systemic issues with students can be difficult, it does not go away by choosing to not address them in the classroom. In addition, the ways that active practices around civics will transform students’ and teachers’ lives inside and outside of the classroom are the heart of why this field is so important.
Pedagogical Tools:
Garcia and O’Donnell added the pose of developing an identity as a writer who teaches as well as a teacher who writes because it “maximizes the learning outcomes of your students” and can be “central to your own professional growth” (Garcia and O’Donnell, 2024, p.98). The value of this pose is so that teachers can both be frequently involved in the practice of writing in a similar way to their students and to the practice of writing instruction. The underline the importance of writing has specifically to BIPOC students and their identity given that it has historically not been something that education systems have encouraged. The act of writing itself is an act of civic engagement. Along with writing, reading and literacy plays a substantial role in what students learn and how they perceive the world. The curation of texts that schools develop and the ways that teachers must wobble around ones that are less accessible for students are essential to nurturing a lifelong passion for reading and literature. An interesting point that they raise is the responsibility teachers have to “help students understand their agency as readers” and to “shift stances and practices based on the texts they encounter” (Garcia and O’Donnell, 2024, p. 128). Teaching and engaging with texts is not a black and white process, but rather a fluid method of meeting students where they are as readers and incorporating recommendations that will expand their horizons and connect with them.
Recommendation:
This book is essential for not only educators, but for parents, administration, caregivers, and leaders who aspire to cultivate a learning environment that encourages and inspires students well after their time spent in the classroom. It breaks down the idea that a teacher is someone with all of the knowledge and students are simply there to absorb what a teacher says. Garcia and O’Donnell approach learning as a nuanced and complex system of shared information where both students and teachers are constantly learning and improving in order to enact change and work towards a better tomorrow.
Pose, Wobble, and Flow: A Culturally Proactive Approach to Literary Instruction, Antero Garcia and Cindy O’Donnell Allen, Teachers College Press, Second Edition, 2024, #6.95, ISBN: 9780807769348
Bio: Haley Master is a West Chester University English M.A student as well as a sales associate for Schiffer Publishing.
In AI – Enhanced Literacy: Practical Steps for Deepening Reading and Writing Instruction by Mary Ehrenworth and Philip Seyfried (published on Oct. 6, 2025), teachers will discover how each chapter examines AI’s possibilities to expand literacy instruction and develop our students’ comprehension with digital texts and tools.
Regardless of how you may feel about using AI tools to improve reading and writing instruction, it is a critical skill for today’s literacy teachers. Through both theoretical approaches and practical examples to help you, K-12 teachers will learn more about the powerful capabilities of artificial intelligence to teach students to think critically and engage in reflective practices.
Each chapter examines the limitless potential AI has to expand literacy instruction and make the teacher’s role more interesting and satisfying while also saving valuable time. I know that most veteran teachers need to feel more at ease with current AI tools. Mary and Philip’s book will help you create AI-enhanced spaces in your classroom, use the power and efficiency of AI as a writing coach, and teach students to use AI tools in a thoughtful, critical, and ethical way during your reading and writing instruction block.
The authors of this book are well-suited for the task. Mary Ehrenworth, EdD, co-led a think tank on global literacy at Teachers College, Columbia University, for 20 years. Presently, Mary works nationally and globally to empower teachers and students through critical literacies and collaborative inquiry. Her most recent research fields are AI and literacy and vocabulary acquisition. Her co-author, Philip Seyfried, spent over a decade in the classroom as an English Language Arts teacher. He is presently a doctoral student in curriculum and teaching at Teachers College, Columbia University. His research focuses on digital literacy and artificial intelligence in education.
Well-defined headings in each chapter and the myriad figures in this book make it easy to navigate. Key information can be found in figures like Figure 1.5 (Effective Prompt Strategies for Educational AI), Figure 3.1 (AI Collaboration in the Writing Process), Figure 4.2 (Digital Comprehension Strategies), and Figure 4.3 (AI Tools for Readers). While it’s best to read the book slowly and carefully, it provides an absorbing introduction to the topic that is accessible and not intimidating. It is a satisfying read that will help you say, “Okay. I can do this. I am ready for more!”
I loved their practical advice such as “Rereading is a superpower” (p. 93) and digital reading is challenging but look at your curriculum for places “…you might insert some attention to digital reading practices” (p. 110). In addition, this book takes a good look at five different ways that classroom teachers can add AI-powered translation tools to the tool set they already use to help deepen the learning of their multilingual students.
Chapter 6 addresses the building and use of text sets to increase reader engagement and help them make meaningful connections while improving accessibility in our curriculum. Included is a figure that displays an AI-generated diverse text set for teaching The Giver by Lois Lowry and a figure that gives practical strategies for incorporating AI-suggested texts such as linking the literature with other subjects or pairing texts with related podcasts and other multimodal forms of expression and related STEM resources when applicable. The authors explore the use as auditory support as a powerful way to orient your students to new topics and texts. This strategy is useful K-12 and beyond! Figure 6.5 provides a useful guide for co-curating text sets with AI.
Using AI tools to improve reading and writing instruction can feel overwhelming, but it is a critical skill for today’s literacy teachers. This powerful book invites educators to engage in inquiries around AI in the classroom: to explore, think, and grapple together about new digital visions for literacy learning. I was hesitant to think about AI use for myself and in the classroom, but I have slowly changed my mind as I have read, experimented, and attended helpful presentations at conferences. Ehrenworth and Seyfried have helped me think more about digital versions for literacy learning and imagine the possibilities! I recommend it as a good place to start — a must-read!
Teaching in Uncertain Times: Strategies for Reclaiming Agency and Impact on Students’ Learning by Laura Robb is refreshing, practical, and hopeful! Robb’s book, available this July from Routledge Publishers, is filled with doable suggestions to support students’ academic learning and social wellbeing and varied needs. Throughout the book, she encourages collaboration and interaction with colleagues to build a strong learning community built on trust. Robb talks about the importance of finding time to reteach and plan interventions by utilizing flexible grouping designs and providing additional practice for those students who need it. She urges educators to become learners alongside their students and tasks us with developing an ongoing habit of time allotted to reading professional books and articles – a critical aspect of being the best teacher you can be and helping all students to thrive!
Robb asks us to take risks and try new teaching strategies or routines or refining something we already are using. I absolutely love her remarks about students’ self-evaluations. How simple yet brilliant to ask students to provide feedback on two questions: What worked? and What can be improved? She discusses ideas for K-1 and beyond in formats that make good sense! Cross-curricular projects are addressed for middle grades to boost engagement, critical thinking, and retention while developing the work force skills students will need later – collaboration, communication, adaptability. Her suggestion for professional study with other schools in the district or in the state can do much to deepen our knowledge of teaching practices and support our striving students in new and varied ways.
Independent reading in the content areas is addressed through rich suggestions for recommendations of magazines and award-winning Orbis Pictus and Scott O’Dell books. Robb also includes a description of key websites to support student learning and interests. A bibliography of sources, before-you-move-on reflection, chapter abstracts, and Robb’s own personal classroom stories are a few ways Robb hooks her readers. Robb also addresses ways educators can focus on self-care and ways they can cultivate their students’ wellbeing. Interest surveys, getting-to-know-you conferences, letters of introduction, kidwatching, reteaching lessons, and how to address cognitive overload are discussed in practical ways from kindergarten through middle school grades.
Chapter 4 takes a closer look at formative assessments and mentoring new teachers. Robb includes a great set of questions to gather important information about our students, providing a student information form so that all teachers who interact with a student and are part of a student’s day can provide feedback to help find alternative interventions and teaching/learning ideas. Her mentoring tips in Part II of chapter 4 encourage ongoing collaboration among new teachers and ways to build trust and positive memories.
Chapter 5 addresses lesson planning with six sensible suggestions and then moves into an in-depth look at three strategies to boost students’ reading skills in all subject areas. Examples of planning charts are included as well as effective collaboration strategies to impact active learning. Robb provides tips to support student comprehension of informational texts, including how to construct meaning during and after reading, deepening comprehension and critical analysis of text.
Her final chapter talks about family partnerships that can help to provide funds for supplies, materials, and snacks while also helping teachers to build trust through their communication with family members. Her appendices are ready to use – everything from practical tips on developing successful learning centers to informational text features and structures.
Laura Robb is a teacher-of-teachers. Her voice is encouraging, kind, and reassuring. She offers classroom snapshots to bring her words to life and provides practical examples, useful forms, and doable advice to cheer us on and help us help all our students to thrive and be the best they can be. Thank you, Laura!
Written by Jennifer Archie, Stephanie Collins, and Kelly Metzler
Nicole Mirra’s 2018 book Educating for Empathy seeks to answer driving questions about the role of empathy in our classrooms, specifically English classrooms, on the quest to develop participatory and civically engaged students. Throughout the text, Mirra returns to these questions: “What role (if any) should schools play in fostering empathy for students? What, for that matter, is empathy? And what kinds of educational practices can reverse the empathy deficit and produce compassionate, democratically engaged young adults?” (3).
In order to establish the need for teaching critical civic empathy, Mirra needs first to define how she uses the term “empathy.” She offers readers the standard idea that empathy allows us to see from another’s perspective, but also that one can move “beyond oneself and into the perspective of another person” (4). This process, she suggests, happens naturally in English classrooms, where students can use their imaginations while reading to move into other times, places, and characters’ experiences. In addition, she also implies that this connected process empowers students to become active critics of the world around them, sparking, perhaps, some activism on their part. She calls this process “critical civic empathy,” and she defines it in this way: “1. It begins from an analysis of the social position, power, and privilege of all parties involved. 2. It focuses on the ways that personal experiences matter in the context of public life. 3. It fosters democratic dialogue and civic action committed to equity and justice” (7). From a teacher’s perspective, this seems like an overwhelmingly important but problematically challenging concept, which is one of the main difficulties with this text.
Mirra does offer a series of really inspiring philosophical and pedagogical ideas. In particular, her focus on the “power of text for social transformation” (9) is one that most English teachers would applaud. She waxes poetic with language like “teachers and students must engage together in reflection and action aimed at breaking down structures of oppression that ensnare us all” (10). Almost all of the English teachers we know would approve of this message; we want students to feel texts at such an impactful level, and we try to engage students in this type of dialogue. However, there are also a variety of impediments to taking this discussion into the realm of transformative power, especially as it relates to disempowering social and political structures in the world around us, restrictive curriculum, and test-driven pedagogy to name just a few. Mirra also hammers home the idea that individual empathy is not sufficient; collective empathy needs to be developed in order to effect more change in reworking our power structures and fully empowering all voices to be present in the discourse of civic socialization.
Mirra continues her call to action with her first chapter in which she seeks to explore why reading helps develop empathy, how certain stories get privileged, and how imagining an alternate world view offers students a chance to project a vision of change onto their current society. Mirra cites several studies (Bal & Veltkamp, 2013; Mar & Oatley, 2008) that suggest frequent readers demonstrate higher empathy ratings than nonreaders. Additionally, while discussing the literary canon (and its controversies), she paraphrases Guillory’s 1993 work stating, “…critics argue that the canon inappropriately privileges particular stories as representative of American culture when, in fact, no single American culture exists; as such, its very existence serves to marginalize stories that deviate from those told by people in positions of power” (20). Most English teachers feel this burden; they need to offer more stories that not only reflect the lives of their students, but also stories that challenge and complicate students’ thinking, especially about power and privilege.
As evidence of how to combat this challenge, Mirra uses two teacher leaders to demonstrate ways of pushing back against the status quo. The first teacher she recognizes is a 10th grade ELA teacher, Jerica Coffey, teaching in a public charter high school in East Los Angeles. Ms. Coffey works with her students to develop the idea of a warrior-scholar mentality, explaining that “she developed this concept as a way to communicate to students her commitment to a vision of literacy linked to self- and social empowerment” (24). Students embraced this commitment and recognized their voices, taking actions like writing to their state governor about the juvenile justice system. The second teacher, Ashley Englander, also a 10th grade teacher, works at a traditional public high school in East Los Angeles. Ms. Englander serves as a “bridge-builder” between the smaller community of her students and families and the larger community in which they live. She does this by taking traditionally taught texts, like Night by Elie Wiesel, and moving the conversation beyond oppression and resistance during to Holocaust to these same concepts in their lives and communities today, using a research article to “provoke discussion about the role of schools as institutions of either marginalization or empowerment for students” (29). For teachers fostering ideas of empowerment through literacy, these two teacher leaders could serve as exemplars for what challenging the status quo looks like in a high school setting.
In chapter 2, Mirra stresses the need to develop engaged and thoughtful citizens through the use of structured debate as demonstrated in New York City public middle schools. She presents the idea that making slight changes to the way debate is implemented can “build relational trust and democratic community within classrooms and across schools” and “foster the development of critical civic empathy” (36). Debates possess mutual respect, discourse, and structure, which is seemingly nonexistent in today’s political climate. Our students are constantly exposed to what Mirra refers to as “ferocious verbal sparring” (35) in both formal and informal settings, especially with the presidential election looming. The thought of reimagining the purpose of debate as a trust- and community-building task represents the ability to empathize may seem like a daunting task for today’s educators.
The chapter goes on to present Mirra’s research exploring how students in the Middle School Quality Initiative (MSQI) in New York City responded to debate. Overall, participation in debate “benefited students’ academic literacy and critical-thinking skills…, and also their dispositions toward critical consciousness and civic engagement” (38). Ben Honoroff, a colleague of Mirra’s, was able to use the power of debate to give life to a school struggling with low test scores, declining enrollment, and the negative effects of gentrification. It should be noted that Honoroff was able to unify the school using a curriculum called Word Generation to address a high interest debate topic once a week across the entire school. While this curriculum is composed of vocabulary-rich interdisciplinary units, its implementation seems highly unlikely in the traditional public school setting considering the pressure of state testing and strict adherence to common core standards.
Youth participatory action research (YPAR), the central idea of Chapter 3, is defined as “the practice of encouraging young people to develop their own research questions about topics that are meaningful to them and related to issues or challenges they see reflected in their communities” (53). Mirra argues that YPAR can foster empathy by helping young people see their own thoughts, experiences, and voices as valued. Writing shifts from research to YPAR when “the three Ps” are taken into account: “purpose, practice, and positioning” (55). Purpose allows students to challenge the narrative, practice gives students the ability to create their own schooling experience, and positioning shows students as experts of their experiences. Mirra especially notes the benefit of YPAR with students from minoritized communities. She states that “young people who have grown up listening to dominant narratives about their communities- narratives that often highlight problems and risks—often begin to internalize deficit-oriented views of themselves and their peers” (67). The YPAR process seeks to help minoritized students change the narrative through “counter-storytelling grounded in community cultural wealth” (67), allowing them to do something about problems in their communities and not just place blame.
Chapter 4 focuses on the use of technology in and outside of the classroom and is well worth reading. Mirra claims that technology is damaging empathy by taking away both trust and perspective-taking as students are unable to pick up on non-verbal clues and online activity is impacting self-esteem as others post their fake and elaborate lives on social media. As access to technology increases, classroom disputes that either stem from or are further developed outside of school through social media and internet access routinely disrupt our classrooms.
The second part of this chapter delves into the ways teachers can use technology. Mirra suggests that teachers need to help students “leverage these tools to achieve the kinds of academically oriented, peer-supported, and interest-driven learning outcomes that the tools can facilitate” (84). She adds that this “takes dedicated pedagogy and a mindset change” (84). To support her initial statement that there is a need for more collective empathy, Mirra introduces the idea of Connected Learning vs. the 21st Century Skills, differentiating that the first focuses on a collective advancement whereas the second lends itself to individual advancement. This chapter offers the definitions of each principle within connected learning and suggests ways teachers can incorporate connected learning skills that are meaningful to students and give them a buy-in rather than using technology just to please administration. These principles are useful for all teachers to engage in at every professional level.
Mirra shifts in Chapter 5 to distinguish between Politics with a capital P and politics with a lowercase p with the former being our traditional view of political parties with elections and the latter encompassing the way our ideas about Politics plays a role in our everyday lives. This chapter strikes a chord as it first challenges the teacher to incorporate and facilitate more conversations within the classroom that allow students to become civically engaged in the community. This is a daunting idea to teachers as it is written in some districts’ handbooks that discussions must not lead into the political realm and stay focused on the curriculum. Mirra then shares a survey conducted with high school English teachers about the purposes of teaching reading. The study revealed that teachers identified college preparation as the first purpose whereas civic duty fell in the middle. Where this chapter becomes worth the read is when Mirra describes her beliefs that “teaching is an act of civic engagement” (100), but it is not enough; she believes we need to participate as private citizens as well. She further defends this by reiterating that every choice we make promotes beliefs, values, and actions and thus is political. Mirra argues that fostering civic empathy must start with our own involvement and teachers should reflect on how we are getting civically engaged in the community. This reflection will help teachers better understand the dynamics in the community that impact their students.
In her conclusion, Mirra states that her goal in writing was to “demonstrate how the foundational activities of literary analysis…can be transformed into opportunities for encouraging mutual humanization and community social action” (102). However, this book is clearly geared toward the high school level and above. For elementary teachers, more research would be needed to find ways to bring civic empathy and engagement into practice with younger children. Though inspirational in nature, implementation is problematic at the elementary level due to a lack of models for developmentally appropriate activities. Middle school implementation is possible through the use of thoughtfully selected texts and community collaboration, but the high school level offers the easiest pathways to implementation, especially in larger urban settings, due to Mirra’s presentation of research, examples, and resources in those areas.
Written by Gwen Dandrea, Kristen Mascitelli, and Morgan Schwalbe
Introduction
Cornelius Minor’s, We Got This: Equity Access, and the Quest to Be Who Our Students Need Us to Be, is an empowering resource that emphasizes the importance of effectively listening to your students, changing the way you teach to best support learning, and working towards more inclusive practices. Minor identifies tools, traits, and strategies that help teachers craft effective and meaningful instruction to reach the diverse learning styles in our classrooms today. One of his most valuable messages is the importance of listening to your students. Much of his book is devoted to learning how to truly listen in order to meet the needs of all your students. Minor (2019) begins with this powerful quote that summarizes his beliefs, “Our journey starts with an understanding that no great good can be done for a people if we do not listen to them first. Powerful teaching is rooted in powerful listening” (p. xi).
The book is broken into 2 parts: Part 1 – This Ain’t Everybody’s Hero Story – It’s Yours and Part 2 – Taking Your Dreams off Deferment. The first part focuses primarily on the idea that teachers have important powers and responsibilities. Teachers must not only understand our students, but also act on that understanding. It is also our responsibility to recognize the need for change and effectively find ways to better serve our students. The second part focuses on the circumstances that teachers are presented with every day and how to create a space where kids feel safe. Lastly, Minor urges educators to truly reflect on curriculum and the way we teach in order to be the best employee/teacher we can be. “Any curriculum or program that we buy, adopt, or create is incomplete until it includes our students and until it includes us” (p. 104). The power is ours to have and it is imperative that we act upon it. “We got this!”
Chapter 1 – Begin by Listening
“We lose lots of human capital each year because people bearing essential insights and experiences are wearing labels that we’ve been conditioned to ignore” (p. 11). In chapter one, Cornelius Minor explains that testing and mandates are problems, but they are underbosses to the real enemy; business as usual attitudes, binary thinking, and inflexibility. He tells us that each time we accept a label for ourselves; we are not covering our whole humanity. If we continue to do things as they have always been done our students become data points.
Minor does an excellent job of hooking teachers in with relatable examples. For instance, some teacher labels are new teacher, veteran, admin, rural, suburban, and urban. Wherever you are in your teaching career, you are one or more of those labels. By making the reader think of herself as a label, Minor triggers feelings of empathy for students.
“The antidote to all of this – our teacher superpower – is not some mythical teacher goodness or hyperbolic self-sacrifice” (p. 11). Our superpower is listening. There are three components: the act of listening, naming what we think we heard and planning a response, and making active and long-term adjustments. One of the things he encourages us to do is to build a bridge between what we do in class and our students’ lives right now. Teaching is dialogue and it is important to be clear about why an experience is happening in our classroom. Although listening will not make teaching easier, it will give us our children back.
In summary, we need to listen to what students are really communicating and teach them how to use their voices. We must allow children to have choices so they will not feel the need to fight the teacher as an authority figure. When this happens, you become a better teacher. It is not always easy to stand up for children, but by listening, that is exactly what the teacher can do.
Chapter 2 – You Can Disrupt the Status Quo in Your Class
“When our vision for kids and for classrooms is guided by a community’s vision for their own children, our work becomes real to children and to parents” (p. 28). In chapter two, Minor discusses the need to disrupt the status quo in the classroom. He shares a story about a student named Jeff. In this story, Minor does not stop to think about Jeff’s need for routine. Rather he thinks of his own need to have his students finish a project. At the end, he realizes that he understands Jeff, but that he did not act on that understanding. He goes on to tell us that racism, sexism, ableism, and classism are systems.
“The hard part of knowing that oppression lives in systems too is understanding that systems don’t change just because we identify them; they change because we disrupt them” (p. 31). Minor explains the importance of understanding that identifying these systems will not change them. He offers some actions that can influence how to identify what can be changed “right now” in order disrupt the status quo. By changing the status quo, students are able to be included. Being included does not mean that you are simply present. It means that you are in a place where you are able to thrive. Education has ensured that power has not shifted due to our established systems. Minor argues that we need to make a shift in that power. “When considering if I am doing the right thing, I’ve got to define what the right thing is. To me, the right thing is any practice that gives children greater access to literacy, to math, to the arts, to science. To power.” (p. 44).
In conclusion, it is okay to make mistakes. As long as you are thinking about and striving for the maximum number of students to have productive access to classwork, you will be attempting to disrupt the status quo. The ultimate goal is to work toward more inclusive practices for the whole community.
Chapter 3 – Do You Homework and Then Go for It
“Sometimes the things that we have to do become tradition, and as tradition ages sometimes those practices do not serve all children. Sometimes we have to change an established way of doing things in order to better serve our kids. Most times, changes that enrich the student experience are sought and welcomed, but sometimes the need for change surprises or eludes us altogether” (p. 49). As educators, we often become so accustomed to our teaching practices that we fail to recognize the need for change. Other times we conform or comply in silence in order to not rock the boat or upset the establishment.
In chapter three, Minor calls for the urgency in teachers to recognize a need for change to ensure that we are reaching all students. He first emphasizes that this will take time and involves true self-reflection. “After all, it takes time to be a hero” (p. 49). A blank template is provided with questions that help recognize the need for change. These questions focus on what is not working for our students and other teachers, ways to be more effective, and why the need for change.
Once you have decided the change that needs to be made, it is vital to focus on how that change would most benefit your students. This requires research and time spent following “your hunch” to find the best answer or approach to implement your vision. An informal research template is shared to aid in this inquiry.
Next, Minor urges you to decide what to do and make a plan for the change. He encourages you to reach out to colleagues, coaches or mentors to assist in this process so that others can support your vision and prepare you for the journey ahead. In order to attempt change in this way, it is also important to be prepared to “make it happen”. Be sure to realize that this change should be small in scale and not yet ready to take on the entire system. The following suggestions are offered when making your plan
Imagine how this change might happen.
Select a small population of students to study.
Make a five-day plan for how you will implement the changes you have chosen.
Choose how you will measure the impact that your work is having on students.
Decide how you will share your findings.
Now, it is time to set that plan in action. Minor reminds the reader to be prepared that it may not go as planned. It is important to continually revise your plan as you begin to implement the change. People will support you if your plan is well researched, thought out, and based on data produced from your classroom. Keep in mind your reason for change and ultimately have your students’ best interests at heart.
Finally, and maybe most importantly “find a productive way to say no”. It is vital to recognize that not all change is good, the need for change may vary, and that things may not go well from the beginning. There are many variables that affect what we value in our classrooms. Minor emphasizes how our values and the students we teach impact our decisions to make a change.
In conclusion, chapter three provides a structure for identifying and changing things that are not effective in the classroom. Minor’ rules of conduct for change advises that you do some reflection, conduct research, make a plan for implementation, determine the impact of the change, and finally communicate your findings with administration. “This work is not about saying no just because we do not like a thing. This is about carefully considering the needs of our students and using our no power to ensure they get what they need” (p. 70).
Chapter 4 – Show Kids That You Hear Them
As educators, how quickly do we take our students and turn them into enemies (p. 80)? This powerful chapter urges teachers to ask ourselves this profound question and truly reflect on how we view our children. Are we quick to judge students with disabilities? Do we characterize them based on their behavior? For whatever reasons, our unspoken actions and reactions often do not allow us to look deeper into our students’ beliefs and perceptions. “The kids are not the enemy. They are simply responding to the things in their world in the best ways they know how” (p. 80). It is up to us as educators to simply listen to them.
The idea in this chapter is to show kids that you hear them. As a classroom teacher, we have the power to create a space where “kids feel safe” and will in turn become active listeners holding the same power as you. One suggestion is to plan for and hold regular classroom meetings. Minor believes that these simple meetings will build rapport with your students and work towards maintaining a successful classroom community. Meetings can address many topics and can take place in many unlikely places throughout the day. “These meetings do more than feed you information. They give your students the experience of being heard” (p. 83). The relationship building that occurs during this time is so valuable in allowing your children’s voices to be heard. Providing the time and structure of a classroom meeting will greatly impact your classroom practices.
It is also important to hear your students through designated feedback. Giving students the opportunity to be heard shows that you value them and their opinion. It also allows students to work on self-improvement and positive communication. Minor asks for feedback in these three areas: use of time, the clarity of his demonstrations, and how well assignments and assessments are constructed. These areas help to build trust, student engagement, and a positive classroom community. He believes that after time with these types of feedback will in turn “condition” them to begin to discuss your teaching practices and how to better suit their individual needs.
Finally, Minor calls for a shift from a punitive to an instructive mind-set. “We often assume that kids know and have what it takes to succeed in our classroom. This is a dangerous assumption to make, because it leaves so many children without a way to access success” (p. 92). This profound statement challenges educators to again show kids you hear them by providing them the skills and resources to be successful. Being prepared for the challenges that lie ahead allows you to begin that shift in mindset. A blueprint for shifting your mindset is provided to facilitate success each week and finding ways to help each other in the classroom. These approaches will help foster a sense of community, as well as a shift towards student independence.
“My job as a teacher is not to teach the curriculum or even to just teach the students; it is to seek to understand my kids as completely as possible so that I can purposefully bend curriculum to meet them” (p. 101).
Chapter 5 – Make Curriculum Work for Your Kids
“Crafting and sustaining an inclusive approach and pairing that with academic content takes insight and time and research and resources that I don’t always have” (p. 105). Chapter five focuses on learning experiences that are accessible and meaningful to students. In order to create curriculum and lessons that students can access, we need to know our students. By understanding students’ background knowledge and learning styles, we can help students create connections between curriculum and their own experiences.
Minor shared several ideas for teachers to think about when planning from a curriculum that we have been given. He said when we are working with a Universal Design Framework (p. 109), we should think about how individual children seem to respond when we…
… consider different ways that the information that I present can be represented?
… create different opportunities for action and expression in the classroom?
… foster multiple ways to sustain engagement?
By readjusting our instruction to meet the needs of the students in our classroom, we create more opportunities for them to experience success.
Additionally, Minor talked about the importance of teacher collaboration. Whether it is planning or just conversing with a colleague, these conversations about curriculum allow us to determine how to best deliver our instruction and make it accessible for all students. Minor’s chart about dissecting a lesson (p. 116) encourages teachers to look at curriculum through a different lens to focus on purpose, importance, delivery, assessment and reflection.
Finally, Minor addresses a topic that many teachers can relate to test prep. “It has been well documented that standardization, assessment and measurement are not bad things at all. But an unhealthy emphasis on any of these things can be detrimental to a learning community and harmful to children” (p. 119). While test prep is a reality in many schools, he reminds us that test prep is not teaching. It is more of helping students apply what they already know in different situations. Minor’s final reminder is that it is most important to be mindful of how we are presenting information that is effective and meaningful for all of our students.
Chapter 6 – Being a Good Teacher Versus Being a Good Employee
“When we want to be self-determining in terms of our professional growth, the first thing that we can do is believe that things can be different” (p. 129). Minor focused on the importance of teacher mindset. Our attitudes towards any aspects of our career drive our decisions and expectations. It is time for a shift in our thinking when we begin to complain and gossip about things happening in school.
Minor provides a number of tools to engage in mindset work. It is important for us to be open to advice from others. Searching for creative ideas to incorporate into the classroom betters our instructional practice. Setting goals and communicating them with students, colleagues and administration helps to hold us accountable for following through with mindset work.
Keeping a universal design framework in mind, feedback is a key component in this process. “There are three kinds of feedback that I consistently seek in school – mine, kids’, and colleagues’. Most times I seek them in that order” (p. 137). Being reflective as a teacher enables us to determine strengths and areas of growth. Student feedback is important because they are the ones being directly impacted by our instructional decisions. Feedback can be evident in a number of ways, especially in students. We need to focus on the verbal and nonverbal feedback because this can be powerful. Being receptive to feedback from colleagues allows us to grow professionally, too.
As teachers, our ultimate goal is to help students be successful in and out of the classroom. Having a reflective approach towards our teaching allows us to be a great teacher instead of just a good employee. We can inspire positive change within the school system and empower our students to be responsible for their own learning.
Conclusion
We would recommend this book to any educator who is looking for a way to change or improve their classroom practices. It is a quick and easy read to help navigate change, make curriculum relevant, and provide equal opportunities to all students by simply listening to what they have to say. Additionally, a user-friendly book provides a number of graphic organizers to help teachers be more reflective in their own teaching. Minor’s ideas and theories are applicable across grade levels, fields of study and diverse socioeconomic school settings.
In conclusion, this text is a powerful resource for teachers who are seeking individual growth as an educator. By focusing on equity, collaboration and engagement, Minor provides countless opportunities for teachers to reflect on their own instructional practices and make small adjustments that can have a long lasting impact on student achievement. Minor’s ultimate goal is to inspire teachers of all levels to promote change and to be heroes in their own classrooms.
