- Their oral and written reports are then translated into the standard dialect or struc-
tured language as part of “Feature Talk.” - In the last step, students developsymbolic or Algebraic representationsthat describe
what they have learned. They present these representations in class and explore how
they can be used to describe other phenomena.
What I especially like about Moses’s work is that he extends critical literacy from social
studies and English into the mathematics classroom. His ideas on empowering students
through a structured learning process that uses their lived experience and home dialects to
engage them in learning complex material is applicable in language acquisition, science, or
any other area of academic study.
JOIN THE CONVERSATION—DECIPHERING OR READING?When I was a preteenager, I learned to pray in Hebrew in preparation for my bar mitzvah
at age 13. A bar mitzvah is a ceremony in which a Jewish boy is accepted as an adult
member of the religious community. My friends and I used to joke that we had to pray in
Hebrew because “God does not understand English.” Of course we did not understand
Hebrew. We simply deciphered meaningless sounds and recited them aloud. Later, as an
adult, I learned that many Roman Catholic youth had a similar experience studying Latin.
I have been in many classrooms where students decipher and recite text the same way.
When questioned, they have no idea what they have just read. The students possess tech-
nical skill, but they are not reading, which, according to Freire, “always involves critical
perception, interpretation, and rewriting of what is read.”Questions to Consider:- How did you learn to make meaning of what you read?
- What motivated you to grapple with difficult text?
3.Do you agree with the idea of critical literacy? Explain.
SECTION B: HOW MANY KINDS OF LITERACY ARE THERE?
This broader notion of critical literacy advocated by Freire, Christensen, and Moses is closer
to the ideas of contemporary literacy specialists than the older version of simply mastering
the three Rs. Because they view literacy as fundamental to the processes of thinking, under-
standing, and acting, literacy specialists are the imperialists of the educational world. For
them, everything is a form of literacy and there are numerous overlapping and interwoven
varieties. One book, published by the International Reading Association (IRA), listed 38
types, including academic literacy, community literacy, critical literacy, cultural literacy, me-
dia literacy, pragmatic literacy, and workplace literacy (Harris & Hodges, 1995).
Let me use an example from the world of sports to illustrate my understanding of what lit-
eracy specialists mean by literacy. One of the most difficult positions to master in any team
sport is quarterback, in football. Not only must a player have the requisite physical skills, but
the quarterback must be able to read and respond to a series of defensive strategies em-
ployed by the other team and to quickly communicate new plans to teammates. Quarterbacks
are assisted in doing this by viewing videotape of earlier games, studying charts of opposition
184 CHAPTER 7