This book presents the work from a selection of contributors who aim to provide educators with hands-on activities to encourage reflection, awareness, and dialogue related to social justice issues. Highlighting the need for teachers to intentionally create spaces where students from all backgrounds can work together and appreciate their differences, teachers and teacher educators showcase hands-on literacy strategies that all educators can adapt and use in their own classrooms to enhance social justice awareness.
Kenneth Cushner, Ed. D. is Professor of international and intercultural teacher education at Kent State University, author of numerous textbooks, chapter and articles in the fields of multicultural education and intercultural training, and a Founding Fellow and Past President of the International Academy for Intercultural Research. He also serves as director of the Consortium for Overseas Student Teaching (COST).
Joanne Kilgour Dowdy is a Professor of Adolescent/Adult Literacy at Kent State University. The American Educational Research Association Narrative and Research SIG awarded her book, Ph.D. Stories: Conversations with My Sisters, the Outstanding Book Award for 2009.
Educators in the 21st century understand the importance of fostering a sense of social awareness in their students; however, it is sometimes a challenge to do so in ways that integrate seamlessly into curricula. Indeed, social awareness should not be developed as a skill unto itself but used as a lens through which to examine myriad disciplines and topics. In Reading Between the Lines, Dowdy and Cushner have compiled 26 lessons that offer educators useful resources for embedding social awareness instruction into their teaching in ways that are student centered and collaborative. The goal of these lessons is to develop social awareness literacy, and they help teachers simultaneously create a sense of community in their classrooms, reinforce content area concepts, and buildl“¯