Early Career Teachers’ Evolving Content-Area Literacy Practices

Authors

  • Anne Murray-Orr St. Francis Xavier University
  • Jennifer Mitton-Kukner St. Francis Xavier University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.37119/ojs2017.v23i2.340

Keywords:

Content area literacy, early career teachers, secondary teachers, disciplinary literacy, pedagogical content knowledge

Abstract

Becoming effective teachers is dependent upon a variety of factors intersecting with early career teachers’ beginning teaching experiences. This paper provides a glimpse into ways in which four early career secondary school teachers began to embed literacies into their teaching practices in content areas and how their approaches shifted between the final term of their teacher education program in 2013 and their first year of teaching in 2014. The authors explore three factors that may shape the practices of early career teachers, with disciplinary specialties in science, math, social studies, and other content areas, as they persist in infusing their teaching practice with literacy strategies over the first year of teaching, or alternatively discontinue using these strategies. These factors are coursework in a Literacy in the Content Areas course during their teacher education program, teaching context, and disciplinary specialty.

Keywords: early-career teachers; secondary teachers; content-area literacy; disciplinary literacy; pedagogical content knowledge

Author Biographies

  • Anne Murray-Orr, St. Francis Xavier University

    Faculty of Education

    Associate Professor

  • Jennifer Mitton-Kukner, St. Francis Xavier University

    Faculty of Education

    Associate Professor

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Published

2017-12-21

Issue

Vol. 23 No. 2 (2017): Autumn 2017

Section

Articles

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