Description

Literacy can empower students, but it may also limit their understanding if taught without regard for the context of their lives. Using his encounters with students - in high school, college and state prison classrooms - as well as his own experience, Robert Yagelski looks at the sometimes ambiguous role of literacy in our lives and examines the mismatch between conventional approaches to teaching literacy and the literacy needs of students in a rapidly changing, increasingly technological world. He asserts that ultimately, the most important job of the English teacher is to reveal to students ways they can participate in the discourse that shapes their lives, aiming to offer a timely look at how technology has influenced the way we write and read.