Adolescents Rewrite their Worlds

Vivian Yenika-Agbaw is professor of education at Pennsylvania State University, University Park where she teaches children’s and adolescent literature.Teresa Sychterz is a professor of education at Kutztown University, Kutztown, PA where she teaches graduate children’s literature and writing courses and supervises student teachers.

• ContentsList of TablesAcknowledgmentsForeword:Patrick ShannonChapter 1: Literature: Art, Tool and More Vivian Yenika-AgbawChapter 2:The Transformative Power of Children’s Literature in the Classroom Teresa SychterzChapter 3:Writing Public Service Announcements and Genre Jabs Jason GriffithChapter 4:Using Photo Story to Rewrite the Classics Jason GriffithChapter 5:Multi-genre Projects and the Urban Classroom: An Examination of Language and Critical Literacy Donna-Marie Cole-MalottChapter 6:Digital Literacy: Writing Biographies Jason MoserChapter 7:Literature Responses and Academic WritingVivian Yenika-AgbawChapter 8:Chatting with Artists Mary Napoli & SychterzChapter 9:Graphic Novels Comes Alive in a Sixth Grade Classroom Mary Napoli & Teresa SychterzAppendix A:Transformative Teaching PracticesAppendix B:Teaching ResourcesContributor’s Biography

Adolescents Rewrite their Worlds: Using Literature to Illustrate Writing Forms is definitely every middle school teacher's "go-to book" for reading and writing instruction. The contributors respect and understand that integrating digital literacies and multimodal projects into the language arts curriculum motivates and engages adolescents to read and write culturally authentic texts. Student choice and collaboration bring the meaning and social interactions that adolescents crave to projects such as writing graphic novels, creating film adaptations of texts, using Photo Story, and illustrator studies that marry technology with traditional writing tasks, always keeping the learner at the center. A book for the 21st century and beyond, the authors tap into what's important to students and suggest teaching and learning projects that can prepare students for the critical thinking and problem solving they need to be productive participants in our ever-changing global society. This is truly a must-have professional book for every middle school teacher!