Teaching Justice-Oriented Picturebooks Through Collaborative Discussion and ‘Slow Looking’: Implications for Initial Teacher Education Settings
Picturebooks have a long history as literature for literacy learning in initial teacher education (ITE) settings. Yet, the practice of “using” picturebooks solely to teach isolated skills becomes more alarming as pre-service teachers encounter classroom picturebook instruction that features diverse...
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MDPI AG
2025-04-01
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| Series: | Education Sciences |
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| author | Angie Zapata Sarah Reid Mary Adu-Gyamfi |
| author_facet | Angie Zapata Sarah Reid Mary Adu-Gyamfi |
| author_sort | Angie Zapata |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Picturebooks have a long history as literature for literacy learning in initial teacher education (ITE) settings. Yet, the practice of “using” picturebooks solely to teach isolated skills becomes more alarming as pre-service teachers encounter classroom picturebook instruction that features diverse racial, linguistic, or ethnic communities as “plugged” into scripted curriculum without opportunities for students to respond to the socio-cultural portrayals encountered. Guidance for ITE programs is needed to ensure that the aesthetic and sociopolitical features of picturebooks are not only considered but deeply taught to pre-service teachers. Drawing from a qualitative analysis of a fifth-grade reader engaging with a picturebook featuring a character with a similar phenotype across ten days, an inductive and iterative process of data analysis identified salient moments of collaborative discussions and the ‘slow looking’ approaches she used to interact with justice-oriented picturebooks. Our findings highlight the visual, material, and multimodal ways these texts serve as mentor resources for writing and drawing, while also acting as identity-affirming texts. To conclude, we offer essential implications for ITE settings, instructors, and their students by unpacking the significance of instruction that matters most for supporting pre-service teachers as curators of justice-oriented picturebooks. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-01ec8bb7d2ed446a803b49da4b88626a |
| institution | OA Journals |
| issn | 2227-7102 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-04-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Education Sciences |
| spelling | doaj-art-01ec8bb7d2ed446a803b49da4b88626a2025-08-20T02:17:14ZengMDPI AGEducation Sciences2227-71022025-04-0115444710.3390/educsci15040447Teaching Justice-Oriented Picturebooks Through Collaborative Discussion and ‘Slow Looking’: Implications for Initial Teacher Education SettingsAngie Zapata0Sarah Reid1Mary Adu-Gyamfi2College of Education and Human Development, Faculty of Learning Teaching and Curriculum, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65211, USACollege of Education, School of Teaching and Learning, Illinois State University, Normal, IL 61790, USACollege of Education and Human Development, Faculty of Learning Teaching and Curriculum, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65211, USAPicturebooks have a long history as literature for literacy learning in initial teacher education (ITE) settings. Yet, the practice of “using” picturebooks solely to teach isolated skills becomes more alarming as pre-service teachers encounter classroom picturebook instruction that features diverse racial, linguistic, or ethnic communities as “plugged” into scripted curriculum without opportunities for students to respond to the socio-cultural portrayals encountered. Guidance for ITE programs is needed to ensure that the aesthetic and sociopolitical features of picturebooks are not only considered but deeply taught to pre-service teachers. Drawing from a qualitative analysis of a fifth-grade reader engaging with a picturebook featuring a character with a similar phenotype across ten days, an inductive and iterative process of data analysis identified salient moments of collaborative discussions and the ‘slow looking’ approaches she used to interact with justice-oriented picturebooks. Our findings highlight the visual, material, and multimodal ways these texts serve as mentor resources for writing and drawing, while also acting as identity-affirming texts. To conclude, we offer essential implications for ITE settings, instructors, and their students by unpacking the significance of instruction that matters most for supporting pre-service teachers as curators of justice-oriented picturebooks.https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7102/15/4/447linguistically diverse picturebookscritical literature responseinitial teacher education |
| spellingShingle | Angie Zapata Sarah Reid Mary Adu-Gyamfi Teaching Justice-Oriented Picturebooks Through Collaborative Discussion and ‘Slow Looking’: Implications for Initial Teacher Education Settings Education Sciences linguistically diverse picturebooks critical literature response initial teacher education |
| title | Teaching Justice-Oriented Picturebooks Through Collaborative Discussion and ‘Slow Looking’: Implications for Initial Teacher Education Settings |
| title_full | Teaching Justice-Oriented Picturebooks Through Collaborative Discussion and ‘Slow Looking’: Implications for Initial Teacher Education Settings |
| title_fullStr | Teaching Justice-Oriented Picturebooks Through Collaborative Discussion and ‘Slow Looking’: Implications for Initial Teacher Education Settings |
| title_full_unstemmed | Teaching Justice-Oriented Picturebooks Through Collaborative Discussion and ‘Slow Looking’: Implications for Initial Teacher Education Settings |
| title_short | Teaching Justice-Oriented Picturebooks Through Collaborative Discussion and ‘Slow Looking’: Implications for Initial Teacher Education Settings |
| title_sort | teaching justice oriented picturebooks through collaborative discussion and slow looking implications for initial teacher education settings |
| topic | linguistically diverse picturebooks critical literature response initial teacher education |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7102/15/4/447 |
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