Literacy narratives toward identity and community in a first-grade classroom

by (Andrea Mia), 1978- Pintaone-Hernandez

In this study, Andrea M. Pintaone-Hernandez discusses how notions of identity and community are intricately linked with the enactment of a critical literacy pedagogy in one first-grade classroom at a suburban elementary school in the Southeast. Building on the work of Bakhtin, Hermans and Kempen, Delpit, Ladson-Billings, Shannon, and Freire, Pintaone-Hernandez examines the ways in which notions of the centripetal and centrifugal forces of the polyphonic novel and polyphonic identity can be used as a lens for examining literacy events in a classroom learning community. Narrative vignettes are used to show the interconnectedness of this theory of community with student academic achievement, the role home and school codes play in literacy education, and the value of a student’s life outside school on his/her literacy learning.