Breaking the Cycle: Gender, Literacy, and Learning

The research is in on how gender bias affects literacy learning, and now it’s time to put that research into practice. It’s time to break the cycle of stereotyping that’s inhibiting our girls’ literacy development and help all of our students become more secure and discerning readers and writers.

In this important new book, Lynne Alvine and Linda Cullum provide real examples of classroom situations in which gender bias occurs and, more important, specific suggestions for addressing gender inequity in school contexts. You’ll gain new insight into how reading impacts girls’ lives and the importance of encouraging girls to take their reading personally. You’ll also discover suggestions for working with nonmainstream girls, along with commentary on the underground literary phenomenon of zining. Best of all, there are lots of suggested readings, teaching approaches, course syllabi, and other specific resources and strategies for transforming the secondary curriculum. Plus an annotated bibliography provides more than one hundred resources on gender-fair schooling and literacy learning.

As English language arts teachers, state the authors, it is our responsibility-and our privilege-to recognize the ways that literacy can help young women and men… . By becoming aware of the messages our culture sends through reading, writing, and visual representations, students can move beyond cultural assumptions. They can use their emerging literacy to expand rather than to circumscribe their horizons. This awareness is a gift that teachers can give to their students-and to themselves.