Winter 2003 Table of Contents-Harvard Educational Review

In this article, Stephen Brookfield explores the "unproblematized Eurocentrism" that characterizes contemporary adult education in light of Herbert Marcuse’s perspectives on repressive tolerance. Brookfield, a White English male, explores the implications of his own social location for his work in adult education by drawing on the works of Cornel West and Lucius T. Outlaw Jr., two prominent African American scholars who racialize the discourse of adult education. Brookfield further considers the broader implications for adult education practice and scholarship that emerge from West’s and Outlaw’s perspectives on critical thinking, which are paradigmatically different from the Euro-American traditions that tend to ignore issues of race and dominate the field. Finally, Brookfield offers recommendations to practitioners and scholars for actively exploring adult education’s role in challenging the "the myth of neutral, non-impositional, adult educators." (pp. 497–523)

In this article, Kevin Cokley challenges conventional wisdom about African American college students and the factors underlying their academic underachievement. In this quantitative study of students attending three historically Black colleges and universities and one predominantly White university, Cokley reviews and integrates existing research on the academic motivation and academic self-concept of African American students. He then introduces self-determination theory as an additional motivational framework to understand African American students’ motivation. While Cokley finds that African American students are intrinsically highly motivated, this motivation is not related to how they perform academically or to their academic self-concept. (pp. 524–558)

In this article, Julio Vargas Clavería and Jesús Gómez Alonso argue that educational researchers have long ignored the Romà people and that this lack of attention has contributed to the persistence of educational inequity that the Romà endure throughout the world. The authors propose a new approach to Romaní educational research based on intersubjective dialogue, and the emergence of an egalitarian relationship between the researcher and the researched. This communicative approach considers the reflections of those researched and safeguards the voices of those studied. The authors contextualize their methodological and ideological discussion within a framework of Romaní history. (pp. 559–590)

Harvard Educational Review
Winter 2003 Reviews of Current Books
(Full Text)

Classroom Discourse: The Language of Learning and Teaching (2nd ed.)
by Courtney B. Cazden.
Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2001. 216 pp. $24.00.

Courtney Cazden, Professor Emerita at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, wrote her classic text Classroom Discourse in 1988. In this second edition she revisits many issues from the original text, including the exploration of "teaching as a linguistic process in a cultural setting" (p. 1), and her belief that the study of classroom discourse is "a kind of applied linguistics — the study of situated language use in one social setting" (p. 3). That first edition examined what Cazden calls the languages of curriculum, control, and personal identity, addressing three research questions still central to this second edition:

Since the first edition was published, there has been "more emphasis on process and strategies for learning and doing" (p. 5), resulting in more classroom discussions, small-group work, and work with or at computers. Furthermore, equity issues — always of concern to Cazden — have gained national attention. More teachers are becoming "reflective practitioners," audio-taping and analyzing how language is used in their own classrooms. In this second edition, Cazden highlights these trends, asserting that since "the social ends of education are changing . . . our responsibilities for discourse . . . must change also" (p. 5). These ends include preparing a diverse population of students to participate fully in all aspects of society. Yet she also reinforces her original message: "The basic purpose of school is achieved through communication" (p. 2).

Readers will find this a clearly organized, engaging, and provocative exploration of the many ways oral and written language can or could support learning and teaching. In chapter two, Cazden describes traditional sharing time as it occurs in many elementary classrooms. A child offers a narrative, describing the key agents and action, and then the teacher asks questions. Cazden analyzes the tensions between "the child’s intended meaning and the teacher’s valued form" (p. 27) of discourse. Cazden devotes the second half of the chapter to teacher research on sharing time.

In chapters three and four, Cazden compares traditional and nontraditional lessons and then explores the role of discourse in student learning. She presents an overview of the three-part "I.R.E./F." tradition of classroom discourse sequence: teacher initiation, student response, and teacher evaluation/feedback. She contrasts this discourse with the nontraditional discourse documented in the mathematics instruction of renowned teacher researchers James Hiebert, Magdalene Lampert, and Deborah Ball, in which explanations are as welcome as answers, teachers probe students to expand their thinking, and students more often listen to, refer to, and even disagree with one another’s comments. Eschewing an either-or approach, Cazden encourages teachers "to have a repertoire of lesson structures and teaching styles" (p. 56). In chapter four, Cazden examines ways that dyadic or group interactions influence students’ mental processes of reconceptualization, internalization, and assimilation. She describes the Reading Recovery program (for children who have not learned to read after one year in school), Reciprocal Teaching (small-group structured practice in comprehension strategies), and Lampert’s mathematics instruction. Citing John Bruer, Cazden explains that discourse-intensive reform programs work because social interaction "makes hidden thought processes public" (p. 75).

Drawing on research from teachers and researchers, chapter five analyzes specific features of classroom discourse that teachers and researchers might want to examine or change. Cazden examines turn-taking practices: teacher nomination, student self-selection, as well as such practices as requiring students to call on peers of the opposite gender, passing a "talking stick," or affirming overlapping speech. She also addresses how seating arrangements, teacher gaze, listening responsibilities, open versus closed questions, and pace and sequence shift students’ relationship to the content, and to one another.

Chapter six, "Talk with Peers and Computers," further illustrates how "differences between learning in teacher-led lessons and learning in peer groups are becoming less marked" (p. 109). Cazden analyzes four intellectual roles students take on when working in pairs or small groups: spontaneous helping, assigned teaching or tutoring, reciprocal critique, and collaborative problem-solving. She then moves on to examine "talk with, at, through, and in relation to computers" (p. 123). Cazden illustrates that collaboration at the computer leads to variations in the I.R.E./F. format, and describes telecommunication projects conducted by middle and high school teachers involved in BreadNet (the electronic network of the Bread Loaf School of English). Highlighting concerns that computers are marginalized, both physically and conceptually, from the rest of the curriculum, Cazden reminds us that "the social organizations of classrooms [must] promote the habits of speaking and listening from which positive interpersonal relationships across [many types of] differences can grow" (pp. 133–134).

Chapter seven addresses these differences directly, focusing on the difference between the "differential treatment perspective" that critiques curriculum that is overdifferentiated and thus gives some students better opportunities, and the "cultural differences" perspective that critiques underdifferentiated curriculum that fails to account for qualitative differences among students (p. 137). She first examines harmful overdifferentiation, citing Allington’s research about discrepancies between low and high reading groups in elementary schools. Next, drawing on research by Clay (about New Zealand Maoris and Whites), Heath (about U.S. middle-class Blacks and Whites), and Ballenger (about Boston Haitians), Cazden describes how teachers can take cultural differences into account by starting with content and talk familiar to students, using peer models for new kinds of talk, talking about talk, and inviting students to "talk more" (p. 162). Cazden pleads with teachers to "face those aspects of differential treatment that are within their sphere of influence . . . [to assure that] classroom discourse as the drama of teaching of learning [has] speaking parts for all" (p. 164).

The final chapter revisits many of Cazden’s main concepts using new terms. She draws the connection between exploratory talk and first drafts of written texts. She also states that "accountable talk" (coined by Resnick at the University of Pittsburgh) and academic language can help students express ideas clearly and concisely, yet may also block students if forced upon them. Cazden closes by discussing work by African American educators Delpit and Shuy about "how (even whether) to deliberately help students to become more bidialectal" (p. 175), claiming their own speech patterns while also learning the dominant discourse.

Cazden’s fascination with language, respect for teachers, and commitment to effective and equitable teaching practices shine through in this new edition of her classic work. She affirms the importance of teacher research and reminds educators that we must change our classroom language use to support the academic and language development for all students, advocating that we use "careful analysis and conscious control so that our implicit theories of the language of teaching and learning can be open to continual re-vision. Nothing less does justice to our profession and our children" (p. 181).

Honky
by Dalton Conley.
Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000. 243 pp. $24.95.

Honky is more than a powerful autobiography. Sociologist Dalton Conley has written a treatise on the social construction of race and class through the lens of a boy growing up in the housing projects of New York City during the 1970s and 1980s. Conley begins:

In this book, Conley skillfully weaves stories of his experiences as a White person to explore definitions of race and class, asserting that "race and class are nothing more than a set of stories we tell ourselves to get through the world, to organize our reality" (p. xii). The result is a useful tool that educators can use to examine concepts of race and class with high school, college, and graduate school students.

Conley’s memoir begins before he is born. He describes his family’s decision to move a few blocks south, from a tenement where they had been repeatedly burglarized to the projects of the Lower East Side. Conley’s family was poor and, unlike their neighbors, White. However, skin tone did not define his family as much as the choices they were afforded because they were White. He writes that his family could have chosen to "move to a White, working-class neighborhood in the outer boroughs or in New Jersey. . . . Our neighbors, by contrast, were largely unwelcome elsewhere for reasons of race and financial status" (p. 9). One of the first contradictions Conley experienced was that he did not fit in with any particular race or culture, rather, he "felt culturally more similar to [his] darker-hued peers than to the previous generations of [his] own family" (p. 7).

For the remainder of the book, school is the main backdrop for the lessons Conley learns. His description of his experiences in elementary school brings the social construction of race alive for readers. When Conyer’s mother enrolled him in school, the principal explained to her, "You see, there is no White class" (p. 44) and asked her to choose the Black, Puerto Rican, or Chinese class. "The choices our race gave us," Conley writes, "were made quite explicit — by a government institution, no less" (p. 44).

Conley’s mother enrolled him in the Black class, where he witnessed his classmates receiving corporal punishment when they misbehaved. He never received the same treatment, regardless of his behavior. "I even tried to get into fights in that school," he writes, "fights I knew I would lose; I wanted to feel the relief of being struck" (p. 46). The principal explained to Conley’s mother why he was treated differently, saying, "We know that White parents spoil their kids so [his teacher] doesn’t strike Dalton" (p. 49). Conley was given the choice to receive the same punishment as his peers or move to the Chinese class, where the teacher did not use corporal punishment. His mother moved him to the Chinese class, where, he writes, "My Chinese language skills improved, and my black hair grew longer and straighter — as if I were unconsciously trying to assimilate" (p. 50).

Conley stayed in this class until a child molester was found in the school’s bathroom and his parents decided to move him to another school. He explains that his parents "knew the magic words and when to say them" (p. 53), and were able to circumvent the requirement that Conley attend his neighborhood school to enroll him in P.S. 41, an elementary school in upscale Greenwich Village. Conley wonders if his parents had access to this knowledge because they were White and therefore possessed "social capital," or social connections that develop into benefits for those involved. "The losers in the arrangement," Conley writes, "were the local schools, which not only lost funding but also the students whose parents enjoyed the most ‘social capital,’ that is, connections" (p. 52).

Conley describes himself during his years at P.S. 41 as "a part-time, after-school honky . . . returning to the projects on the school bus each afternoon while most of [his White] classmates . . . sauntered home through safe Greenwich Village streets" (p. 79). At this school, being White did not define Conley as it did at home in the projects. However, at P.S. 41 Conley got his first lessons about social class:

After elementary school Conley went to Intermediate School 70, which enrolled children from a variety of races and classes, and where he hoped to "sew the two halves of [his] life together" (p. 133). However, middle school proved no simpler than elementary. According to Conley, "academic tracking reproduced, to some extent, the larger society’s hierarchy of race and class" (p. 133). In Intermediate School 70 there was an academic or high track and a lower, non-academic, vocational track. He writes, "These classes [in the lower track] were populated predominantly by minority students, a fact to which I failed to ascribe any importance at the time. Journalism was replaced by sewing, history by typing, and science by wood shop" (p. 170). Conley gravitated toward the poorer students who "sat inside, eating our federally subsidized hot lunches, while the Village kids went to the local shops for food" (p. 133). He was eventually placed in the lower track: "Being in the lower track gave me a touch of coolness that I had never experienced; . . . the two halves of my life, it seemed, were finally being sewn back together" (p. 170).

Toward the end of middle school, Conley began to develop his understanding of cultural capital. After moving into an apartment complex for artists in Greenwich Village (subsidized by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development), Conley found it "difficult . . . to understand why artists had become an identifiable group, like the poor, who really deserved help" (p. 211). While living in Greenwich Village, Conley enrolled in Stuyvesant High School, an elite public exam school. Though happy with the school, Conley did not fit in with his peers. "I paced in circles like a closed-up laboratory animal, wishing I were back in our old neighborhood, where at least I had my skin color to blame for not fitting in" (p. 214). He recalls, "Nerdiness seemed to level most racial boundaries, and the friends I had crossed ethnic and national boundaries" (p. 219).

In the final part of the book, Conley builds on the social construction of race and class by examining the death of a friend, the incarceration of other friends, and his own role in setting an apartment fire. These examples and Conley’s focus on the educational system are effective, in part because they are so personal and in part because he examines the oft-ignored concept of Whiteness. His use of school as a backdrop through which to examine these social issues is also effective because he contradicts a popular argument that schools are places where equal opportunity exists, regardless of race or class.

Conley notes that even the fact that he wrote his memoir is indicative of race and class. "This is the privilege of the middle and upper classes in America, the right to make up the reasons things turn out the way they do, to construct our own narratives rather than having the media and society do it for us" (p. 119). Honky entertains and educates. It is a unique autobiography and a powerful text on the social construction of race and class, a powerful book for educators to learn from and to use to teach others.

Courage
edited by Barbara Darling-Smith.
Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2002. 168 pp. $20.00.

In Courage, Barbara Darling-Smith brings together various authors (primarily philosophers of religion, theology, literature, and political science) who contribute intriguing essays about their perspectives on courage. Darling-Smith begins this volume of philosophical essays by challenging readers to think of courage as more than a simple "dramatic quality exhibited only by infantry soldiers who plod stealthily through land-mine-laced jungles" (p. 1). She and ten other authors "bring their own wisdom to the discussion of courage" (p. 1) and urge readers to think of courage as something that can be, and often is, enacted by "ordinary" people daily. Although not explicitly addressed to educators, these essays about courage may inspire students, teachers, and others in educational institutions to take courageous action for needed reforms and/or social justice.

The book explores courage in three significant ways. The first part, "Courage in Philosophy and Literature," begins with an essay by William Desmond, a former professor of philosophy at the Institute of Philosophy, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. In "The Secret Sources of Strengthening: Philosophical Reflections on Courage," Desmond explores the relationships among courage and knowing, willing, the passion of being, and philosophers. He also examines four forms of courage: vital self-insistence, affirming life in the face of threat, affirming a way of life, and affirming beyond one’s life. Desmond asserts that "we do not call upon courage; rather, something is called forth from us in courage" (p. 11). In educational settings, this may occur when teachers inspire students to take courageous acts, such as speaking up about their personal beliefs regardless of whether their thoughts are counter to any prevailing views.

In the next essay, Leroy S. Rouner, a professor of philosophy at Boston University, discusses "Stoics, Christians, and the Courage to Be." Rouner considers the role of Christianity by including an analysis of Tillich’s definition of courage: "The courage to accept the fact that we are accepted, in spite of the fact that we know ourselves to be unacceptable" (p. 37). Rouner suggests that, although we all have many faults, people in our lives often accept us for who we are, and all of us long for love to end loneliness and reconnect with God. Rouner’s essay is followed by Remi Brague’s "Facing Reality." Brague considers courage a "transcendental virtue" (p. 43) and explores courage as dangerous and necessary in modern times. He reflects on how work by philosophers like Plato and Aristotle help clarify the meaning of courage, and ends urging people to have the courage to live in the frightening world. Thus, although some people might find places like schools intimidating, Brague implies that students and faculty should not allow fear to interfere with their teaching and learning.

Geoffrey Hill, a professor of literature and religion at Boston University, follows with an analysis of instances in which some of Shakespeare’s leading and supporting characters display acts of courage. The book’s first part concludes with an essay by Philip J. Ivanhoe, a scholar of Asian languages and cultures and of philosophy, entitled "The Virtue of Courage in the Menicus," in which Ivanhoe compares Menicus’ ideas about courage with Aristotle’s.

Section two begins with historian John M. Taylor’s essay, "Courage, Duty, and Robert E. Lee," taking a critical look at how Lee displayed signs of courage by making decisions that were not officially approved by his military superiors. Taylor claims, "Courage can be found in the service of unworthy as well as noble causes, [and] deserves its high place in the pantheon of virtues, but . . . is best employed in combination with judgment, compassion, and righteousness" (p. 93). He suggests that courage is something that often supersedes organized hierarchies. The next essay takes a provocative spin by suggesting that "Courage Is a Verb; Do It." In this brief piece, Daniel Berrigan, poet and priest, challenges readers to take actions that display courage. Lucius T. Outlaw Jr., a professor of philosophy, ends the second section with an essay analyzing race in the United States, focusing on the lives of the "American Negro," their past and present struggles and courageous acts for freedom. These three essays urge readers to act courageously for social change and justice, regardless of personal position or social location in life.

Part three, "Courage Every Day," offers of two powerful essays. In the first, "Courage: Heroes and Anti-Heroes," Robert Neville, a professor of philosophy, religion, and theology at Boston University, shares his thoughts about having the courage to dare, stick to it, face random harm, be alone, love, and the courage of self-identity. Katherine Platt, in "Guts Is a Habit," then offers a detailed description of courage as "an action, not an attribute" (p. 134). Platt suggests that all courageous actions are preceded by "preexisting mental and spiritual labors" that include what she refers to as the "building blocks of courage": inner honesty, consciousness of choice, vision of the courageous action, intention, and decision to act (p. 135). She concludes with thoughts about the pedagogy of courage, asserting that students are consistently "reframing [their] own experience[s] and internalizing the example of others . . . practicing. We can only hope that this practice becomes a habit" (p. 145). Both essays describe courageousness in introspection and how understanding oneself is necessary for other types of courage, such as the ability to love.

The ten essays in this volume explore the meaning of courage in authentic and provocative ways. Readers may gain useful insights and find helpful suggestions from the authors’ various perspectives about how to recognize, enact, practice, and/or maintain courage in their daily lives within and outside of educational institutions.

The Skin That We Speak: Thoughts on Language and Culture in the Classroom
edited by Lisa Delpit and Joanne Kilgour Dowdy.
New York: New Press, 2002. 384 pp. $24.95.

In The Skin That We Speak: Thoughts on Language and Culture in the Classroom, Lisa Delpit and Joanne Kilgour Dowdy have compiled essays from a diverse group of scholars and educators who share a common belief about the potentially harmful power of language and language attitudes on children in the classroom. The authors seek to "explore the links between language and identity, between language and political hierarchy, and between language and cultural conflict" (p. xiv). The book is divided into three sections and includes personal essays, linguistic analysis, case study, and policy analysis, many of which speak to the ongoing debates surrounding Ebonics and the education of African American students.

Part One, Language and Identity, includes personal essays that explore the struggles of two individuals with issues of identity connected to the languages they were raised to speak. In "Ovuh Dyuh," Dowdy describes growing up in Trinidad where she spoke British English to succeed in school and gain her mother’s approval, yet felt separated from her peers and her inner Trinidadian self. She writes about the tension among her multiple identities, which were tied up in these two dialects or linguistic codes, and how, through acting, she gives her Trinidadian self credibility and acceptance. Ernie Smith, in "Ebonics: A Case History," traces his own educational, linguistic, and professional history as he evolved from failing student and street hustler to community and civil rights activist.

The second part, Language in the Classroom, examines language attitudes in the classroom and addresses ways to constructively combat the negative consequences of such attitudes. In "No Kinda Sense," Lisa Delpit describes hearing her 11-year-old daughter Maya begin to speak African American English after transferring from a mostly White private school to a predominantly African American charter school. Through Maya’s experiences, she realizes that "acquiring an additional code comes from identifying with the people who speak it, from connecting the language form with all that is self-affirming and esteem building, inviting and fun" (p. 39). She realizes that her initial fears and shame about Maya’s new language are shared by many in the African American community, yet claims that in the context of the Ebonics debate, speaking out against the children’s home language is speaking out against that child’s home. "Since language is one of the most intimate expressions of identity, indeed, ‘the skin that we speak,’ then to reject a person’s language can only feel as if we are rejecting him" (p. 47).

In "Trilingualism," Judith Baker, a high school English teacher at a large vocational school in Boston, presents strategies she has employed to help her students understand and feel respect for their home language, while supporting their writing and speaking abilities in many ways. Michael Stubbs focuses on the relationship between language and perceptions of social class, level of education, and family background, noting that stereotypes and social meanings are often propagated through the schools themselves. In "Language, Culture and the Assessment of African American Children," psychologist and Africanist scholar Asa G. Hilliard picks up on this theme of how language attitudes disadvantage African Americans, saying we must "re-educate our nation to the truth about language" (p. 102), beginning with a new understanding of basic linguistic principles and of the history of American and African American English. The last two chapters in this section, by Gloria Ladson-Billings and Victoria Purcell-Gates, focus specifically on how teacher attitudes affect educational outcomes for linguistic minority children. Ladson-Billings writes about a six-year-old African American girl, Shannon, who risks being educationally shortchanged because her teacher allows her to refuse to do simple writing assignments, day after day. Purcell-Gates recounts the story of a how a White family from Appalachia is affected by negative teacher attitudes toward their nonstandard dialect of English.

Part Three, Teacher Knowledge, examines teachers’ language and their preparation to examine their own practices. Author and teacher Herbert Kohl exhorts teachers to study their language and "when you see trouble, attune your work and topsy-turvy your practice in the service of your students. If you see your students failing, re-attune your work" (p. 161). Geneva Smitherman addresses the Council of Teachers of English and the Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC) in her piece entitled "Toward a National Public Policy on Language." This chapter, originally written in 1988, follows up action taken after the CCCC’s 1974 language education policy entitled "The Student’s Right to Their Own Language" and the National Language Policy of 1988, also known as English Plus. Smitherman expresses dissatisfaction with the implementation and follow-up on these policies, writing that "all that is required for oppression to take hold is for good and well-meaning folk to do nothing" (p. 168). She calls for institutional collaboration on a broad scale to ensure that the linguistic rights of students are extended and protected.

Shuaib Meacham, in "The Clash of Common Sense," offers a case study of two African American college graduates enrolled in the professional school program to become certified teachers, raising questions about the effectiveness of programs that train teachers for culturally diverse classrooms. The final chapter, by Joan Wynne, underscores the harm that myths about language supremacy impose on both African American and mainstream children. As a White English teacher, Wynne recognizes the impact of attitudes of linguistic supremacy as she watches eight of her bright African American students refuse to ask questions at a press conference they were attending in order to receive an award for their high school newspaper. She raises a voice of warning for teacher-education programs that "give so little time, effort, and attention to teaching our pre-service teachers about the basic assumptions of the realities of language diversity" (p. 211). Wynne’s chapter echoes the book’s main theme: by failing to promote awareness and respect for the richness of the African American heritage and language we fail to provide a true understanding of the complexities of our American society. This linguistic racism fails to provide an education that allows our children to come to understand one another in our troubled democracy.

Tell Me More: Listening to Learners Explain
edited by Eleanor Duckworth.
New York: Teachers College Press, 2001. 202 pp. $19.95.

In Tell Me More: Listening to Learners Explain, six authors invite readers into the rich pedagogical, intellectual, and emotional intricacies of teaching and learning. Based on Eleanor Duckworth’s educational and philosophical strategies, the teacher-authors emphasize paying close attention to the learner as he or she explores the challenging questions that arise from his or her own interests. It is a book about the passion for teaching, the politics of education, the psychology of learning, and the pure joy of uncovering a question and finding an answer.

Unlike other education articles that depend heavily on analysis, these chapters focus on the step-by-step experiences of teaching and learning. The authors give specific accounts of the symbiotic relationship between having an idea and moving that idea forward with more questions and exploration. This up-close focus allows the reader to clearly see the pedagogy in action by hearing the educators question what materials to provide at what moment, how those materials might lead to challenging questions, and how to verbally back away from the learners’ intellectual engagement and pursuit so that the development of an idea becomes his or her own. The authors also reveal the difficulty in this pedagogy, since the movement between question and response is like a dance of uncertainty. Duckworth writes in the first chapter, "Inventing Density," that "to make a connection with [the students’] thoughts, I was groping as much as they were, and I moved toward the helpful questions stumbling as much as they did in moving toward the helpful ideas" (p. 23).

The authors convey this method of teaching as they retell the learning experience step-by-step, thus allowing the reader to hear the evolution of the learners’ thinking and see their understanding develop. In "Understanding the Presidency," Mary Kay Delaney says of her student, Mark,

As in each of the articles, this close focus on the learner’s new idea is essential to the teacher’s understanding of how the learners’ thoughts are progressing and how she can help facilitate their development.

Chapter one, "Inventing Density," describes a small group of teachers who devise their own experiments with the floating and sinking of various devices, including rubber bands, wood, Styrofoam, and other liquids. Duckworth explores the struggles and pleasures of the group’s discoveries and details how their relationship with both one another and the materials they choose to examine leads them to a new understanding of "density." In chapter two, Lisa Schneier, a high school English teacher, describes her work with a small group of low-track ninth-grade students on a single poem over the course of five weeks. She ignites excitement about the details of language, the rhythm of a stanza, and the beauty of high school students’ curiosity.

In chapters three and four, authors describe engagement with younger students. Hallie Cirino’s "Journal Journeys: An Exploration with Young Writers" describes three preschoolers in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and their experiences writing journals. Cirino’s narrative shows "that children can and will happily produce writing at a very young age when provided with both the opportunity and appropriate tools" (p. 90). In "Children Map Their Neighborhoods," nine-year-old Inés illustrates her own maps to express her ideas regarding the geography of her neighborhood in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Ileana Quintero, the author-teacher, recognizes that Inés’ drawings are an integral part of the development of her understanding of geography, and that through her creation of maps "she was beginning to connect places independently of her body. She was facing San Cristóbal as she drew" (p. 114).

In chapter five, "Understanding the Presidency," Mary Delaney describes how two of her high school seniors developed a photo file to explore their questions about democracy, the presidency, and their own participation in and around both of these issues. As a teacher, Delaney struggles with how to share her own political views without silencing the students’ voices. In "Newborn Developments," physician-teacher Isabella Knox describes how she supports the learning of a medical student in the neonatal care unit of the hospital. Through observations and the physical relationship with a newborn, the medical student, Aral, comes to a deeper understanding of life outside of the mother’s womb. Namane Magau’s chapter, "Looking at Learning to Understand Teaching: A South African Case Study," documents her experience with a group of teachers in South Africa who not only deepen their understanding of math and science, but also have the opportunity to engage others in teaching and learning while closely observing how they come to understand similar topics.

In each chapter, teacher-student relationships are formed with a small group of learners. In this intimate environment, the educator can closely follow and support the learners’ ideas. A reader might question the practicality of this type of learning and teaching in larger classrooms and whether it is appropriate, given the national pressure on testing and high standards in the United States. In the final chapter, "A Schoolteacher’s View," Schneier addresses such issues with a keen awareness of current politics. She notes that in her experience large groups, a reality of today’s schools, can also create this kind of deep, personalized learning through the teacher’s and the group’s careful listening and questioning skills. Schneier also argues that students can get to "the right answer" by deeply exploring the subject’s many layers. Instead of paraphrasing the answers for given assessments, students are able to question "the very nature of the structures of knowledge" (p. 191). "If we listen," Schneier says, "they will hear their own answers" (p. xiii).

The passion of these educators evidences a strong conviction for this teaching methodology. As Duckworth writes, "If there is any basic principle in my teaching, it’s that people are to feel free to express their thoughts about what is going on and why, and that those thoughts are to be taken seriously" (p. 19). For teachers who want to listen carefully to learners, this book is a wonderful resource and exploration.

Methods of Literacy Research: The Methodology Chapters from the Handbook of Reading Research (Vol. 3)
edited by Michael L. Kamil, Peter B. Mosenthal, P. David Pearson, and Rebecca Barr.
Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2002. 164 pp. $16.50.

Since the 1984 publication of the first volume of the Handbook of Reading Research (HRR), the series has been seen as a researcher’s guide to the field of literacy studies. While the second volume contained no chapters on the subject of methodology in literacy studies, Methods of Literacy Research: The Methodology Chapters from the Handbook of Reading Research, Volume 3, contains ten such chapters. This renewed focus on the role of methodology signals two important shifts in researchers’ attitudes. First, methodology has become a central issue for literacy researchers. Many of the authors link methodological concerns with practical issues, indicating that research design has an impact on the classroom as well as the academy. Second, researchers have become more interested in expanding their methodological options, increasingly appropriating theoretical frames and methods from other fields.

In their preface to volume three of HRR, the editors encourage methodological exploration, drawing on historian Daniel Boorstin’s notion of a "verge" as a zone of exploration between the familiar and the unknown. They state that "the fortified borderlands and imperial reigns of reading research of old have given way to border crossings and new participants in the reading research of new" (p. viii). One goal of this collection is to delineate verges in the field and to encourage researchers to investigate those spaces.

A helpful way to categorize the chapters is by considering whether they are predominantly methodological or theoretical in their approach to research. Some of the more methodological chapters discuss established methods in the field of reading research. For example, Therese Pigott and Rebecca Barr consider various methods of conducting literacy program evaluation. They argue that "we need both carefully designed studies and collaborative participation from all of those who care about research, policy and practice" (p. 30). Pigott and Barr also claim that the "intervention and evaluation should both be grounded in theory" (p. 30). Susan Florio-Ruane and Mary McVee discuss the importance of ethnography to literacy research. They note that when the first volume of HRR included a chapter on ethnography, it had already attracted the interest of literacy researchers who saw it as a powerful tool to explore theories that literacy involves social practices and occurs in community contexts.

Florio-Ruane and McVee’s examination of ethnographic methods includes a brief history of the anthropological roots of ethnography and its appropriation by educational researchers. The authors also rely on Kathryn Au’s work and her reflections to discuss three recent developments in educational ethnography: the applied value of ethnographic research, literacy studies through the lens of social history theory, and the importance of postmodern theory, particularly feminism, to educational ethnography. Yet it may have been impractical to present an inclusive description of how ethnography is employed in educational research since, as the authors note, ethnographers have not agreed on a single understanding of the method.

Narrative research is one area in which Boorstin’s notion of the verge is particularly appropriate. In a chapter drawing heavily on qualitative work done outside of literacy research, Donna Alvermann makes a strong claim for scholars to take advantage of the multitude of narrative methods, including "autobiography, autoethnographies, biography, personal narratives, life histories, oral histories, memoirs, and literary journalism" (p. 47), all of which share the primacy of story. Alvermann discusses three areas of concern in narrative research: the problems of subjectivity, truth, and representation. Without opting for easy answers, Alvermann considers how these challenges to narrative research have been discussed by influential scholars including Elliot Eisner, Clifford Geertz, and Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot.

Additional chapters that focus on methodological perspectives include Peter Afflerbach’s discussion of the history and utility of verbal reports and protocol analysis, and Timothy Shanahan’s review of research synthesis. Afflerbach notes that much of the research on protocol analysis has focused on the cognitive dimensions of reading, using readers’ descriptions of their methods and strategies to develop our understanding of the cognitive tasks. Afflerbach suggests that future researchers may use verbal reports and protocol analyses to explore the social context of reading, such as the role of motivation and affect. Shanahan’s chapter introduces research synthesis, including a historical perspective and a detailed description of how scholars conduct these studies, which will interest many who have debated the methods and conclusions of the recent reports on reading by the National Reading Panel and the National Research Council.

The editors also include a chapter by E. Jennifer Monaghan and Douglas Hartman that describes the methods of historical research, or historiography, which they describe as the "self-conscious practice of thinking about the development of historical scholarship" (p. 34). This chapter both provides an introduction to historical analysis and encourages scholars to adopt this rarely used methodology. Monaghan and Hartman claim that understanding "a particular reading method . . . requires more than simply knowing about it: It must also be located in the milieu of its times" (p. 33).

Two chapters in this collection center on theoretical approaches to literacy research. Marjorie Siegel and Susana Laura Fernandez present a concise account of the origins of critical theory while they simultaneously acknowledge that "there is no single ‘critical approach’" (p. 67). They note that even though critical perspectives have a long history in the social sciences, they are relatively new to literacy studies, perhaps because the field has been preoccupied with teaching methods. They urge researchers to consider literacy from a critical perspective, which they see as "more urgent than ever as new literacies, along with new modes of exploitation, multiply in our increasingly globalized and digitalized world" (p. 73). In the other chapter, James Paul Gee provides an overview of the work done in discourse and sociocultural studies, synthesizing research in a way that will be informative to students, yet offers minimal new insight.

Perhaps the most interesting chapter addresses a growing segment of literacy studies: teacher research. James F. Baumann and Ann M. Duffy-Hester report on a qualitative study designed to uncover "the nature of methodologies teacher researchers have employed" (p. 3) in literacy studies. Their results reveal considerable variation in how this work is conducted. For example, while many teachers researching in their own classrooms avoid using statistical methods, some do incorporate them. Baumann and Duffy-Hester stress that teachers’ perspectives differ from those of most qualitative researchers in the classroom because "teacher researchers are first and foremost teachers, who are responsible for the learning and well-being of the students assigned to them" (p. 18). Unlike other chapters that draw on the experience and accumulated knowledge of scholars, Baumman and Duffy-Hester make their claims based on evidence, which gives readers insight into the strength of their argument.

Although the contents of this volume have already appeared in HRR, the value of the book lies in having multiple perspectives on literacy research bound together in way that invites readers to consider the range of methodologies adopted by researchers. An obvious audience for this collection will be students and professors of research courses. These authors also provide insight into the past and future of literacy studies, which researchers and practitioners in the field will value. Even with ten chapters on methodological approaches, the editors note that this volume does not provide an exhaustive overview of methods. As literacy research expands its techniques and researchers explore new methodological options, we can expect exciting new developments that enrich our theoretical and practical understanding of literacy development.

How the Way We Talk Can Change the Way We Work: Seven Languages for Transformation
by Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey.
San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2001. 241 pp. $24.95.

"We are deeply grateful to the thousands of people who have participated in the learning sessions that have led to this book." So begins the telling acknowledgment of a publication written by two influential researchers, educators, and consultants in the field of adult transformational learning. After many years of working with individuals and organizations worldwide to promote long-lasting change, Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey now bring these learning sessions to the reader in a volume intended to support personal and professional development.

How the Way We Talk Can Change the Way We Work is an interactive learning experience that takes the reader through a series of exercises that the authors call "technologies." These technologies, which are grounded in the readers’ own experiences, elucidate how the "forms of speaking we have available to us regulate the forms of thinking, feeling, and meaning-making to which we have access, which in turn constrain how we see the world and act in it" (p. 7). To counter those constraints, Kegan and Lahey introduce seven new languages and demonstrate how those languages can be used to create more constructive experiences in the workplace.

The first part of the book examines how we subconsciously keep ourselves from reaching our personal and professional change goals. "If we want deeper understanding of the prospect of change," write Kegan and Lahey, "we must pay closer attention to our own powerful inclinations not to change" (p. 1). To uncover these subconscious constraints, Kegan and Lahey lead the reader through an activity that they call the "four-column exercise." In this exercise, the reader can practice the use of four new languages that provide "more focus, increase direction, and enhance capacity" (p. 7).

The first column of the exercise helps the reader move from the language of "complaint" to the language of "commitment," since Kegan and Lahey believe that "beneath the surface torrent of our complaining lies a hidden river of our caring, that which we most prize or to which we are most committed" (p. 20). In the second column, the reader is asked to list the behaviors that keep him or her from fulfilling the commitments listed in column one. In so doing, the reader moves from the language of "blame" to that of "personal responsibility." In the third column, the authors lead the reader from "New Year’s resolutions" that are typically developed to counter those behaviors to the language of "competing commitments" where the reader recognizes why these traditional resolutions tend to fail. In the last column, the reader uncovers the "big assumptions that hold us" and comes to understand "the assumptions that we hold." It is through this final move that our mental framework, which often dwells in our subconscious, is revealed to us in unexpected ways. Through the combination of these four columns, the reader comes to realize the significant ways that he or she prevents the success of his or her own desired change.

In this first part, Kegan and Lahey seem to combine Kegan’s theory of adult development with practice most directly. Language used in these first four chapters, specifically the use of the constructivist psychology term subject/object relation (p. 76), is more fully explored in the authors’ previous publications. Although the reader does not need to be familiar with these more abstract psychological terms or theory to engage in the work of this book, other works by Kegan and Lahey might help further realize the potential of the tools in this text.

In Part Two of this book, Kegan and Lahey advocate for subtle but powerful changes in the way that we communicate with each other in the workplace. in chapter five, for example, the authors explore the difference between the language of "Prizes and Praise" and that of "Ongoing Regard." Unlike the traditional system of rewarding individuals through prizes and praise, Kegan and Lahey suggest giving feedback to colleagues that is directive, specific, and non-attributive, since it is more sincere and personal. In chapter six, Kegan and Lahey compare the language of "rules and policies" to the language of "public agreement." In the former, the members of the organization see the regulations as intended to create order from the top down, whereas norms created through the language of "public agreement" develop competence from within (p. 118). In chapter seven, the authors advocate for the language of "deconstructive criticism" rather than "constructive criticism," since deconstructive criticism does not assume that the feedback provider holds all of the answers. In each of these subtle shifts, a powerful new way of interacting evolves that not only supports the organization’s growth, but also that of the individual.

Part Three of this book, Carrying on the Work, provides specific examples of the ways others have used the seven languages to "build and maintain the machine." By reading the stories of real-life characters such as "Emily" and "Peter," readers can explore practical ways to move reflective work out of the pages and into real life.

Since it is clear that the transformation suggested in this book is rich and complicated work, Kegan and Lahey have given careful consideration to the reader’s learning process. With humorous anecdotes and an accessible writing style, the book draws the reader into its pages. Once there, the participant feels as if he or she is part of a private tutorial with clear instructions for the technologies, coupled with helpful examples of the seven languages for transformation. Although this book is written for adults in the workplace, it is useful for readers in other domains of their life. Continuing the practice of reflection will also be of invaluable help as individuals’ contexts change, assumptions build, and minds are challenged to grow.

Nigger: The Strange Career of a Troublesome Word
by Randall Kennedy.
New York: Pantheon Books, 2002. 226 pp. $22.00.

In his provocative book Nigger: The Strange Career of a Troublesome Word, Randall Kennedy explores various meanings of this contentious and ambiguous word. Kennedy claims that the term "nigger is fascinating precisely because it has been put to a variety of uses and can radiate a wide array of meanings" (p. 34). He notes that words like honky, kike, wetback, and gook do not seem to capture the same attention or create the uneasiness that nigger does. Kennedy, a Harvard Law School professor, delves into the history of the word nigger as well as the countless ways and contexts in which the term is now being used by Americans of different ethnic and racial backgrounds.

Kennedy approaches the analysis of this highly controversial word in four detailed chapters. He begins chapter one, "The Protean N-Word," by retracing the origin of nigger, the various ways Americans tend to use the word and why it "generate[s] such powerful reactions" (p. 3). Nigger, Kennedy asserts, is derived from the Latin word niger for the color black, and has become part of the vocabulary of all types of people, including those Kennedy describes as "whites high and low" (p. 8). For example, Kennedy cites Supreme Court Justice James Clark McReynolds’ reference to Howard University as the "nigger university" and President Harry S. Truman’s reference to Congressman Adam Clayton Powell as "that damned nigger preacher" (p. 11). In this same chapter, Kennedy includes personal accounts of prominent Black Americans, such as Paul Robeson, Malcolm X, Michael Jordan, and Tiger Woods, who have been targets of this epithet. Interestingly, Kennedy points out that many Black Americans have actually embraced the word nigger and shifted its meaning to a more positive connotation that they use among themselves. For example, Kennedy documents Black American rap artist Ice Cube as saying, "When we call each other ‘nigger’ it means no harm. . . . But if a white person uses it, it’s something different, it’s a racist word" (p. 52). In contrast, Kennedy cites University of Pennsylvania professor Michael Eric Dyson, a Black American, who believes that "there is nothing necessarily wrong with a white person saying, ‘nigger,’ just as there is nothing necessarily wrong with a black person saying it. What should matter is the context in which the word is spoken — the speaker’s aims, effects, alternatives" (pp. 51–52).

Kennedy also draws on a powerful comment made by journalist Jarvis Deberry, which describes the word nigger as "beautiful in its multiplicity of functions . . . capable of expressing so many contradictory emotions" (p. 37). To illustrate some of these "multiple functions," Kennedy cites sociologist John Hartigan’s research, which describes how nigger can refer to anyone of any color or shade. For example, Hartigan’s research documents how poor Whites in Detroit refer to their White neighbors as niggers, and in some cases as wiggers, which signifies a White nigger.

Having set a broad context for interpreting the word, Kennedy devotes the second chapter, "Nigger in Court," to discussing how the use of nigger has been debated over many years in court cases in the United States. He divides "Nigger in Court" into four sections that underscore Kennedy’s assertion that the use of nigger is extremely complicated, and that court decisions dealing with this term reflect this complexity, as they are usually decided on contextual factors that differ from case to case.

Also in chapter two, Kennedy includes the various definitions of nigger in Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary and acknowledges that some Black Americans are not pleased with the way the term is defined. However, Kennedy is adamant that decisions "whether to note or how to define a deeply controversial word is an inescapably ‘political’ act, and claims to the contrary are either naïve or disingenuous" (p. 136). Kennedy also incorporates the ideas of eradicationists (i.e., people who believe that any use of nigger is always inappropriate). Because he primarily sets out to describe various meanings of the term, such a view from eradicationists appears valid at best, but somewhat limited and uninformed for Kennedy’s taste.

In chapter three, "Pitfalls in Fighting Nigger: Perils of Deception, Censoriousness, and Excessive Anger," Kennedy looks at how the word nigger has received much publicity when used in the media or in contexts other than the courts. To illustrate this point, Kennedy explores some White Americans’ artistic use of nigger as well as Black Americans’ perceptions about the word and White Americans’ use of it. For instance, he mentions filmmaker’s Spike Lee’s belief that African American filmmakers have more of a right to use nigger than do White Americans. This chapter also addresses some people’s concerns with Mark Twain’s use of nigger in Huckleberry Finn. Kennedy claims that although Twain was once "inculcated with white-supremacist beliefs and sentiments," he eventually "underwent a dramatic metamorphosis" that radically changed his beliefs (p. 139). This change in Twain’s perspective is actually reflected in Huckleberry Finn, which depicts the ignorance of White Americans who use the term.

Kennedy ends his third chapter with a proclamation that current Black comedians are liberally and appropriately "eschew[ing] boring conventions . . . that nigger can mean only one thing" (p. 171). Kennedy’s briefest and final chapter, "How Are We Doing with Nigger?" suggests that "public opinion has effectively stigmatized nigger-as-insult," regardless of the context in which people use the term, and predicts that "as nigger is more widely disseminated and its complexity is more widely appreciated, censuring its use — even its use as an insult — will become more difficult" (p. 175).

With so many accounts of the use of nigger in various contexts, Kennedy appropriately concludes that "for bad and for good, nigger is . . . destined to remain with us for many years to come — a reminder of the ironies and dilemma, the tragedies and glories, of the American experience" (p. 176). Kennedy’s provocative piece is a powerful illustration of how one term can have an array of meanings for those who use it, for those who interpret it, and in the specific situations in which the word is spoken and heard, written and read.

Gifted Bilingual Students: A Paradox?
by Esther Kogan.
New York: Peter Lang, 2001. 154 pp. $24.95 .

In Gifted Bilingual Students: A Paradox? Esther Kogan investigates the often-overlooked area of gifted education for bilingual students. She deconstructs the seeming paradox of gifted bilingual students on behalf of educators, parents, students, and readers who believe that giftedness "can be found in all ethnic, cultural, and linguistic groups and that socioeconomic stereotypes, ethnic prejudice, political climate, societal attitudes, and language can influence the identification and nurturance of this ability" (p. 19). Combining theoretical discussions with case studies, Kogan contributes to the larger conversation on education for minority students by closely examining how giftedness can be assessed and developed among bilingual Hispanic children, who have historically been underrepresented in programs for the gifted student.

The book has four parts. Part One provides a historic overview of bilingual education in the United States. Part Two includes four chapters that review gifted bilingual education in the United States, including and addressing issues surrounding assessment, inclusion, and parental involvement in such programs. Part Three portrays the educational experiences of three gifted Hispanic children New York City. Part Four offers a concluding chapter that integrates and discusses the case studies and implications of this book.

In chapter one we learn that bilingual education, which grew out of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, began as a compensatory approach to the education of second-language learners, particularly the growing economically disadvantaged Hispanic population. Disparate educational attainment among bilingual Latino children has raised questions about the effectiveness, advantages, and disadvantages of the different pedagogical approaches included under the umbrella of bilingual education, including transitional, maintenance, and two-way immersion programs. However, Kogan points out that "the fates of immigrant children divide along lines of economic opportunity, social adjustment, educational aspirations, and bilingualism as an intellectual and cultural resource" (p. 15). She asserts that educational policy requires a system that provides both excellence and equity in education.

In Part Two, Kogan describes gifted bilingual education in the United States. Kogan asserts that definitions of giftedness must be constructed within the context of the cultural, linguistic, and social characteristics of a population to provide greater opportunities for identifying and including larger numbers of bilingual children in gifted programs. She examines how to identify gifted children among bilingual populations, suggesting that varying levels of English proficiency and cultural and linguistic differences among bilingual students often confound educators’ judgments about actual ability. She states, "Identification must be then based upon superior potential instead of superior performance" (p. 24). Kogan cautions against the use of IQ tests with bilingual populations, unless they are used to include rather than exclude bilingual students from gifted programs. However, Progressive Matrices and the Woodcock-Johnson Psychoeducational Battery do not guarantee more valid test results, especially if such tests use original U.S. norms for determining scaled scores and equivalents.

Kogan asserts that "the goal is to have a variety of measures that complement each other in order to find diverse indicators of potential that a single measure cannot reflect" (p. 37). She recommends a nontraditional identification process utilized by Project Synergy, a federally funded project that includes "observations, group enrichment activities, draw-a-person activities, teacher nominations, information from parents, standardized tests, literature-based activities, and a child interview" (p. 38).

In chapter four, Kogan addresses the complexity of providing for the specific educational needs of gifted bilingual children, stressing that any curriculum should be based on individual assessments of students in the program. She provides information such as school district, types of curriculum implemented, and the ethnic and language groups served, about several programs for gifted bilingual students in New York City. She ends by stating that the key to training in-service teachers for bilingual programs "should be to sensitize teachers not only to the characteristics of culturally and linguistically different learners but also, and perhaps more importantly, to the rights of these students to be what they are — gifted and different" (p. 55).

Chapter five addresses what Kogan considers the crucial involvement of Hispanic parents in the education of their gifted children. She notes that although low- and high-income parents show similar levels of concern for their children’s education, low-income parents often resist becoming involved or doubt their abilities to help their children. As many gifted bilingual children come from recent immigrant households or those with lower socioeconomic status, parents may be unaware of how the school system works and of how to become involved in special programs for their gifted children. Educators must work with parents to help them build partnerships.

Part Three applies the theoretical perspectives and practical advice from the previous chapters to portraits of three gifted, bilingual Hispanic children in New York City: Oscar, Gaby, and Tina. Each child was identified by Project Synergy and placed in a special educational program. Kogan used different data sources, including student, teacher, and parent interviews, for what she calls "retrospective case studies" (p. 63). Observations were collected and grade transcripts were reviewed for supplemental information about each child. The detailed educational histories provide readers with an intimate understanding of some of the challenges these three gifted bilingual children face and some of the strategies that they employed to secure an education that provided for their unique needs.

In the final chapter, Kogan draws on the case studies to highlight the multifaceted and heterogeneous conceptions of giftedness and the value of identifying talent potential in children. She addresses the similarities and the differences between each of the three children’s educational paths, highlighting such issues as identifying giftedness and the role of parental involvement. Although Kogan does not want us to generalize from these portraits to the general Hispanic population, she does want us to pay attention to some particular lessons. She refocuses attention on the role of bilingual education in promoting bilingualism and maintaining cultural pride. She also describes how gifted children are identified within the Hispanic community, advocating for early identification in order to meet these students’ needs. Finally, Kogan returns to the myth of the gifted bilingual paradox. She states that gifted bilingual children are "an integral part of the educational system requiring attention to be appropriately identified and nurtured so that their talent potential can be fully realized" (p. 135). Her hope is that language diversity and bilingualism can be recognized as a resource, and that gifted bilingual students may receive the educational opportunities they deserve.

Teaching Problems and the Problems of Teaching
by Magdalene Lampert.
New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2001. 496 pp. $35.00.

A cacophony continues about standards and accountability in states and districts, but the conversation about teaching practice continues to be muffled. Magdalene Lampert’s Teaching Problems and the Problems of Teaching brings a welcome perspective to the discourse. As an elementary school mathematics teacher and an educational researcher, she is uniquely positioned to describe her everyday work in the "teaching of problems" and the "problems of teaching" that she encounters in this work. Lampert provides a valuable study of the teaching practice of using complex mathematical problems to generate conceptual understanding in her fifth-grade mathematics class. The book benefits from Lampert’s professional hybridization; she brings obvious skill as both a teacher and researcher to this study. Her book offers a close examination of one teacher, herself, with one group of students studying one subject, math, over the course of one academic year, providing an understanding of the implications of teaching with problems.

Lampert observes that coordinating the teacher’s actions with the students’ actions is the "essence of [teaching] practice" (p. 7). However, she points out that the implications of teaching with problems for this "coordination" are rarely documented. Lampert undertakes this documentation beautifully, demonstrating how incredibly complicated teaching is through vivid, detailed accounts of lessons, complete with transcripts of teacher-student interactions, figures used during the lessons, a replica of the blackboard during various stages of the lesson, and excerpts from her own teaching journal. Those familiar with Lampert’s writing have come to expect her to take on such questions as, "How do teachers manage to teach?" In her introduction, Lampert explains that she wrote the book to "inform debates about [reform] issues with a more adequate understanding of the problems in practice that teachers need to manage in order to teach productively" (p. 8). Her book provides one of the most comprehensive and thoughtful descriptions of teachers’ work in the field.

Lampert begins with the question, "Understanding Teaching: Why Is It So Hard?" (p. 1), and sets out to understand the problems that an individual teacher must address and to document the ways a teacher manages to teach, given the complicated nature of the enterprise. She explains that in order to study teaching in a way that acknowledges this complexity, researchers need an approach that captures several levels of this practice, such as teaching a lesson, a unit of study, and teaching individual students or groups. Next, she describes what it means to teach with problems. She concludes,

In chapter two, Lampert briefly describes her school, classroom, students, and partnership with her co-teacher before introducing the cornerstone of her practice, the "Problem of the Day," which catalyzes each day’s mathematical lesson. This chapter provides a case study of one lesson and introduces the reader to the book’s format; Lampert uses at least one "problem of the day" to illustrate her points so that the structure of the book replicates the structure of her teaching. Lampert introduces the problem. Students work individually, then discuss. To help readers understand her pedagogy, Lampert "zooms in" by featuring students’ responses to her questions during discussion. She then analyzes the challenge she has undertaken: to find a representation of the "multiple levels of teaching action as they occur in different social relationships over time to accomplish multiple goals simultaneously" (pp. 27–28).

In the third chapter, Lampert explains "why [she] wrote this book and how" (p. 28). She definitively states, "Without a professional discourse about classroom practice, education is in a weak position to improve itself" (p. 30). She provides a model of teaching practice, and elaborates upon the model by describing teaching in terms of "time . . . relationships with social groups . . . connections in content . . . [and] overlapping complexities" (pp. 37-38). She continues by explaining her methodology and data collection strategies. Researchers will find this section quite interesting; classroom teachers will envy the resources and possibilities for copious documentation of practice and student learning.

Each of the remaining chapters addresses a specific issue of practice. The topics are well known, but it is fascinating how Lampert delves into each one. For example, she begins the chapter about teaching to cover the curriculum by outlining her district’s curricular expectations and the textbook she is given. She provides her curriculum topics chart, a list of curriculum topics ordered by a "range of student activity," and an annual calendar of topics. Then Lampert "uses a wide-angle lens" (p. 220) to give readers some theory about mathematical learning; for example, she describes the "theory of conceptual fields" (p. 221), which holds that students must see relationships among concepts and topics in several types of problems. In addition, Lampert offers specific excerpts from a lesson, explaining why she has designed the problem in this manner. She then refers to her teaching journal and includes the transcript of her lesson with diagrams from the blackboard with accompanying teacher and student text from the lesson. At the end, she offers her "map of the mathematical terrain" (p. 256) for this unit on time-speed-distance, an analysis of the curricular topics addressed, and students’ mathematical modeling.

The most interesting aspect of this chapter is Lampert’s discussion of the "invisible work" in covering the curriculum: the deliberate, careful work of making connections among the topics that arise within the teaching of problems (p. 259). Lampert says that because teaching with problems is not a linear, topic-by-topic approach, visitors might miss altogether her construction of lessons that allow students to examine "different, but related" topics (p. 260). She emphasizes that her teaching occurs in several "nested time frames" (p. 263); it is the strength of the book that Lampert provides the reader with data, reflections, and student experiences across those days, weeks, and months.

The final chapter presents an "elaborated model of teaching practice" (pp. 423–448). Lampert builds on the familiar triangle model of teaching practice — the relationships between the teacher, the student, and the content — to address the problems of teaching a whole class over an extended time; the importance of social relationships and their influence of the "social complexities" (p. 426) on practice; and the ways in which time or "temporal complexities" (p. 427) develop and provide a historical context and continuity of events within which a teacher teaches. Lampert’s model portrays teaching practice as an action of "zooming in and out temporally and socially" (p. 430). Lampert illuminates the ways in which teaching mathematics with problems is complicated by the way that classrooms are organized, including the fact that the triangle-model only includes one student and one teacher (p. 424). She also contends that this model assumes classroom interactions are static, rather than social relationships that have a history and a future (p. 425). Next, she includes the influences of the nature of the subject matter on teaching (p. 434). Lampert concludes with a hopeful observation:

In documenting the teaching of problems and the problems of teaching, Lampert has catapulted the professional discourse of teaching into a place where teaching is described across dimensions of time and relationships, from the minute detail of a teacher-to-student exchange, to the teacher’s personal reflections, to the complexities of whole-class teaching, to the challenges of teaching content across these dimensions. Researchers will marvel at the studious ethnography that has yielded so much detailed data about the events of her classroom. Practitioners will appreciate how this book has captured the teacher’s infinite, split-second decisions and the richness of the exchanges between teacher and students and among students. Parents will wish every teacher had the inclination, time, and resources to document student learning with such precision. All will enjoy looking into a teacher’s mind when she is preparing, teaching, and reflecting upon her practice, and the rare delight of "listening in" as students puzzle over mathematical problems and engage in the very hard work of learning.

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Winter 2003 Issue

Article Abstracts:

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Racializing the Discourse of Adult Education

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