Text I

                       Critical Literacy and Foreign Language Education

      Understanding the basic principles of Critical Literacy is vital for establishing a viable relationship between EFL teaching and the general (critical) education of the individual. Critical literacy supporters conceive literacy in broader socio‐cultural and political terms. Critical literacy is mainly derived from post‐structuralism, critical social theory and critical pedagogy. From post‐structuralism, critical literacy has borrowed its methods of critique and the understanding of texts as ideological constructions embedded within discursive systems. Based on critical social theory, critical literacy sees texts as continually subjected to methods of social critique. Finally, because of the influence of critical pedagogy, critical literacy practices need to draw on social justice, freedom, and equity as central concerns. As I am discussing critical literacy and language education in Brazilian contexts, I will highlight the contributions of Paulo Freire's Critical Pedagogy. Freire's contributions to the conceptualization of critical literacy are fundamental, as critical literacy essentially determines a different attitude towards reading. Reading the word is not enough. As stated in Freire's work, reading the word and reading the world should be intrinsically related, as any text is embedded in comprehensive contexts of social, historical, and power relations that generate it. Moreover, the critical reading of the word within the world, and vice‐versa, is a tool for social transformation. Consequently, critical pedagogies to literacy centralize issues of social justice and emancipation. How does critical pedagogy enlighten the roles to be played by EFL teaching in the education, for example, about race relations?  

      A major concern of Freire's critical pedagogy as well as for other educators committed to critical forms of education is the development of "critical consciousness." Through critical consciousness, students should come to recognize and feel disposed to remake their own identities and sociopolitical realities through their own meaning‐making processes and through their actions in the world. Ultimately, critical literacy is an instrument of power and provides a possibility of transforming the society if the empowered individual wants to.

      Considering the status of English as a lingua franca, materials, especially those de‐signed by publishers in the US and UK, are used for organizing lessons around topics that can be included in classroom activities without causing discomfort, so that the same textbook series can be sold to different parts of the world. Some publishers even have lists of banned topics or rely informally on the acronym PARSNIP (politics, alcohol, religion, sex, narcotics, isms, and pork) as a rule of thumb.

      The convention of avoidance, then, is related to problems that tend to be purposefully neglected and are those that customarily are the most meaningful issues in real world students' lives. The avoided topics are also close to the ones suggested by OCEM as topics that should be present in Brazilian schools to promote critical literacy. Teachers of English, as well as any other teacher, face, in their daily teaching, educational challenges that go beyond the imagined protected spaces of schools and the imagined worlds portrayed in textbooks. What seems to be relevant in students' lives are not necessarily common topics included in EFL textbooks, such as ‘Mr. Smith's weekend' or ‘global warming', although these can be considered valid topics to be discussed in classrooms.

      Considering all these challenges, it is necessary to define the role of teacher education in this process. Teachers should be seen as transformative agents and their education should be focused upon this perspective. This encompasses the traditional contents of sociology of education, psychology of education, educational legislation and other subjects. But, the specific weight on ELT needs to entail criticism of current practices and suggestions for creating new ones.  

(JORGE, M. Critical literacy, foreign language teaching and the education about race relations in Brazil. In: The Latin Americanist, vol. 56, 4, December 2012, pp.  79‐90. Available in: https://www.academia.edu . Accessed on September 24th, 2014.)

Text I

                       Critical Literacy and Foreign Language Education

      Understanding the basic principles of Critical Literacy is vital for establishing a viable relationship between EFL teaching and the general (critical) education of the individual. Critical literacy supporters conceive literacy in broader socio‐cultural and political terms. Critical literacy is mainly derived from post‐structuralism, critical social theory and critical pedagogy. From post‐structuralism, critical literacy has borrowed its methods of critique and the understanding of texts as ideological constructions embedded within discursive systems. Based on critical social theory, critical literacy sees texts as continually subjected to methods of social critique. Finally, because of the influence of critical pedagogy, critical literacy practices need to draw on social justice, freedom, and equity as central concerns. As I am discussing critical literacy and language education in Brazilian contexts, I will highlight the contributions of Paulo Freire's Critical Pedagogy. Freire's contributions to the conceptualization of critical literacy are fundamental, as critical literacy essentially determines a different attitude towards reading. Reading the word is not enough. As stated in Freire's work, reading the word and reading the world should be intrinsically related, as any text is embedded in comprehensive contexts of social, historical, and power relations that generate it. Moreover, the critical reading of the word within the world, and vice‐versa, is a tool for social transformation. Consequently, critical pedagogies to literacy centralize issues of social justice and emancipation. How does critical pedagogy enlighten the roles to be played by EFL teaching in the education, for example, about race relations?  

      A major concern of Freire's critical pedagogy as well as for other educators committed to critical forms of education is the development of "critical consciousness." Through critical consciousness, students should come to recognize and feel disposed to remake their own identities and sociopolitical realities through their own meaning‐making processes and through their actions in the world. Ultimately, critical literacy is an instrument of power and provides a possibility of transforming the society if the empowered individual wants to.

      Considering the status of English as a lingua franca, materials, especially those de‐signed by publishers in the US and UK, are used for organizing lessons around topics that can be included in classroom activities without causing discomfort, so that the same textbook series can be sold to different parts of the world. Some publishers even have lists of banned topics or rely informally on the acronym PARSNIP (politics, alcohol, religion, sex, narcotics, isms, and pork) as a rule of thumb.

      The convention of avoidance, then, is related to problems that tend to be purposefully neglected and are those that customarily are the most meaningful issues in real world students' lives. The avoided topics are also close to the ones suggested by OCEM as topics that should be present in Brazilian schools to promote critical literacy. Teachers of English, as well as any other teacher, face, in their daily teaching, educational challenges that go beyond the imagined protected spaces of schools and the imagined worlds portrayed in textbooks. What seems to be relevant in students' lives are not necessarily common topics included in EFL textbooks, such as ‘Mr. Smith's weekend' or ‘global warming', although these can be considered valid topics to be discussed in classrooms.

      Considering all these challenges, it is necessary to define the role of teacher education in this process. Teachers should be seen as transformative agents and their education should be focused upon this perspective. This encompasses the traditional contents of sociology of education, psychology of education, educational legislation and other subjects. But, the specific weight on ELT needs to entail criticism of current practices and suggestions for creating new ones.  

(JORGE, M. Critical literacy, foreign language teaching and the education about race relations in Brazil. In: The Latin Americanist, vol. 56, 4, December 2012, pp.  79‐90. Available in: https://www.academia.edu . Accessed on September 24th, 2014.)

One day I was showing the beginning saxophone students at Ridgecrest Junior High school in Paragould, Ark the proper way to assemble and hold their instruments. It s extremely important to connect the neck strap to the loop on the back of the instrument so it doesn't fali out of your hands at a careless moment, I explained. “ Mr. Reely”, a dull student sitting in the back of the room quipped, “ Are you teaching us how to practice safe sax? “

                                                Contributed by Trey Reely Adapted from Readehs Digest, March 1997

A recent study, performed with children aged 2 months to 10 years, produced clinicai evidence delineating the stages a child goes through in developing a self-image. It involved exposing the child to his reflection in both a true mirror and then one that was convexly distorted. Children from 9 to 10 months old were highly responsive to both the true and the distorted mirror images. Their excitement, attention, and activity seemed to be unaffected by the distortion, indicating they had no self-image. Slightly older children, aged 10 to 11 months, made rhythmic circular movements when exposed to their distorted image as though attempting to correct the distortion. This change in response indicates the child may have some idea of his image and perhaps recognizes the distorted image is wrong. Amarked change in response changes when a child reaches 18 to 22 months of age. The child avoids both images, having begun to develop a self-image which does not match the mirror image. From 2 to 5 years, the child has developed a definite self-image which is recognizable in the mirror, since the child literally flees the distorted image. Children ages 7 to 10 had reached a levei of cognitive development which allowed them to laugh at the distorted images, play with the mirror and observe the changes they could effect.

                                                                                                                       Crescer magazine 1992

A recent study, performed with children aged 2 months to 10 years, produced clinicai evidence delineating the stages a child goes through in developing a self-image. It involved exposing the child to his reflection in both a true mirror and then one that was convexly distorted. Children from 9 to 10 months old were highly responsive to both the true and the distorted mirror images. Their excitement, attention, and activity seemed to be unaffected by the distortion, indicating they had no self-image. Slightly older children, aged 10 to 11 months, made rhythmic circular movements when exposed to their distorted image as though attempting to correct the distortion. This change in response indicates the child may have some idea of his image and perhaps recognizes the distorted image is wrong. Amarked change in response changes when a child reaches 18 to 22 months of age. The child avoids both images, having begun to develop a self-image which does not match the mirror image. From 2 to 5 years, the child has developed a definite self-image which is recognizable in the mirror, since the child literally flees the distorted image. Children ages 7 to 10 had reached a levei of cognitive development which allowed them to laugh at the distorted images, play with the mirror and observe the changes they could effect.

                                                                                                                       Crescer magazine 1992

A recent study, performed with children aged 2 months to 10 years, produced clinicai evidence delineating the stages a child goes through in developing a self-image. It involved exposing the child to his reflection in both a true mirror and then one that was convexly distorted. Children from 9 to 10 months old were highly responsive to both the true and the distorted mirror images. Their excitement, attention, and activity seemed to be unaffected by the distortion, indicating they had no self-image. Slightly older children, aged 10 to 11 months, made rhythmic circular movements when exposed to their distorted image as though attempting to correct the distortion. This change in response indicates the child may have some idea of his image and perhaps recognizes the distorted image is wrong. Amarked change in response changes when a child reaches 18 to 22 months of age. The child avoids both images, having begun to develop a self-image which does not match the mirror image. From 2 to 5 years, the child has developed a definite self-image which is recognizable in the mirror, since the child literally flees the distorted image. Children ages 7 to 10 had reached a levei of cognitive development which allowed them to laugh at the distorted images, play with the mirror and observe the changes they could effect.

                                                                                                                       Crescer magazine 1992

A recent study, performed with children aged 2 months to 10 years, produced clinicai evidence delineating the stages a child goes through in developing a self-image. It involved exposing the child to his reflection in both a true mirror and then one that was convexly distorted. Children from 9 to 10 months old were highly responsive to both the true and the distorted mirror images. Their excitement, attention, and activity seemed to be unaffected by the distortion, indicating they had no self-image. Slightly older children, aged 10 to 11 months, made rhythmic circular movements when exposed to their distorted image as though attempting to correct the distortion. This change in response indicates the child may have some idea of his image and perhaps recognizes the distorted image is wrong. Amarked change in response changes when a child reaches 18 to 22 months of age. The child avoids both images, having begun to develop a self-image which does not match the mirror image. From 2 to 5 years, the child has developed a definite self-image which is recognizable in the mirror, since the child literally flees the distorted image. Children ages 7 to 10 had reached a levei of cognitive development which allowed them to laugh at the distorted images, play with the mirror and observe the changes they could effect.

                                                                                                                       Crescer magazine 1992

Michael Joseph Jackson’s story was an American tale of celebrity and excess that took him from musical boy wonder to global pop superstar to sad figure haunted by lawsuits, paparazzi and failed plastic surgery.

At the height of his career, Mr. Jackson was indisputably the biggest star in the world; he sold more than 750 million albums. He spent a lifetime surprising people, in his last years mainly because of a surreal personal life, lurid legal scandals, serial plastic surgeries and erratic public behaviorthat turned him — on his very best days — into the butt of late-night talk-show jokes and tabloid headlines.

Mr. Jackson died atage 50 in Los Angeles on June25,2009. His death itself became an enormous spectacle. On television and on the Internet, tens of millions of people worldwide watched a memorial Service at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.

The cause of Mr. Jackson’s death was a mixture of the powerful anesthetic propofol and the anti-anxiety drug lorazepam, according to the Los Angeles County Coroner’s Office.

Two days after Mr. Jackson’s death his personal doctor, Conrad Murray, told detectives that he had been using propofol nearly daily for the last two months to help Mr. Jackson sleep. But he said that he had been trying to wean Mr. Jackson off the drug and had tried sedatives instead. Dr. Murray was charged with involuntary manslaughter for providing him with propofol.

                                                                                             Adapted from New York Times, Nov. 29, 2011

Michael Joseph Jackson’s story was an American tale of celebrity and excess that took him from musical boy wonder to global pop superstar to sad figure haunted by lawsuits, paparazzi and failed plastic surgery.

At the height of his career, Mr. Jackson was indisputably the biggest star in the world; he sold more than 750 million albums. He spent a lifetime surprising people, in his last years mainly because of a surreal personal life, lurid legal scandals, serial plastic surgeries and erratic public behaviorthat turned him — on his very best days — into the butt of late-night talk-show jokes and tabloid headlines.

Mr. Jackson died atage 50 in Los Angeles on June25,2009. His death itself became an enormous spectacle. On television and on the Internet, tens of millions of people worldwide watched a memorial Service at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.

The cause of Mr. Jackson’s death was a mixture of the powerful anesthetic propofol and the anti-anxiety drug lorazepam, according to the Los Angeles County Coroner’s Office.

Two days after Mr. Jackson’s death his personal doctor, Conrad Murray, told detectives that he had been using propofol nearly daily for the last two months to help Mr. Jackson sleep. But he said that he had been trying to wean Mr. Jackson off the drug and had tried sedatives instead. Dr. Murray was charged with involuntary manslaughter for providing him with propofol.

                                                                                             Adapted from New York Times, Nov. 29, 2011