“Dear Sophia, I’m Going to Another World”: Transforming Literacy Practices in Early Childhood

Background

Diversity has become a focus of educational conversations, particularly when educational researchers consider the documented achievement gap in U.S. schools; white middle-class students continually outperform students of color and those from lower socio-economic levels (U.S. Department of Education, 2000). In an effort to close this gap, the U.S. Department of Education instituted the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB). Unfortunately, the current legislation actually “exacerbate[s] the existing achievement gap between black and Latino students and their white counterparts” (Paul, 2004, p. 648). For example, students from low-income families and students of color are increasingly more likely to attend schools with large class sizes, less experienced teachers, less money spent per pupil, and curricula developed around discrete knowledge bits rather than integrated critical-thinking activities (Kozol, 2005; Neuman, 2006; Paul, 2004).