Summer Institute Co-Director Brandie Trent, an English teacher at Fleming County High School, recently published an article in the July 2012 issue of English Journal, a publication of the National Council of Teachers of English. The article, “Everything . . . Affects Everything”: Promoting Critical Perspectives toward Bullying with Thirteen Reasons Why,” was researched and written with Dr. James Chisholm, formerly of Morehead State University and now at the University of Louisville.
The article describes the lessons that Trent’s students learned about bullying through young adult literature, specifically Thirteen Reasons Why, and literature circles.
Trent and Chisholm will also present the results of this project at the NCTE 2012 Annual Convention in the session “From Text to World: Using Young Adult Literature to Promote Critical Perspectives toward Bullying” as part of a panel “Critically Thinking: Using Young Adult Literature and Wikipedia to Encourage Critical Stances.”
Trent has also been asked to lead a session focused on digital literacy at NCTE. Trent regularly leads professional development sessions featuring digital storytelling for the Morehead Writing Project and has also presented on this topic for the Kentucky Council of Teachers of English and the Kentucky Society for Technology in Education.
Trent and Chisholm also collaborated on a project studying the issues of place and identity through students’ digital stories which they presented at the 2012 NCTE Applied Research Conference and will share again at the 2012 Kentucky Writing Project State Conference.