Graduation Term

Spring 2026

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Department of English

Committee Chair

Danielle Lillge

Committee Member

Maggie Morris-Davis

Abstract

This teacher-research study, conducted during a nine-week choice reading unit in my high school English Language Arts (ELA) classroom, explores how adjusting my reading instruction influences all students’ engagement with reading and their identities as readers, especially those underserved by systems of schooling that prioritize teaching reading as a set, evaluated procedure. Building on others’ research that affirms the positive correlation between students’ choice in reading and increased engagement, I pursued the following research question: What does it mean to take up a teaching practice that opens, responds to, and extends students’ meaning-making of literary texts? I used qualitative methods to collect and analyze students’ written notes, transcripts from conference conversations with students about their reading, artifacts of my reading instruction, and field notes. Analysis revealed the importance of creating opportunities for students to notice, name, and explore patterns in their self-selected reading across time, which enabled students and me to trace, through writing and conference conversations, the evolution of their analytic thinking. Studying our conversations, I also identified spaces where I supported and, at times, constrained students’ ability to develop their textual analysis and readerly identities. These findings hold implications for honing my conferencing with students and maintaining an inquiry stance in my teaching of reading to support students’ textual analysis as well as for maintaining my participation in critical professional communities that support teacher-researchers’ use of inquiry to study and strengthen their practice in service of all learners.

Access Type

Thesis-Open Access

Download

Included in

Education Commons

Share

COinS