Chapter 4: Literacy Places: Preservice Teachers’ Exploration of Place-Based Theory to Read Picturebooks

Literacy, as it exists in today’s 21st century landscape, encompasses a great deal more than an isolated skill set on the pathway towards reading and writing (Harste, 2003; Street, 1984; The New London Group, 1996). Literacy today is viewed as a social act, necessitating classroom opportunities for engaging in social practices (Harste, 2003; Street, 1984). Scribner (1984) asserts that “recognition of the multiple meanings and varieties of literacy argues for a diversity of educational approaches, informal and community-based as well as formal and school-based” (p. 81). As such, diversity in instructional approaches requires change in the current methods through which educators approach literacy within elementary classrooms (Harste, 2003).