Grounded in Rosenblatt's transactional theory and Pacific literary theory, this qualitative case study looked at Chamorros teachers' responses to contemporary fiction books as a way of exploring cultural authenticity within a recently emerging genre of children's books. Nine teachers read and responded to eight books that presented a variety of character types, settings, and social issues related to the island of Guam. Guided by three research questions, this study explored what artifacts, images or depictions reflected the lived experiences of the contemporary Chamorro people. Data (transcripts of interviews, literature discussions and participant-generated artifacts) was collected from teachers in a professional development course on children's literature and from individual meetings. Using inductive analysis, the teachers' responses were examined for recurring themes, concepts and words that focused on their personal connections with the books, their cultural understandings, and their perceptions of the portrayal of the Chamorro culture. The teachers' connections drew attention to the ways in which they attempted to use their knowledge about the Chamorro culture to make sense of the stories they read. The teachers' responses to the stories demonstrated that they were making connections to those representations that emphasized and honored their Pacific identity, such as the extended family and how certain traditional practices symbolize the resiliency of the Chamorro people. They also demonstrated how rich cultural images served as prisms that revealed layers of cultural understandings. Finally, the teachers' responses revealed that their decisions regarding the authenticity of a book were mediated by their personal senses of culture as well as by a communal ideology. Not only does this study highlight culturally appropriate representations of the Chamorro people, it also sheds light on the relationship between cultural elements in a story and a culture's value system, and how these two influence the meaning that a reader finds within the story. By highlighting how readers home in on the subtleties of cultural depictions, this study demonstrates how the issue of cultural authenticity can best be understood as a complex matrix of cultural images, a community's value system and personal experiences.

The purpose of this research was to understand the relationship between urban elementary teachers’ beliefs about diversity and their selection of literacy material for instructional practices in their classrooms. Currently, the teacher population is essentially homogenous, consisting of a majority of middle-class White females, while the student population is growing more diverse. Teachers’ instructional decisions tend to reflect their own cultural background and not the cultural background of the diverse student population. This study examined urban teachers’ personal and professional beliefs about diversity and found that gender was a factor in the teachers’ diversity scores. The review of children’s literature listed by the teachers further revealed that there was a lack of representation of characters of color in the teachers’ classrooms. Finally, teachers that scored high on the diversity scale had more multicultural literature available in their classrooms.

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This multiple case study explores the ways in which Latina/a immigrant children make sense of immigration by reading critical multicultural texts and blogging. As U.S. immigration policy shifts have created more punitive policies for immigrant adults, these changes place both documented and undocumented children in difficult situations. With many children born in the U.S. as citizens, these families are identified as "mixed-status" families because of the rights and privileges that immigrant children and parents are afforded or denied (Capps & Fortuny, 2006). What appears to be missing from the research around immigration status and children of immigrants is how literacy, in particular digital literacy or blogging can play a role in the understanding of immigration. Studies have illustrated that critical literacy discussions often help facilitate Latina/a immigrant youth's understandings of the multiple communities and larger social spaces and their identities. Moreover, blogging also gives students an opportunity to express themselves in a way which will make them feel comfortable, which is not always possible in a classroom setting (Bloch, 2011, p. 159). The questions guiding this study are: How does reading critical multicultural texts around immigration issues and discussions in computer-mediated discourse communities help children make meaning of a larger social issue like immigration? and (2) How do children use computer mediated discussions to deepen their understandings of literature? Three lines of inquiry guided the research: social constructivist learning theories (Gee, 2004; Lave & Wenger, 1991; Vygotsky, 1978), critical literacy theory (Lewison, Flint, & Van Sluys, 2002: Luke, 2012; Luke & Freebody, 2012), and transactional theory (Rosenblatt, 1978, 2005; Smagorinsky, 2001). Participants in the study were third grade Latina/a students. Data sources included students' blog posts, audio recordings of classroom discussions, student writing samples, field notes, and interviews. Constant comparative approach (Glaser & Strauss, 1965) was used to analyze the data. Findings demonstrate that discussions and blogging afforded students a space to deconstruct the complexities surrounding immigration and immigration policies. Students' gained a greater sense of agency when disrupting the status quo and taking action on such issues. The broader implications from this study highlight the need to use varied modalities and formats when working with culturally diverse students and critical multicultural texts.