ABSTRACT
The middle-grade years, which frame a context for language arts learning for young adolescents, have garnered substantial attention both historically and in recent years. During the period between elementary and high school, readers and writers encounter increasing demands presented by disciplinary literacy. They begin to participate in diverse discourse communities in and out of schools and use multiple literacies for social and political purposes. Middle-grade students’ engagement in school-based literacy is mediated in part by their ability to connect themselves, their lives, and their cultures to the literature and the experiences they encounter in language arts classrooms (NCTE, 2007).
