Children Authoring Literacy and Community
A Discourse of Belonging in Elementary Classrooms
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 10721963 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Erica Holyoke (0000-0002-7974-4939, School of Education and Human Development University of Colorado Denver Denver Colorado USA, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Volume | 61 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Publication date | 2026-04-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Reading Research Quarterly (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0034-0553 • E-ISSN: 1936-2722 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1002/rrq.70101 |
| OpenAlex | W7138280858 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 47 |
This qualitative study investigates how young children use language and literacy to co‐author belonging in early elementary classrooms that draw on foundations of restorative justice. Grounded in sociocultural and critical perspectives that position literacy as a relational social practice, the study conceptualizes belonging as a literate process through which children make meaning, connect with others, and participate equitably in classroom life. Using sustained classroom observation, video‐based interaction analysis, and discourse analysis across three classrooms (Kindergarten–Grade 3), the analysis traces how children's talk, writing, and collaborative storying enacted what is theorized as a Discourse of Belonging. Through three analytic strands, (a) storying selves and others into belonging, (b) embodied and empathic listening, and (c) co‐authoring shared literate worlds, the findings illustrate how children used literate actions to negotiate inclusion and agency. These everyday literacy events reveal belonging as an affective stance and a collectively authored literacy practice that enables children to imagine and sustain community. The study contributes to literacy research by demonstrating how discursive and multimodal forms of authorship support equitable participation and a sense of belonging in early learning spaces. Implications emphasize designing early literacy environments that foreground dialogue, empathy, and shared authorship as central dimensions of reading, writing, and learning together
Critical literacy · Discourse analysis · Embodied cognition · Emergent literacy · Inclusion (mineral) · Literacy · Negotiation · Qualitative research · Sociocultural evolution · Literacy, Media, and Education · Multilingual Education and Policy · Reading and Literacy Development
Social Linguistics and Literacies
What Schools Need to Know About Fostering School Belonging
Can restorative practices in schools make a difference?
Troublemakers
Discourses in Place
Balancing the debate
Reorienting curriculum materials as agents of restorative justice in early literacy classrooms
A Transformative Justice Approach to Literacy Education
Forum
Interviews and Focus Groups With Children
Toward a humanizing pedagogy
Student belonging
Storytelling Dramas as a Community Building Activity in an Early Childhood Classroom
The Significance of Critical Theory for Restorative Justice in Education
Resisting punitive school discipline
Belonging and Not Belonging
Whose ‘voice’ is it anyway? The paradoxes of the participatory narrative
Disrupting Racism and Whiteness in Researching a Science of Reading
Sedimented identities in texts
Pointing With a Pen
Restorative Justice, Civic Education, and Transformative Possibilities
From the Achievement Gap to the Education Debt
Limits of the Local
This isn't my real writing
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |