Submission Guidelines

 

Talking Points, a peer-reviewed journal, is published in May and October by LLA, Literacies and Languages for All, a conference of NCTE. Talking Points helps promote literacy research and the use of whole language instruction in classrooms. It provides a forum for parents, classroom teachers, students, and researchers to reflect about literacy and learning. We invite submissions from professionals across the educational spectrum, including classroom teachers, teacher educators, researchers, and educational advocates/activists.

Manuscripts submitted should: (1) be on a topic or issue related to holistic teaching and learning; or (2) present theory and/or research that contributes to the knowledge base for holistic, democratic, and inclusive education. Manuscripts should:

• be no more than 15 pages in length (standard margins, double spaced);
• contain page numbers;
• follow the latest APA guidelines;
• be consistent with NCTE’s Statement on Gender and Language.

In addition, to ensure a blinded manuscript, do not include a cover sheet but instead provide author information in the Comments box in Editorial Manager during the manuscript submission process.

To submit a manuscript, register as an author at our online manuscript submission system, Editorial Manager, and then follow the steps to submit your article. Manuscripts are accepted at any time.

Questions? Contact editors Patricia C. Paugh and Sherry Sanden at talkingpoints@ncte.org.

October 2020
Miscue Analysis: Key to Understanding the Reading Process
Submission deadline: March 1, 2020

Talking Points seeks manuscripts on a range of whole language teaching and learning topics. For the October 2020 issue we particularly invite submissions detailing the use of miscue analysis to support the growth of 21st-century readers. As an approach with decades of evidence supporting its use, we aim to showcase the power of miscue analysis to build understanding of teaching, learning, and the reading process and to support teachers’ work with student readers. Some examples of manuscripts appropriate for this issue might include miscue research that supports our knowledge about how readers approach and work with text, accounts of preservice and inservice teachers’ understandings about miscue analysis, descriptions of teachers applying information acquired from miscue analysis to their work with readers, ways that educators negotiate discrepancies between miscue analysis and school-/district-/state-mandated assessment systems, and opportunities for miscue analysis to support the literacy growth of a diverse population of 21st-century learners. We encourage manuscripts that reclaim whole language beliefs and practices as powerful pedagogies that support children’s lifelong literacy understandings and perspectives.

May 2021
Children’s Literature That Anchors Meaningful and Critically Focused Literacy Practices
Submission deadline: October 1, 2020

Talking Points seeks manuscripts on a range of whole language teaching and learning topics.
For this issue, we invite submissions that explore the role of quality children’s literature in anchoring meaningful and critically focused literacy classrooms. Examples might be manuscripts that provide evidence of children’s literature as the basis for creating rich and welcoming learning spaces for the intersectionality of students’ identities; engage teachers in furthering a dialogic literacy environment where students learn to share and listen to others’ perspectives; utilize literature to encourage students to critically interact with dominant social messages encountered in their daily lives; address what “quality” means in children’s books; expand or disrupt the meaning of children’s literature outside of printed books; share classroom experiences of authors’ or illustrators’ visits; discuss how practitioners deal with censorship or pressures to avoid including children’s literature about controversial topics; provide guidance on developing classroom libraries that are inclusive; and explore classroom use of texts in multiple languages. We encourage manuscripts that demonstrate the role of children’s literature in reclaiming whole language beliefs and practices as powerful pedagogies that support children’s lifelong literacy understandings and perspectives.

Note: For this issue, we especially welcome brief reviews of children’s books for inclusion in the Classroom Voices section.

October 2021
General Theme Issue
Submission deadline: March 1, 2021

Talking Points seeks manuscripts on a range of whole language teaching and learning topics. For the October 2021 issue we invite submissions that include research and practice that reflect the goals and mission of the Literacies and Languages for All (LLA) conference. This is a general call for manuscripts on multiple relevant topics that are of interest to literacy and language researchers and practitioners who align themselves with the whole language belief systems of LLA.

Some examples of timely topics might include the following: inquiry exploring current discussions about early reading prevalent in the news and educational media; expanded literacy practices that invite multiliteracies to the learning of students in and out of school; incorporation of disciplinary literacy practices that both value students’ existing knowledge yet challenge them to expand their linguistic repertoires; youth using critical literacy practices as tools for civic engagement; equity in access to quality literature for children and youth; global engagements involving students across borders; solidarity around religion, LGBTQ, racial, and linguistic perspectives; or current experiences teaching youth and families undergoing refugee relocation.

Presenters in the LLA strand of the NCTE Annual Convention as well as in the Literacies for All Summer Institute are especially encouraged to develop their presentations into manuscripts.

Classroom Voices (ongoing feature)
Submission deadline: October 1 for the May issue; March 1 for the October issue

In each issue of Talking Points, the Classroom Voices section provides space for shorter alternative pieces that highlight the richness of whole language in the classroom. We invite classroom vignettes, photo essays, book reviews, samples of students’ work, teacher interviews, or anything else that helps us situate the principles of whole language in real classroom contexts. These pieces should be no longer than 1–2 double-spaced pages of text; accompanying photos should be submitted in a standard graphics format (tiff, jpeg, etc.) in high resolution (300 DPI) and will require signed permissions from the photographer and the subjects. Student work will also require permission to be included.

Note: For all pieces, please rely on the Whole Language Beliefs (http://www2.ncte.org/groups/wlu/beliefs/) to demonstrate how your work draws on and contributes to whole language principles and teaching practices.