Reading in the teacher education classroom: The affective reader and the effective teacher

In an increasingly diverse and complex global society, the education system has a responsibility to foster and develop members of society who are compassionate and have a broad understanding of varied human experiences. Cognitive criticism and neuroscience research provide evidence that deep, nuanced reading of literary texts can be transformative. Prerequisite to this transformation to be enacted in school classrooms, are the literary experiences of pre-service teachers. Thus, this chapter outlines detailed readings of selected texts on a developmental continuum from early picture books through to sophisticated and ambiguous young adult fiction, as models for such literary encounters in initial teacher education courses