Contending with Gun Violence in the English Language Classroom

Shelly L. Shaffer is an assistant professor of Literacy at Eastern Washington University, USA. Gretchen Rumohr-Voskuil is an associate professor and chair of English at Aquinas College, USA. Steven T. Bickmore is an associate professor of English Education at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, USA.

i. Preface by Ashley S. Boyd

ii. Introduction by Steve Bickmore, Gretchen Rumohr-Voskuil, and Shelly Shaffer

iii. Section 1: Gun Violence in Schools: What Does History Tell Us?








Chapter 1. Exploring School Violence as a YA Author by Chris Crutcher



Chapter 2. History of Violence: Guns, U.S. Education, and American Exceptionalism by Paul Thomas



Chapter 3. Unreal: How the Rest of the World Views U.S. Gun Policy by David Belbin



Chapter 4. #NeverAgain: Considering the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Student Activists’ Media Representations through a Youth Lens by Chris Goering



iv. Section 2: Reading About School Violence: Books that Explore School Shootings and Their Aftermath








Chapter 5. What Do We Know? and What Can We Do?: Using Mercy Rule to Help Students Understand the Causes and Warning Signs of School Violence by Jim Blasingame



Chapter 6. Looking for Hope--and Helpers--in Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock by Gretchen Rumohr-Voskuil



Chapter 7. Adolescent Counter-Storytelling: Finding Youth Voice and Truth in That’s Not What Happened by Shelly Shaffer.



Chapter 8. Exploring the Blame Game Through the Lens of the Scout: Reading and Writing about Give a Boy a Gun by Melissa Williamson-Pulkkinen



v. Section 3: Recovering from Trauma, Finding Allies, and Taking Action Towards Social Justice








Chapter 9. Welcoming Ghosts into Our Classroom: Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds by Sarah Donovan



Chapter 10. This is not a Drill: Exploring the After-Effects of Traumatic Events with Are you still there? by Sarah Lynn Scheerger by Maria Hernandez Goff



Chapter 11. What He Knows and What He Will Say: Voicing for Justice in All American Boys by Jason Reynolds and Brendan Kiely by Alice Hays



Chapter 12. Making Good Trouble: John Lewis, Andrew Aydin, and Nate Powell’s March Trilogy and the Lessons of the Civil Rights Movement by Meghan Sweeney



vi. Section 4: Writing Beyond Fear by Addressing the Issues








Chapter 13. On Rhetorical Analysis, Teaching, and the American Culture of Guns by Jonathan Bush



Chapter 14. Writing through Pain: How Teachers can Support Writing as Therapy for Students Processing Trauma by Jason Griffith



Chapter 15. Writing in the Margins: Students’ Voices in the Aftermath of Trauma by Jim Fredricksen and Joe Dillon



vii. Section 5: Arming Teachers with Words, Stories, and Power








Chapter 16. When the Gun isn’t Metaphorical: Educating Teachers in the Age of School Shootings by Melanie Shoffner