Contacts
Departments
Wanda Brooks,
Assistant Professor of
Elementary Education & Reading
Curriculum, Instruction, Technology in Education
Ritter Hall 449
1301 Cecil B. Moore Avenue
Philadelphia, PA 19122-6091
phone: 215 204-3344
wbrooks@temple.edu
Education
2001 Ed.D. University of Pennsylvania in Reading, Writing, Literacy
1995 M.A. University of California at Berkeley in Language & Literacy
1991 B.S. Hampton University in Elementary-Middle School Education
Areas of Professional Interest
- African American Children’s and Young Adult Literature
- Middle School Readers & Reader Response
- Literacy Instruction & Culture
Recent Scholarship
Books
Brooks, W. & McNair, J. (2008). (Eds.) Embracing, Evaluating and Examining African American Children’s and Young Adult Literature. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press.
Journal Articles
Brooks, W. & McNair, J. (2009). “This story of mine is not unique:” A review of research on African Americans in children’s literature. Review of Educational Research, 79(1), 125-162.
Brooks, W. & Savage, L. (2009). Critiques and Controversies of Street Literature: A Formidable Genre. The ALAN Review, 37(3), 48-55.
Brooks, W. (2009). An author as a counter-storyteller: Applying Critical Race Theory to A Coretta Scott King Award Book. Children’s Literature in Education: An International Quarterly, 40(1), 33-43.
Brooks, W., Brown, S. & Hampton, G. (2008). “There ain’t no accounting for what folks see!” Considering colorism within a Sharon Flake narrative. Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 51(8), 660-669.
Hampton, G. & Brooks, W. (2007). Octavia Butler and Virginia Hamilton: Black women writers navigating the margins of otherness in the genre of science fiction. Children’s Literature Review, 127. {Reprint from the English Journal, 92(6), 70-65}.
Brooks, W. (2006). Reading representations of themselves: Urban youth use culture and African American textual features to develop literary understandings. Reading Research Quarterly, 41(4), 372-393.
Brooks, W. & Hampton, G. (2005). Safe discussions rather than first hand encounters: Adolescents examine racism through one historical fiction text. Children’s Literature in Education: An International Quarterly, 36(1), 83-98.
Brooks, W. (2003). Accentuating, preserving, and unpacking: Exploring interpretations of family relationships with African-American adolescents. Journal of Children’s Literature, 29(2), 78-84.
Hampton, G. & Brooks, W. (2003). Octavia Butler and Virginia Hamilton: Black women writers navigating the margins of otherness in the genre of science fiction. The English Journal, 92(6), 70-75.
Brooks, W. (2002). Virginia Hamilton’s The House of Dies Drear: A textual analysis of embedded African American literary features. The New Advocate Journal, 15(4), 283-291.
Chapters in Books
Brown, S. & Brooks, W. (2008). Historical fiction and “cultural evocations” in a community based literary club. In, Brooks, W. & McNair, J. (Eds.), Embracing, Evaluating and Examining African American Children’s and Young Adult Literature. (pp. 97-110). Lanham: Scarecrow Press.
Brooks, W. (2007). The literary voices of urban readers: Multi-factor influences on textual interpretations. In, Solomon, R. & Sekayi, D. (Eds.), Urban Teacher Education and Teaching: Possibilities and Hope in Canada, the United States and the Caribbean. (pp. 195-206). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Brooks, W. (2005). Reading linguistic features: Middle school students’ responses to the African American literary tradition. In Hammond, W., Hollins, E., Hoover, M., & McPhail, I. (Eds.), What we know: Teaching African American learners to read: Perspectives and practices (pp. 253-263). Newark, DE: International Reading Association.
Presentations
Brooks, W. (2008). Just Black Girls: Textual Images and Heterogeneity. Paper presented at the National Council of Teachers of English Conference, San Antonio, Texas.
Brooks, W. (2007). Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: Encountering Multiple Layers of Story Identification. Paper presented at the National Council of Teachers’ of English Conference, New York, New York.
Brooks, W. (2007). Analyzing Sharon Flake’s The Skin I’m In Through the Lens of Black Feminist Thought. Paper presented at the American Education Research Association Conference, Chicago, Illinois.
Brooks, W. (2006). Using Critical Race Theory to Examine Reader and Text-Based Constructions and Ideologies of Race and Racism. Paper presented at the National Reading Conference, Los Angeles, California.
Brooks, W. (2006). Reader Response Criticism, Comprehension Pedagogy and Culture: When, Whether and Why They Meet. Paper presented at the International Reading Association Conference, Chicago, Illinois.
Brooks, W. (2005). Beyond Authenticity: Readers and an Author from a Similar Culture Viewing the "Inside" Differently. Paper presented at the International Reading Association Conference, San Antonio, Texas.
Brooks, W. (2004). That’s a spirit not a ghost! Unexpected responses to an “authentic” cultural depiction embedded within a well-known novel. Paper presented at the National Reading Conference, San Antonio, Texas.
Brooks, W. (2004). Middle school students respond to the African American Vernacular English found in texts: Interpreting the language they speak. Paper presented at the International Reading Association Conference, Reno, Nevada.
Brooks, W. (2004). Reading, writing, and literacy within linguistically diverse contexts. Panel chairperson at the American Education Research Association Conference, San Diego, California.
Brooks, W. (2004). Texts thick with culture: How family themes, linguistic patterns and ethnic group
Practices mediate a reader’s understanding. Paper presented at the American Education Research Association Conference, San Diego, California.
Brooks, W. (2003). Cultivating meaningful transactions with culturally relevant literature for children. Paper presented at the National Reading Conference, Phoenix, Arizona.
Brooks, W. (2002). Valuing the words of ethnically diverse authors and children: Introducing a culturally grounded reader response model. Paper presented at the National Reading Conference, Orlando, Florida.