SRU English professor and graduate co-author article

Feb. 23, 2021

Tim Oldakowski, a Slippery Rock University associate professor of English, co-authored an article with an SRU graduate that was published in the Winter/Spring 2021 issue of the Ohio Journal of English Language Arts. The article is based on research conducted at classes taught by co-author Samantha DeConciliis, who is an English teacher in the McGuffey School District. DeConciliis earned two degrees from SRU, a bachelor’s degree in English education in 2014 and a master’s degree in English in 2018. Oldakowski and DeConciliis’ article is titled “The ABC’s of Romeo and Juliet: A Multimodal Approach to Analyzing Shakespeare.” The co-authors used a multimodal approach to teaching William Shakespeare’s play, “Romeo and Juliet,” as students in DeConcilliis’ class were asked to draw images as a means for analyzing the play. As a result, students critically analyzed multiple literary devices, provided evidence-based justifications for their illustrations and provided commentary on their classmates’ work. The Ohio Journal of English Language Arts is the official journal of the Ohio Council of Teachers of English Language Arts and it is published twice per year and circulated to more than 2,000 language arts teachers of elementary, secondary and college students.