Teaching Literature in Secondary Schools

Dr. BuchananENG 499Fall 2012

Teaching Literature What is literature? Why teach literature? Who we teach? How to teach literature?

Student centered Lead students through task-oriented interactions Engage students in challenging tasks Scaffold to support construction Move from “near to home” to “far from home” Individual, Small Group, Large Group

Instructional Sequence Before teaching: Set Goals Before reading: Frontload activities Beginning to read: Set purpose During reading: Guide students’ reading After reading: Reflect on experience Follow up: Extend understanding beyond

text

Three Phases of Teaching Literature

Enter (Frontload) Explore Expand

Enter Gateway Activities Freewriting Think-Pair-Share Interviews Minilectures Booktalks

Enter K-W-L Quick Writes Tea Party Opinionnaries Scenarios Role Play

Explore Reader Response Interpretive Community Formal analysis Critical Synthesis

Reader Response Personal Triggers Suppositional Readers Conceptual Readiness Synergistic Texts Associative Recollections Collaborative Authors Imagine This

Reader Response Character Continuum Character Maps Focal Judgments Opinion Survey Interrogative Reading Jump Starts Title Testing

Interpretive Community

Think Aloud Jump-In Reading Communal Judgment Defining Vignettes Readers’ Theater Assaying Characters Psychological Profiles Venn Diagramming

Formal Analysis Formal Discussion Questions Literary Rules of Notice Intertextuality Students Write Authors Speak Teachers Read

Critical Synthesis Moral/Philosophical Historical/Biographical Formalist/New Critical Rhetorical. Freudian Archetypical

Critical Sythesis Feminist Marxist Deconstructionist Reader Response New Historical Post-Colonial Criticism Queer Theory or Gender Theory

Classroom strategies to explore theory

Small Group Questions Jigsaw Groups Role Playing Counter Questions Battle of the Book Critiques

Discussion Questions Engage students in creating questions Connect book to lives Volunteer contribution Engage everyone

QARs (Question-Answer Relationships)

(Raphael, 1982) Text-Based Questions

Right There Questions Think and Search Questions (inference)

In My Head Questions Author and Me (not in the story, life

experience) On My Own (don’t need to read book)

Question Levels (Hillocks, 1980)

Level 1: Basic Stated Information Level 2: Key Details Level 3: Stated Relationships Level 4: Simple Implied Relationships Level 5: Complex Implied Relationships Level 6: Author’s Generalizations Level 7: Structural Generalizations

Questioning Circles

Rules for Questioning Consider purpose and choose questions

accordingly Involve as many students as possible Ask follow-up questions Allow for wait time Listen to all answers, not just the ones you

are expecting Teach students to ask their own questions

Teaching Discussion Silent Discussions Three Index-Card Discussion Listen and Follow Up Student Created Questions