Literature Instruction : a Focus on Student Response
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DOCUMENT RES UM E ED 341 999 CS 213 178 AUTHOR Langer, Judith A., Ed. TITLE Literature Instruction: A Focus on Student Response. INSTITUTION National Council of Teachers of English, Urbana, SPONS AGENCY National Endowment for the Arts, Washington, D.C.; Office of Educational Research and Improvement (ED), Washington, DC. REPORT NO ISBN-0-8141-3318-5 PUB DATE 92 CONTRACT G008720278 NOTE 218p. AVAILABLE FROMNational Council of Teachers of English, 1111 Kenyon Rd., Urbana, IL 61801 (Stock No. 33185-0015; $10.95 members, $14.95 nonmembers). PUB TYPE Collected Works - General (020) -- Reports - Evaluative/Feasibility (142) EDRS PRICE mm1/Pco9 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS Elementary Secondary Education; English Curriculum; Higher Education; *Instructional Improvement; Literature Appreciation; *Reader Response; *Student Reaction; Teacher Student Relationship; Theory Practice Relationship IDENTIFIERS Aesthetic Reading; Center for the Learning and Teaching cf Literature; Educational Issues ABSTRACT Intended to provide an overview of current thinking on response-oriented literature i:Istruction and meant to stimulate dialogue leading to reform, this book reports research findings and ideas from teacher conferences of the Center for the Learning and Teaching of Literature at the State University of New York at Albany. The book contains the following articles: (1) "The Background for Reform" (Arthur N. Applebee);(2) "Testing Literature" (Alan C. Purves); (3) "Rethinking Literature Instruction" (Judith A. Langer); (4) "Five Kinds cf Literary Knowing" (Robert A. Probst);(5) "Challenging Questions in the Teaching of Literature" (Susan Hynds); (6) "Teaching Literature: From Clerk to Explorer" (Jayne DeLawter); (7) "Literary Reading and Classroom Constraints: Aligning Practice with Theory" (Patrick X. Dias); and (8) "To Teach (Literature)?" (Anthony Petrosky). (NKA) ******** ************************************ ********** M**************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. ************** ***** ** ********* ** ******** ******************************* U DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Ottwe 01 EducationalResearch and Improvement EDUCATIONAL RE SOURCES INFORMATION CE NTE R tERIct r This document nes beenretvoducod as received from the person or Organization or.g.nahng .1 r Minor changes have beenmade to improve reproduction Quality E'enntS Of we,* Or 00InIOnS Stated ,n thisOnicu mem do not necessarily represent official OERI POSition or policy a a Ii _A I 2 BEST COPY AVAILABLE Literature Instruction A Focus on Student Response Edited by Judith A. Langer State University of New York atAlbany National Council of Teachers of English 1111 Kenyon Road, Urbana, Illinois61801 NCTE Editorial Board: Richard Abrahamson, Celia Genishi, Joyce Kinkead, Louise W. Phelps, Gladys V. Veidemanis, Charles Suhor, chair, ex officio, Michael Spooner, ex officio Staff Editor: William Tucker Cover Design: Canton Bruett Interior Book Design: Tom Kovacs for TGK Design NCTE Stock Number 33185-3050 0 1992 by the National Council of Teachers of English. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. Every effort has been made to trace the copyright holders and to obtain all permissions. In the case of those copyright holders who could not be located or those, if any, who did not respond, the publishers will be pleased to make the necessary arrangements upon receiving notice. It is the policy of NCTE in its journals and other publications to provide a forum for the open discussion of ideas concerning the content and the teaching of English and the language arts. Publicity accorded to any particular point of view does not imply endorsement by the Executive Committee, the Board of Directors, or the membership at large, except in announcements of policy, where such endorsement is clearly specified. Preparation of these reports was supported in part by a grant number G008720278, which is cosponsored by the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Educational Research and Improvement (0ERVED), and by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA). However, the opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect the position or policy of OERI/ED or NEA, and no official endorsement of either agency should be inferred. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Literature instruction: a focus on student response / edited by Judith A. Langer. p. cm. Outgrowth of a variety of projects of the Center for the Learning and Teaching of Literature, State University of New York at Albany. ISBN 0-8141-3318-5 1. Litirature--Study and teachingUnited States. I.Langer, Judith A,II. State University of New York at Albany. Center for the Learning and Teaching of Literature LB1575.5.U5L58 1992 807dc20 91-38081 CIP Contents Introduction vii Judith A. Langer 1. The Background for Reform 1 Arthur N. Applebee 2. Testing Literature 10 Alan C. Purves 3. Rethinking Literature Instruction 35 Judith A. Langer 4. Five Kinds of Liteiary Knowing 54 Robert E. Probst 5. Challenging Questionsin the Teaching of Literature 78 Susan Ifynds 6. Teaching Literature: From Clerk toExplorer 101 Jayne DeLawter 7, Literary Reading and Classroom Constraints: Aligning Practice with Theory 131 Patrick X. Dias 8. To Teach (Literature)? 163 Anthony Petroskv Editor 207 Contributors 209 Introduction Judith A. Langer State University of New York at Albany This book is not only the outgrowth of a varietyof projects of the Center for the Learning and Teaching of Literature,but also an ongoing part of its continuing mission tostimulate national reform in the teaching of literature. Among the Center's majoremphases has been a revitalization andreconceptualization of the teaching of literature with a particular emphasis on the special kinds of creativeand critical thinking that separate literary experiences from others.Thus, the exploration of possibilities, the welcome of ambiguity,the tolerance for multiple interpretations, as well as the quest toseparate the indefensible from the theoretically sound have been atthe heart of our instructional concerns.This has placed students' growing ability to develop and ponder their ownand others' understandings at the center of instruction. Some of the chapters that follow are reports ofresearch carried out during the first three years of the Center's existence,from 1987 through 1990. Other chapters were prepared for a teacher'sconference the Center sponsored called "New Directions in theTeaching of Literature.- Still other chapters were commissioned to provideadditional issues for consideration. All have appeared as part of theCenter's Report Series, and have been read by a small hut loyalfollowing. This NCTE publication provides the first opportunity for theseideas to be presented as a related whole and toreach a wider readership. Together, the chapters provide an overview of thelatest thinking on response-oriented instruction,pointing to new and needed directions for instructional change. Chapters 1 and 2 providethe argument for change in literature education, and point toparticular concerns that need to be addressed. In the first chapter, ArthurApplebee discusses the findings from a series of surveys and classroomstudies of literature instruction across the United States, usingwhat he learned to raise a number of issues he feels must be addressed as startingpoints for any vii t; viii Judith A. Langer meaningful reform. In the next chapter, Alan Purves discusses his studies of formal and informal literature testing and descrfoesthe limitations he found in the conceptualization as well as presentation of present-day tests. He then suggests several dimensions that should be considered in the future. Both Applebee and Purves argue that instruction and assessment in literature continue to be based ontheories of criticism and of learning that are no longer current in their respective fields, and consequently call for a new theory of effective teaching and learning of literature to guide both day-to-day practice andlonger range curriculum planning. In chapter 3,Judith Langer discusses her two complementary strands of research that underlie astudent-re- sponse-based view of the learning and teaching of literature. First, she examines the nature of literary understanding and the ways it develops during reading and discussion, and contrasts it with meaning making when reading other types of materialfor other purposes. Then,she describes findings from a series of collaborative studies that explored the effective ways in which literature instruction could support students' literary understandingsupporting their ability to arrive at and go beyond their initial responses. Each of the remaining chapters suggests a particular approach to literature instruction from a student-response perspectiveone that supports students not oniy in coming to understand the textsthey are reading, but in learning to engage in the kinds of creative and ciitical thinking that underlie the literary experience, in chapter 4, Robert Probst, from a reader-response perspective, discusses ways in which literature instruction can reflect the literary experience as a coming together of reader and text,as a significant event in areader's intellectual and emotional life.1 k describes five kinds of reader- knowledge the teacher can tap in supporting such transactions. In chapter 5, Susan Hynds focuses on the use of questions, suggesting that by reflecting on the cognitive, social, and cultural dimensionsof the questions they ask, teachers can gain insight into the kindsof