Appleman, Chapter 10 (Kindle version has no page numbers)

"Every English teacher acts on the basis of theory. Unless teaching is a random series of lessons, drills, and readings, chosen willy-nilly, the English class is guided by theories of language, literature, and pedagogy. That is, insofar as teachers choose readings and plan instruction, they are implementing a theory."

After having to think so consciously about literary theory this semester in this course, I have realized how true this is. I see it in other teacher's instruction and in my own teaching and lesson planning. Mt CT thought that teaching a literary theory and a novel simultaneously would be too complicated, not so much for the students, but for me as novice. However, I did purposefully plan a unit in which they study a novel taking mostly a reader response approach. Recently, my CT pointed out many of the strategies of my approach and said she really liked and appreciated them; even though I'm not explicitly teaching students how to apply the theory, they are still studying the novel through the lens.

Appleman, Chapter 9 (Kindle version has no page numbers)

"Molly is impressed with these responses. She knows there is a tendency to underestimate 'average' students in 'regular' classrooms, and she laughs off the skepticism of those who doubt her students' ability to read insightfully and through multiple lenses."

I think most students have the ability to learn literary theory and apply it. The key consists of adapting, scaffolding and differentiating appropriately to the particular learners you have to teach. If students fail to apply literary theory then, most likely, the fault lies in the teacher. When my students are unable to complete an assignment appropriately, first I always ask myself what I should have done better. Students will not all be at the same intellectual level or even have certain skills developed , but that's why teachers need to differentiate and adapt their teaching to meet students halfway.

Appleman, Chapter 9 (Kindle version has no page numbers)

"Molly is impressed with these responses. She knows there is a tendency to underestimate 'average' students in 'regular' classrooms, and she laughs off the skepticism of those who doubt her students' ability to read insightfully and through multiple lenses."

I think most students have the ability to learn literary theory and apply it. The key consists of adapting, scaffolding and differentiating appropriately to the particular learners you have to teach. If students fail to apply literary theory then, most likely, the fault lies in the teacher. When my students are unable to complete an assignment appropriately, first I always ask myself what I should have done better. Students will not all be at the same intellectual level or even have certain skills developed , but that's why teachers need to differentiate and adapt their teaching to meet students halfway.

Appleman, Chapter 9 (Kindle version has no page numbers)

"'Being able to use these lensese and perspectives helps me be more open-minded about things. It helps me think about certain situations and events in more than one perspective. It allows me to learn more and thinkmore in depth about issues that I haven't before. It's like taking a look at a picture and noticing something different' […] The lenses offer a way of triangulating the subject so that students can address the issues without completely personalizing them."

I have tried talking to my students about the difference between racism and racial prejudice and explain racism as a system that works at an institutional level, that although it manifests itself through individuals, it is a bigger issue than that. I've tried explaining that fighting racism doesn't equate to fighting/hating white people. It can be quite difficult to have students think in those abstract terms, but I feel that maybe if we studied these issues through a critical lens it would be easier.

"Genre and Thinking in Academic Writing Tasks" by Sarah W. Beck and Jill V. Jeffery (page 11-12)

"[…] in order to master analytic forms of writing such as essays on document-based questions students must be able to deploy particular linguistic resources to signal an interpretive stance towards source texts […] In a discussion of students’ literary analysis essays, Schleppegrell (2004) pointed out the importance for student writers of acquiring what she terms 'means for impersonal construal of evaluative meaning,' which include 'nominalization' and 'relational processes that enable generalization and evaluation'. Paradoxically, although analytic exposition requires students to assume a subjective, evaluative stance toward the content they are writing about, it also requires them to articulate that stance in impersonal, objective terms."

I have seen students seem confused about this all the time. They wonder how they are supposed to give their opinion and defend a stance, while simultaneously being impersonal. It's not natural for them to associate argument (as in an argumentative essay) with objectivity and lack of attachment. They are not used to think in these terms in their daily lives, either. It can also be a cultural things because it has been proven that black Latino and other minority students think about ideas by relating to them and making them very personal, however, white students tend to be more used to think in an impersonal way about ideas. I still wonder about how to effectively teach students to think in this way.

"Teaching Disciplinary Literacy to Adolescents: Rethinking Content- Area Literacy" by Timothy Shanahan and Cynthia Shanahan (page 12)

"In summary, the disciplinary experts we studied approached reading in very different ways, consonant with the norms and expectations of their particular disciplines. We left this phase of the study convinced that the nature of the disciplines is something that must be communicated to adolescents, along with the ways in which experts approach the reading of text. Students’ text comprehension, we believe, benefits when students learn to approach different texts with different lenses."

We usually disregard how literature functions differently within specific disciplines and we expect students to naturally catch on to this. However, students would benefit from teachers being specific about how to approach texts that belong to different disciplines. Teacher may sometimes be apprehensive about teaching students how to do this because they feel like they should not be teaching literature and it is the ELA teacher's job to do this, but they fail to realize that it wouldn't distract from the course of study at all and would actually benefit students understanding and promote more effective engagement.

"Constructing Meaning When Reading Poetry: An Expert-Novice Study " by Joan Peskin (page 21)

"These 'expectations about poetry and ways of reading guide the interpretive process and impose severe limitations on the set of acceptable or plausible readings' (Culler, 1976, p. 27). Therefore, although the novices' knowledge of the canonical structure of poetry as discourse enabled them to vocally anticipate what they needed to do, their frustration reflected their sense of shortcoming."

This study is somewhat limited because it only studied periodical poetry, so it is only natural that students would need to have previous knowledge, especially historical knowledge, in order to make better interpretations. It indicates a level of awareness if students are able to realize that without specific, historical knowledge they are unable to make much progress is their interpretations or that it is cut short.

"Constructing Meaning When Reading Poetry: An Expert-Novice Study " by Joan Peskin (page 21) "These 'expectations about poetry and ways of reading guide the interpretive process and impose severe limitations on the set of acceptable or plausible readings' (Culler, 1976, p. 27). Therefore, although the novices' knowledge of the canonical structure of poetry as discourse enabled them to vocally anticipate what they needed to do, their frustration reflected their sense of shortcoming."

This study is somewhat limited because it only studied periodical poetry, so it is only natural that students would need to have previous knowledge, especially historical knowledge, in order to make better interpretations. It indicates a level of awareness if students are able to realize that without specific, historical knowledge they are unable to make much progress is their interpretations or that it is cut short. However, the fact that they did not annotate to help them make connections and do close readings also halted their interpretations.

"How Different Media Affect Adolescents' Views of the Hero: Lessons from Amistad" By Ellen S. Friedland, Stephen Phelps, & Pixita del Prado Hill (page 6)

"[…] the various sources of information were mutually reinforcing and accommodated a variety of learning preferences. For instance, Dominique reported, "I learned a lot from each [the film, the book, and the ship], ... But I think I learned the most from the movie. The movie went more in detail, and they showed every little part that happened. ... It's funny to say because most books are more detailed than movies." When asked what influenced her first choice of hero (Sengbe), she noted that all three media events affected her choice because, "In all they were the same, like, Sengbe was the main character, and it influenced me to put him as number one. ... They put him as a hero in all three."

Presenting the same content through different media or sources will definitely be more beneficial and effective in a classroom because it allows students to receive the information more than one time and in more than one way. So this will most likely reinforce knowledge and even skills because the type of analysis that students would need to develop for a piece of writing, is not the same as the one they would need for studying a painting or a song. Also, students strengths and weaknesses vary. Some students are better at understanding informational texts, while others are better with literature, and yet some other do better when listening to a lecture.

"How Different Media Affect Adolescents' Views of the Hero: Lessons from Amistad" By Ellen S. Friedland, Stephen Phelps, & Pixita del Prado Hill (page 3)

"Incorporating other forms of media along with print and firsthand experience into classroom instruction can also accommodate adolescents' multiple literacies and provide more students with more opportunities to learn. Furthermore, when exploring a topic through different media sources, students have a chance to construct their own perspectives by interpreting, evaluating, and comparing the reliability of information "

This reminds me of a lesson I taught before. I selected excerpts about Native Americans, the arrival of settlers to America and their first encounters from 4 different text books. Then I presented these texts to students, who had to identify the bias in each of the texts and describe how they presented information, what information was presented and what info was disregarded. Finally, they had a discussion about the information they had read, about how recounts of history are inescapably biased to some extent, and then arrived to their own conclusions about which text they believed to be the most reliable.

"Intertextual Connections during Discussions about Literature" by Susan Davis Lenski (page 4)

"According to Vygotsky (1978), learning results from the use of language and the social interactions of language. As students discuss texts, their individual meanings are shaped by the language of the discussion. Students use and hear language in discussions that influences their provisional interpretation of texts and adds to their evolving inner texts. As students attend to or ignore points raised by other discussion members, they decide whether to abandon, adapt, or confirm their initial thinking. This process further shapes students’ construction of meaning."

I see this happen in almost all of the class discussions that I've had when teaching, and I have personally experienced it when taking it classes. The students in my placement are all in different levels of skills and knowledge, so when we have class discussion they all feed from each other's contributions to the conversation. They usually clarify things from the text and add to each other's bank of knowledge, so my job is to simply guide them to deeper understandings and lead them to make significant connections and develop different skills.

Broz (p. 58-59)

"Often, uninitiated students’ attempts to write short, thesis/support, literary essays, at least early in the semester, tend toward summarizing the plot or commenting on many disparate aspects of the story in journal-like fashion. These essays are too general and lack the focus of an interpretive thesis. With graphic responses, however, I have found that students cannot easily be “too general.” Making a representational, symbolic, or abstract graphic response seems to inspire focusing on a specific interpretive concept that the reader has constructed in response to the text."

I've seen this happen in my placement. Recently, my students worked on a final project for a unit and I gave them many options, which included visual art expressions. Those who chose to write articles and essays had some of those same problems that Broz mentions: they had difficulty creating a unified , cohesive, single-focused piece and they tended to be all over the place. However, those who chose to create a visual art piece were ALL able to be more specific and focused on the main concept of the project: being unapologetic. Even when they wrote the accompanying metatext to explain the creative process of the visual piece, the texts reflected the same focus that the visual work had. It's so interesting, but I'm not sure why this happens, though. Maybe because we are used to seeing images as texts in our daily lives (even if unconsciously). I'm not sure.

Dallaqcua (p 367)

"As our class read print-based novels, we focused on literary devices like point of view, allusion, themes and morals, tone and mood, symbolism, and flashback and foreshadowing—concepts that were often difficult for me to teach and for my students to grasp. Prior visual knowledge from graphic novels, however, strengthened my lessons and advanced my students’ understanding. I concluded that educators would profit from looking at comics as transitional, conduit material"

I like the idea of using graphic novels as a way to transition into more "complex" texts. I think especially struggling readers could benefit from using graphic novels as a starting point. Almost like a scaffolded way of approaching literature. However, I've read graphic novels before and I think they could also be texts to be studied in their own right. It all depends on how they are approached, I guess. But there are graphic novels that are just as layered, ambiguous and complex as any other "traditional novel.

Vasudevan, (p. 6-7)

"We need to rethink language arts education by first recognizing technologies as composing spaces, while also acknowledging the com- plexity of navigating these spaces with youth who both know a great deal about 2.0 technolo- gies and have become familiar with the new lit- eracies that these technologies inspire. Such a posture invites recognition of the various authorial stances (Vasudevan, Schultz, & Bateman, in press) that children and youth assume in embodied and performative ways. Web 2.0 technologies can amplify educators' ability to build on what we know about the storied lives and playful tendencies of children's imaginations provided that we "recognize that children's identities - who they imagine themselves to be and who they imagine they could become - are inextricably bound with learning" (Stornaiuolo, Hull, & Nelson, 2009, p. 384). "

I completely agree with this statement. I think this generation of teachers in general is more open to using technologies in the classroom because we have grown up with it and are usually just as familiar with it as students. I have always seen technology merely as a tool; it is intrinsically neutral, therefore, the outcome of its utilization will be positive or negative depending on how it is utilized. However, technology has incredible potential for maximizing students' academic skills development. In this technological era, the end goal should not be to have students memorize massive amounts of information -something that in the past was understandably important-, it should be to have students become critical and creative thinkers, and technology can be a great aid in achieving this.

Abdul-Jabbar, page 224 "Edwards (2008) speaks of the appeal of postcolonial literature to our acute awareness as readers of the ‘continuing politics and violence of contemporary forms of imperialism, for example in Iraq and Afganistan’ (p. 1). He suggests that postcolonial literature addresses not only ‘the histories of violence and trauma … [but also] tell us about what is happening in our own lives, mapping out where we come from and where we are going’"

This is one of the most important things we can get students to do with the help of the post-colonial approach: having students realize the very real implications and long term effects of colonization, imperialism, and of the entitlement mentality of white and European society. I think it is important that they are aware of the role those things still play today, and referring to contemporary events and issues is a great way to do that. This will allow students to develop their critical thinking skills and become better informed and more conscious citizens. It can also be empowering for students of target and minority groups because it opens the path for them to unlearn many internalizations about their groups.

Appleman , Chapter 6, (Kindle version has no page numbers0

"In the colonial mindset, the colonized come into existence when they are "discovered" by the colonizers. This explains, for example, the colonialist claim that 'Columbus discovered America,' [...] Prior to this "discovery," it is as if Native Americans did not exist, or they existed in a state that had little meaning or significance for people from the "civilized" world."

I think the post-colonial approach is great not only for explaining this mentality as something that shaped history, but also a mentality that is still prevalent today. I think it can help students realize how those past events and ideologies have shaped the world they live in today and how that same mentality continues to exist at different levels. I think it would be an approach that would be very interesting and relatable to classrooms with a diverse students body. I think that it would be more challenging to teach in classrooms that are more homogenous and composed of students who belong to agent groups (white, upper-middle class, etc.) because they would offer resistance, but it would be very beneficial for them as well.

Appleman, chapter 6 (kindle version doesn't have page numbers):

"As school populations become more diverse, the task of helping students see themselves in the literature they read becomes more challenging for teachers. As more immigrants and refugees enter our classrooms, we must consider a broader range of literary texts in order that they may see themselves and their circumstances in the work they read. In addition, we need to consider the perspectives and identities of populations who historically have not seen themselves as part of the American mainstream. If we can successfully demonstrate for them that alternative ideologies belong within the American imagination, we will demonstrate as well the liberating power of literary interpretation."

It should definitely be a top priority for teachers to use a variety of texts that reflect the diversity of their classrooms and of today's American society because it empowers underrepresented groups while it simultaneously educates and brings awareness to agent groups. Students need to see that their cultures and groups are valued contributors of ideas and also help shape discourses. I personally think this is even more important than teaching them how great Shakespeare was and other idolized white men. And by that I don't mean we shouldn't study the "canonical" texts produced by these white men, but that they should be presented and studied differently. We need to explicitly point out what they are lacking, and because of which criteria they are valued so much, and WHO values them and develops this criteria. So it is an approach that avoids the internalization process that students (especially students who belong to target and minority groups) have always gone through in schools. It is an approach that empowers them.

Chappell, page 282

"[...] texts which do not conform strictly to known patterns and which contain significant gaps and open endings encourage active, creative and critical interpretation."

Well, that's a given. Literature, good literature, needs to be ambiguous. That's what makes literature so layered and complex. So inexhaustible.

Chappell, page 282

"This article [...] suggests that Rowling's writings may be preparing young readers to critically engage with power structures in their lives and become architects of their own agency."

I'm skeptical of how effective or significant this influence is on young readers because I remember reading Harry Potter as a pre teen and then as an adolescent and I read it for pure enjoyment, I was not able to see past that. I never realized "oh, this story is a metaphor for our actual societal structure and systems of oppression... Harry Potter's agency inspires me to do the same..."

Appleman, Ch 8 (Kindle version doesn't have page numbers)

"Adolescents are often, as psychologist William Perry (1970) points out, excessively dualistic in their thinking, which prevents them from being able to imagine, let alone sustain, multiplicity of thought. The dismantling of binaries, which is a requisite part of the deconstructive move, helps adolescents see the limits of binary thinking."

This is one of the best arguments the chapter makes about the usefulness of teaching adolescents the deconstructive approach. It seems like a valid point, yet I wonder if maybe it is more appropriate for older high schoolers who are probably more able of thinking outside of binaries.

Appleman, Ch 8 (Kindle version doesn't have page numbers)

"Perhaps deconstruction has fired fear in people because it is difficult to define, and what cannot be defined cannot pinned down and labeled; yet here lies the productive energy of deconstruction."

That the deconstruction approach can be difficult to explain and teach to high school students seems like a better reason to be hesitant about it to me, than because it allows students to question assigned meanings of canonical texts.

Appleman, Ch 8 (kindle version doesn't have page numbers)

"It challenges the very iconic nature of the high school curriculum and the fixed meanings that have been assigned to canonical texts, it is a lens that most secondary language arts teachers have avoided."

This actually sounds great! I would love for my students to think differently, question "assigned ...meanings" and redefine them. Schools should be about children learning how to think for themselves, not merely neutrally accepting ideas to then regurgitate.

Keely, page 7

"The unit also provides classes with the opportunity to address the idea of the 'happy ending' and the ways in which their definitions of such endings have been socially constructed by, among other cultural forces, the tales that they have just finished reading. Grimms' fairly tales and Sexton's poetic revisions of those tales can be powerful tools in the English teacher's project of helping students become 'readers' of 'the old, old stories' by which they are surrounded."

I really like anything that has to do with facilitating connections between content and students' realities. I think this allows for genuine learning and growth. It would also help them think critically about why they think the way they do, why stories are created, and how these stories reflect what humans are collectively.

Eckert, Chapter 2, pg 39

"It became immediately apparent that students were engaging with this novel wit an enthusiasm that surprised even them."

There's such a wide range of options of stories, novels, among others, to teach archetypal theory. The best way to proceed I think would to allow students to choose from a pre-selected listed.

Eckert, Chapter 2, pg 42

"Ask students to consider the ways in which archetypes are represented in video-game narratives...Using anthologies of world mythology and folktales, have students read and locate a myth, legend, or folktale from another country...Model and archetype reading of comic or anime books, or allow student's to work with this genre."

I really like these suggestions because students retain information the most when it is relatable to them in their everyday life or interests. And with the global myths suggestions they are abler to be exposed to a wider variety of literature.

Appleman, Chapter 7 (kindle version doesn't have page numbers) "When we view all of culture as a "text," we recognize that history and literature are products of a common impulse: a need to explain what is meaningful about nay society and its impact on our awareness of humans experiences. So, while historians and literary critics use different methods for exploring human experience, in a sense they use the same text: the cultures out of which their respective representations of human experience arise."

I very much agree with this passage because I have always seen literature and history intertwined .I think that you can learn much about other time periods and cultures by reading its literature, but you can also gain a deeper/wider understanding of the literature aided by historical knowledge.

Eckert, Chapter 5 page 84

"Concrete facts about author's life and language can be verified, helping to narrow the range of meaning possibilities and validating an interpretation as being the closest one to the author's intended meaning."

I think it's important to point out to students that this is just one of the many possible methods/lenses that can be used to interpret literature. Otherwise, they might assume that reading for enjoyment or their initial reaction to a text is not as valid.

"Macbeth the Philosopher: Rethinking Context" by Michael Bristol page 16 "Nemesis [...] is not determination by unseen social forces; it is the direct outcome of lucid agency"

Ok, but does this apply to all works and all characters? Yes, they all can have some amount or type of agency, but this statement is affirming and assuming that ALL characters have nearly total agency which is completely unrealistic! Also, this would mean that if a character is not successful or fails, it is his fault, maybe even his own determination, and that social forces have nothing to do with it because, apparently, since they are "unseen" they do not exist in a way that affect the destiny of the characters. This just doesn't have any logic to me.

Appleman, Chapter 4

"Henry Louis Gates, Jr. writes, 'The teaching of literature is the teaching of values; not inherently, no, but contingently, yes; it is-it has become--the reaching of an aesthetic and political order in which no women or people of color were ever ale to discover the reflection or representation of their images, or hear the resonances of their cultural voices.'"

I think this quote reflects my thinking and sentiment in my previous posts. We have to be very careful and responsible when teaching literature because today's classrooms are extremely diverse, and children are able to register even very subtle, unspoken ideologies that are in literature; we must teach them to navigate them wisely. Also, when their voices are not present in the literature that we decide to teach, we are sending them the message that their groups are not important or have nothing to offer of relevance.

Appleman, Chapter 4 (the kindle version doesn't have page numbers)

"Besides our evolving and more inclusive literary canon, the increasing diversity of our students, even in primary White suburban school districts, underscores our need to integrate cultural criticism into our literary study."

I agree completely with integrating social/cultural criticism theory to schools, but I don't think our literary canon is evolving into a more inclusive one. There has definitely been a push to introduce texts that represent the diversity of today's classrooms, but I don't think that has really transformed the canon. Those texts have been introduced more like in a tangent and supplementary way, they are not being presented at the same level as, for example, the works of Shakespeare, or the Greek tragedies which are deemed as the literary staples. If they were, most AP classes wouldn't focus mostly on those types of texts. Evolving? I don't think so.

Appleman, Chapter 5 (the kindle version doesn't have page numbers)

"Feminist/gender literary theory asks us to attend to the cultural imprint of patriarchy as we read. We do this by heeding features of language, of canon formation and transformation, of the nuanced voices of female and male writers, and of the portrayal of masculine and feminine experiences."

I believe this same idea should be applied to the western literary canon in general. We should question what the imprint of those in power (white, male, privileged) has been on the formation of the canon and how that has shaped and portrayed the voices of those oppressed (minorities, women, those of lower socio-economic status).

Eckert, Chapter 6, page 114

"I learned that I needed to challenge the ways students gain prior knowledge (or what they think is prior knowledge) of feminism before addressing what feminist theory means as a way in to a text. I learned that we have so much further to go in admitting women into the mainstream literary canon; the way we talk about women in and as authors of literature is just as important as including works written by women."

This quote also ties into my last two comments. What she says about the ways we should talk about feminist literature applies to many other aspects and elements of the literary canon. And also challenging previous knowledge is very important and should be a priority in any literature class. Talking about literature through the different critical lenses is just as important as examining those approaches themselves.

Eckert, Chapter 6

" I felt responsible, to a certain extent, for these students' reaction to feminist theory because up to this point I had essentially adhered to the canonical "givens" in my curriculum." *The author's describing how this had affected her class when going into feminist theory.

   Recently I was discussing with a classmate our emerging philosophies of teaching, and we were talking about how beneficial and useful it is, and whether we actually HAVE/ NEED to teach around or parting from the western literary canon. I was saying that I understand why it's seen as fundamental, but I firmly believe that it is possible to teach without it being a primary focus. It's probably inescapable to teach in that way within our actual education system because of the way it works, but I would teach children to view western literary canons critically, meaning that they realize that it is nothing more than a series of books that scholars have agreed are the most valuable; these scholars are mostly white, privileged, older men and the authors of these books are also mostly white. older, privileged men and sometimes women. I want them to realize, that although the canon (and even some aspects of the process thorugh which it is formed) unarguable hold value, it is ultimately very biased.  

Eckert, Chapter 4

"They also learned to question not only the text but their interaction with it, and the ways in which discussions can further clarify the way they answer those questions. This is an important skill not only in understanding literary theory, but in processing many of the "texts" thrown at them by the world at large." page 81

I'm glad that Eckert repeatedly states how reader response theory studies the "initial gut reaction" and how and why the reader got there. Reader response theory isn't about accepting all initial responses and interpretations as valid, it's about questioning where they came from and learning to support them with the text, to develop a more critical way of thinking about literature.