Spring 2003
Thursdays 4:30-7:10
West Building 256
Seminar Leader: Chris Thaiss
Office: Robinson A423
Phone: 703-993-1273
E-mail: cthaiss@gmu.edu
Hours: TR 3-4 and by appointment
Class Schedule*** Requirements ****Grades ****Texts
This is a course for teachers and prospective teachers. I see the course as both practical (specific tactics for reaching specific objectives with specific texts for specific students) and speculative (posing and trying to answer basic questions: what is reading? what is literature? what does it mean to "teach literature"?). I want these Thursday evenings from winter to spring to give us a chance to think, talk, and write about all those ideas that our day-to-day working lives give us little chance to ponder. We'll read and discuss some provocative essays by teachers; we'll reflect in writing and conversation on our own encounters with literature; we'll consider our own teaching of literature and the people we teach; we'll develop new teaching ideas and present them to each other, with the class as our students. My goal is not to explicate a way to teach literature, but to have us encounter, imagine, and experiment with different ways. Here's a tentative schedule of topics, presentations, and readings:
1/23
Introductions and Course Overview
1/30
What Is Reading? (Some Theories and Approaches)
Readings to be discussed: Phelan (CR) articles by Nolan, Olson; EJ (CR) essay by Patterson; Elbow article from Young/Fulwiler. Develop presentation proposals; hand in first "position papers."
2/6
What Is Literature? (What Isn't?) Standards and Mores
Readings to be discussed: Bishop and Greene essays from Young/Fulwiler. We will meet the first hour this week in Robinson A105, the English Department computer lab, for an introduction to the Townhall electronic forum, on which we will conduct a thematic discussion each week (see below). Presentation schedule will be decided.
2/13
A Potpourri of Critical Approaches
Readings to be discussed: DiYanni, Critical Perspectives and George/Blanning essay from Young/Fulwiler.
Seminar presentations
2/20
Applications of Critical Approaches
Readings to be discussed: TETYC (CR) essays by Jones, Carino, and Tucker
Seminar presentations
2/27
Web Resources for Teaching Literature
Readings to be discussed: EJ (CR) essays by Dreher, Elliott, Claxton/Cooper; Young/Fulwiler essay by Schwartz.
Seminar presentations
We will meet for the first hour this week in Robinson A105 to browse and discuss selected sites and databases.
3/6
The Reading/Writing Connection (Response Logs, etc.) Readings to be discussed: Phelan (CR) articles by Mink, McKendy; Sommers essay from Young/Fulwiler.
3/13 Spring Break
3/20
Text and Community: Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich
Readings to be discussed: have read the core Text and Community book and perused materials on the 2003 T&C website. These readings will be the basis for our Townhall discussion.
PLEASE NOTE: We will not meet as a class this week, except via the Townhall forum, as I will be attending the College Composition and Communication convention in New York. I will be taking part in our Townhall discussion that week while at the conference.
3/27
Text and Community II: Discussion and Application of Nickel and Dimed and other autobiographical/ethnographic works
Readings to be discussed: have reviewed essays from T&C website and any handouts on the uses of autobiography/ethnography.
Seminar presentations
4/3
Models of Teaching: Language as Intellectual Artifact
Readings to be discussed: Handout from Gere et al, Language as Reflection; Mandel essay from Phelan (CR); Coles essay from Young/Fulwiler.
Seminar presentations
4/10
Models of Teaching: Language as Social Construct
Readings to be discussed: Jenseth and Bean-Thompson essays from Phelan (CR); Lovitt essay from Young/Fulwiler.
Seminar presentations
4/17
Models of Teaching: Language as Development and Expression
Readings to be discussed: Peters, Newkirk essays from Young/Fulwiler; Hogarty and Kutiper/Abrahamson essays from Phelan (CR).
Seminar presentations
4/24
Issues in Teaching Literature: Censorship
Readings to be discussed: NCTE monograph "A Student's Right to Read." I strongly suggest your perusing the NCTE censorship website before our discussion.
Seminar presentations
Book summaries/ teaching plans, presentation descriptions, professional book reviews, and second position papers due.
5/1
Reading as a Writer: "Creative" Criticism
Readings to be discussed: Turk essay from Phelan (CR); Bloom essay from Slevin/Young.
Seminar presentations
This schedule is highly flexible. I intend the list of class topics to be provocative, and it may very well be that we will deal with parts of several topics in more than one discussion. In addition to the readings I've listed, feel free to recommend (and to distribute if you wish) to the class other readings you have found particularly relevant. As such, discussion of readings will involve only part of our class sessions. After the beginning of the seminar presentations, this part will become even smaller, roughly one half of our period.
Reading/Teaching Log on Townhall Electronic Forum--Each week I'd like you to write reflectively about two things: the reading that you are doing and yourself as a teacher or prospective teacher of literature. Each week I will give the seminar a prompt that springs from our topic for that week or from our discussions. I ask you to make two entries to the electronic forum each week: one between Thursday and Sunday and one between Monday and Wednesday. In this way, all of us will take part early in the week between classes and then later. These later responses can be reflections on comments made by other members of the seminar. I ask that your entries for the week total a minimum of one full screen of text. Entries should always maintain professional courtesy but should not avoid an honest, critical analysis of issues or of comments by other members of the seminar. When it works well, this forum has provided a great way to let us delve into important issues, share expertise and ideas, and get to know one another better as professionals.
Position Papers on the Teaching of Literature-- After our first class and before our penultimate class, you will write 500-750-word statements of your "position" as teacher or prospective teacher of literature: your goals, your sense of the issues, your sense of the students' needs, your questions, your doubts, your joys--anything that helps to define you as a teacher or prospective teacher at the present moment. The second paper should take the first as its starting point and explore changes that have occurred in your position since the start of the course. I'll read your first paper after our second class and your final paper before our last class.
Analysis of a Professional Book--At the next to last class (April 24), hand in as part of your folders a three-page analysis (about 750 words) of a professional book you have read during the course. The book is of your choice (I'll be displaying several possibilities at the second class). The only restriction is that it be a book about literature--e.g., about teaching reading, about an author, about a literary work--rather than a creative or critical work on another subject. Please approve your choice with me. Write the analysis as if you were reviewing the books for a professional journal (e.g., The English Journal , The Reading Teacher, The Whole Language Newsletter). Focus on specific benefits the book would have for other teachers (or students, parents, policy makers, etc.). What does the book lack that you feel it should have? What questions does it raise in your mind? How might you use the book? If you wish, feel free to submit a discovery draft of your analysis up to two weeks before it is due, for my comments.
Synopsis/Teaching Plan for Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed--Write a one-page, single-spaced synopsis/teaching plan for some aspect of the Text and Community core text. More on format later in the course. These synopses/teaching plans will be included in a class publication we'll be compiling as a contribution to the Text and Community Program. Final drafts of these will be due with your folders on April 24.
Seminar Presentation--On the first evening, I'll ask you to brainstorm ideas for a 30-minute presentation that you'll make to the class sometime between weeks 4 and 14. (On email between classes 1 and 2, I'll ask you to write to me your tentative ideas for a presentation and I'll give you feedback.) The presentation will actually be a demonstration of a technique you have developed (or are in the process of developing) for teaching a particular piece of reading to a particular group of people. If you are currently teaching, you may choose something you have already tried, but on which you'd like to work more; you may also experiment with something totally new. If you are a prospective teacher, you may want to adapt a technique you've seen used, or, again, concoct something completely fresh. The important thing is to use us as your students for the exercise, so that we can get the feel of this from the student's point of view. Also feel free to develop this assignment as a one-hour collaborative presentation with another member of the class. (My only caveat on collaboration is that the presentation must clearly show equal contributions by the two collaborators.) Either before or after the presentation, give us a bare-bones explanation of the context of the exercise (the students with whom you've used it, where in your curriculum it comes, your objectives); if it's a totally new exercise, give us your speculations about the appropriate context.
Since 30 minutes is a very short time for an exercise, judge whether we'll need to do any preparation before class. For example, we could do a few minutes' reading during your presentation, but you'll need to hand out the previous week anything requiring more than five minutes' reading. A short story of a few pages, a poem, a scene from a play, a short essay, an excerpt of a novel, a couple of newspaper editorials--selections such as these tend to work well. (NOTE: if you choose Nickel and Dimed as the text for your presentation, you can count on our having read the entire work.) What we do in the presentation, how we do it, and why you want us to are all up to you. I hope that by the end of our first-week email exchange you'll have a good idea or two on which other members of the seminar can give you some feedback in a brief period in our second class.
At our next to last class, along with the other material in your folder, please hand in a one-page (about 600 words single- spaced) description of your presentation. Include a statement about the context, a step-by-step description of the exercise, and a concluding statement of your perceptions of the results of the exercise: why it works and how you might like to modify it. This one page will go into an anthology (besides the one we're compiling about the Text and Community materials) that I'll run off for everyone and distribute at the final class. (If you do your presentation based on Ehrenreich's ethnography, prepare for the Text and Community anthology a description of another presentation that would also use this book.) I'll give you a format for the page before you prepare it.
Visit to a Class of a Teacher You Admire-- Sometime during the first half of the semester, I'd like you to visit a class conducted by a teacher of literature whose work you admire. I'd like you to take notes on this class and submit to me sometime during the course (but not after April 24) a report (at least 600 words) that summarizes and reflects critically on what you observed. How was learning going on in the class? What did the teacher do? The students? What techniques of this teacher would you adapt? What changes would you make for your teaching situation?
I'll base your grade on holistic assessment of all the work you hand in; your active, thoughtful participation in the seminar; and your presentation. Since so much of the work is experimental and exploratory, I'll be looking most closely for experimentation and exploration: speculative thought, trying out different ideas-- including those you might feel initially uncomfortable with--, asking questions, probing your assumptions and those of others, writing with imagination and a sense of possibilities. I encourage you to express your reactions and opinions in regard to readings, issues, etc., but don't be satisfied (I won't) with just expressing your impressions. Look at pros and cons and try to entertain alternative points of view. All the issues we deal with in this course are controversial, and I'd like you in your writing to try to see through the eyes of persons who hold different views from those you bring to the discussion of each issue. Please don't hesitate to ask for my feedback or that of others. Final letter grades mean the following:
B = completion of all requirements on time and according to instructions given above; active involvement in class discussions of readings and issues; clear, competent writing
A = completion of all requirements on time and according to above instructions, plus clear, consistent evidence of imaginative intellectual engagement in writing, discussion, and presentation;
C = completion of less than all requirements on time and according to instructions.
Plusses and minuses will be given according to GMU policy.
Costs
In addition to cost of required texts, there may be a fee for photocopying of the two class-produced anthologies.
DiYanni, Robert. Critical Perspectives: Approaches to the Analysis and Interpretation of Literature. New York: McGraw- Hill, 1995.
Young, Art and Toby Fulwiler, eds. When Writing Teachers Teach Literature: Bringing Writing to Reading. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann/Boynton/Cook, 1995.
Ehrenreich, Barbara. Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America. New York: Henry Holt, 2001.
Course Readings for English 610-Thaiss. Packet available for purchase from course anthologies office in the GMU Bookstore.
One book of your choice, as described above.
I also highly recommend that you join NCTE, if you are not already a member, and that you begin regular reading of the NCTE journals, e.g. The English Journal, College English, Teaching English in the Two-Year College. Student memberships are available at a very low yearly rate. If interested, see the NCTE website (http://www.ncte.org).