This paper articulates a framework for the development and integration of three instructional strategies--discussion, reading and learning from text guides, and writing--to teach secondary school students how to produce independent and productive responses to literature. An explanation of the need for and rationale behind an integrated approach is…

Intended for teachers, this book demonstrates the importance of teaching with real books. The first three chapters outline the components of a literature program, the settings in which it operates, and the human communities that shape it. Chapter 4 discusses literary elements: character, time, mood, layers of story meaning, place, point of view,…

A college-level course in business literature is an ideal place to raise and discuss ethical issues. To be successful, a teacher of this course must engage student interest, help the students articulate and understand their own ethical attitudes, clarify the stance and artistry of the author, and refine student responses to ethical questions. When…

Focusing on reader response in the classroom, the works collected in this book represent the results of a five-week summer institute in which 25 middle school, high school, and college teachers studied the principles and applications of literature instruction. The following essays are included: an introduction by G. Garber; "An Overview of the…

Poetry of the romantic age is often uninviting to students, leaving them puzzled because they do not sense the connections between the poetry and themselves. Yet, much romantic poetry can be enjoyed and comprehended if approached in terms of some personal, reflective, and connective readings. Wordsworth and Whitman are often avoided because they…

The choice between the fusion of literature and life and a pedagogy of engagement, on the one hand, and the separation of literature and life and a pedagogy of detachment, on the other, is a painful one. Philosopher of education James Gribble would rather risk some form of aestheticism than allow that a great work of literature could be viewed in…

Written for those who would like to seriously and systematically study response to literature and the teaching of literature, this book presents a review of the major theories that might inform research on response and a catalog of most of the promising research techniques. The book is organized into three parts: theories of response, ways to…

As part of the interdisciplinary Turko-Danish Fairytale Project concerning the nature of response to literature, this paper discusses the rationale, principles, and actual translation procedures behind nine fairytales considered for use in the study. Various sections of the report discuss (1) the texts to be chosen, including their authenticity,…

Describes a method for teaching developmental writing using reader-response theory and the works of James Joyce and Plato. (HTH)

Reports observations of the storytime of preschool children at home and in schools. The results indicated that children's responses were similar in type whether at home or at school but that children tended to respond to literature more like the adult in the situation than like the other children. (HTH)

Presents comments by authors of children's and adolescent literature about qualities of good writers, which include being a good reader, caring about language, being well educated, being an alert observer, being a good story teller, and being a compulsive writer. (EL)

Argues that different kinds of response statements, focusing on issues from cultural, historical, phenomenological, and structuralist approaches to reading texts, can be assigned to help students learn about more demanding kinds of information and, hence, can make students stronger, more informed, and more self-conscious readers of literature. (EL)

Discusses "critique" in an analysis of the relationship between discourse, text, and subjectivity, particularly as it relates to the teaching of poetry. Stresses how to make students more aware of the power of the text and to comprehend more fully the nature of their own responses. Illustrates with student responses to Blake's poem, "The Rose."…

This book, part of a series which serve as guides for K-12 teachers who are striving to align lively, classroom-tested practices with standards, gathers together brief articles spotlighting instructional suggestions. The book begins with overviews of the key component of fiction, with special emphasis on character. It then continues with a section…

Addressing the complexity of the question of multicultural literature in the classroom, this anthology of 27 articles includes: contemplations by seven award-winning writers of young adult (YA) literature on the subject of diversity; a resource section that describes over 200 literary works and lists 50 reference tools to help teachers stay…