Following up research by Radway and others on readers of romance novels, a study, employing a reader-response approach, was conducted with 18 female adolescent readers of romances to discover if they perceived and enjoyed the novels in ways appreciably different from other readers. The subjects filled out questionnaires about their romance novel…

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 spontaneous use of imaging and its relationships to verbal recall and literary analysis were investigated in a study in which 72 college students read a literary text under one of three sets of instructions that manipulated processing depth in an externally valid fashion. Imagery reports and free verbal recalls of the story were collected…

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…

A study examined the ways in which college readers interact with literary texts. The method of interviews and think-along protocols, in which a text was read aloud by the subject while he simultaneously verbalized his thoughts, was used to compare the reading processes of eight college freshman to those of eight masters students in literature who…

The relationship between reading comprehension and the number and complexity of idea units in a text was examined. The results showed that readers using text-entailed recall strategies gained the most insight into the meaning of text and that recall ability is an important encoding strategy for gaining meaning. (JAZ)

Describes a three-week seminar for education students that simulated the environment of the classrooms in which they will eventually teach and focused on the writing process, the reading process, and the reading-writing relationship. (SRT)

Discusses the concepts of play and imagination and how these shape personal development and the knowledge gained through experience with reading and writing. (SRT)

Studies how children negotiate the meaning of literature by examining how they responded when given the opportunity to retell a story directly after hearing it. (DF)

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."…

Reports the impact of metadiscourse on sixth grade students' learning and attitudes. Finds that low-comfort students learn more when informational metadiscourse is presented in interpersonal voice and high-comfort students learn less. Finds that students' attitudes are more tolerant of opinions if they read just one type of metadiscourse. (KEH)

Describes classroom-based research on the use of reading logs with second and third graders. Discusses the range and character of student responses, student behavior about books, and the stories they tell the teachers and each other. (SR)

Discusses how young children, when given a chance in the classroom, display many and varied responses to literature. Shares, through the use of classroom experiences, how language and literature can guide the development of curriculum. (MG)