August 29

Since we have this blog now, and since many of you will have occasion to refer here for useful information, I thought I’d try to add one level of value to this site by telling you about interesting articles and events that pass my way.

I invite anyone in the department, who has something to say, to submit posts for our departmental enjoyment and education.

Today I wanted to tell you about an article that appeared in the May issue of the English Journal. It was by a college professor, William Broz, of University of Texas—Pan American. (You can email him at brozwj@utpa.edu). The article in entitled, “Not Reading: The 800-Pound Mockingbird in the Classroom”.

If I quote from the first two paragraphs of the article I think you’ll get the gist of his argument, and, also, get a sense of why I found his ideas so compelling:

Not reading, even for many good students, has become a mode of operation with respect to book-length texts assigned in school. Many students enter our secondary and postsecondary literature classes intending to not read the books we assign. If you think that most of your secondary literature students are reading the canonical texts you assign, you might have to think again….Many students {in my teacher education classes} have admitted to me…that in high school they did not read any of the assigned books.

Even though I already know some of the answers, I will say dramatically, ‘You are English majors who intend to become secondary English teachers! How could it be that you did not read the books assigned in English classes in high school?’ The main answer will be, ‘You didn’t have to. You could still get good grades.’

Then I will assert to them…If students do not read the assigned texts, nothing important is happening in your literature classes—nothing very important to develop your students’ reading and interpretive abilities is happening, no matter how many lectures you deliver, vocabulary words students, ‘learn,’ elements of fiction students define, quizzes students take, essay test answers students write, or films you show.

Then Broz drops his controversial assertion:

Students who can read and do not, have done nothing important enough to deserve passing grades in our classes, even if they have been present for every class period.

Knowing the details of the story or the theme of the work or anything else obtained from Spark Notes is nearly worthless, Broz argues:

It is the transformative ritual of actually reading TKM {To Kill A Mockingbird} that makes the book important, not knowing who killed Bob Ewell.

Broz then makes one specific recommendation to secondary teachers: use reader-response journals and small group discussions instead of quizzes:

As assessments of reading engagement, journals and discussion items are of much higher quality and more accurate than quizzes and tests that can be copied, guessed at, or passed based on not reading strategies.

He gives some specifics:

I require that reading response journals and discussion items include frequent page-numbered references covering the whole book. Journal entries made up of general comments, or retelling the story, that do not contain questions, quotes, and comments accompanied by page-numbered passage references and which do not cover the whole book, do not meet the assignment guidelines and are assumed to have been created based on not reading strategies.

Broz suggests giving students reading choices, sometimes pairing these student-chosen books with ‘canonical texts’:

Even in ninth and tenth grades….pairing the reading of a classic text with a young adult text….may help break the not reading cycle.

Broz suggests beginning the semester with an easier text or one by a local author so that students can find the enjoyment in participating in discussions and start the term with good grades.

Support students in developing their reading and interpretive abilities by inviting them to read any high-quality text, including popular texts, young adult texts, regional and culturally relevant texts, and texts in non-traditional formats such as graphic novels.

And he does not want you to make it easy on kids with low reading abilities by summarizing texts for them.

Even for poor readers, not reading, is a useless and counterproductive strategy….Differentiating texts and assignments is a better way of addressing differences in students’ abilities.

What if you schedule a small-group discussion and some students haven’t done the reading?

Students…obviously not prepared…need more reading time. {They} are not granted entrée to a book group. They read while the prepared students discuss.

What do you avoid?

1. Teacher-controlled talks about the book that inadvertently give students summaries of the story;

2. After-reading viewing of the film, which often tells students what to think about the book;

3. Overemphasis on literary terms:

Do not…let testing on ‘climax’ or ‘foreshadowing’ become an end in itself. Mature readers read to experience the book, not primarily to analyze narrative style or dissect inventive authorial moves.

Broz finished by repeating his earlier warning:

Are you sure {your} students actually read the books? You might be surprised if you knew how many do not.