Journal #5
The reading from Moller and Allen hit home with me on a couple of levels. As I think I mentioned before, I taught reading at Osseo Senior High for 2-1/2 years, in addition to teaching English 12. It was a very diverse classroom, primarily African-American students and African immigrants (mostly Liberian), along with a few Mexican students, and occasionally, a white student. In addition to being struggling readers, many of these students were still taking ELL classes and working toward mastering English grammar and vocabulary. Some were also receiving Special Ed services. Most were juggling a combination of these situations.
The Read 180 program focuses on exactly what Moller and Allen refer to as the “legacy of comprehension taxonomies and sequenced instruction” that keeps them working on decoding and denies them the opportunity to engage in the literary experiences and materials afforded better readers (page 150). I didn’t get that for most of my first year. I gamely stuck to the Read 180 curriculum, and while some of the students truly benefited from the program’s focus on decoding skills, I could tell it wasn’t enough.
Part of my charge was to get these students ready for regular English classes, and about half way through that first year I realized that while their reading skills may improve along the way, they weren’t being prepared for success in a classroom that embraces what Dudley-Marling and Fine called “the tools of intellectual engagement.”
Under the guise of introducing a text the rest of the sophomores had already read (“you guys will be expected to know this next year…”), we started reading “Until They Bring the Streetcars Back,” a novel set in St. Paul about a teenager in 1949-50. Unlike the European American students Beach wrote about who resisted multicultural literature, this group freely embraced it, especially since most of the books in the Read 180 program featured non-White protagonists. When they found out the main character in “Streetcars” was White, however, there was some initial resistance.
This resistance faded when they were able to make other connections, though. Some were immediately recognizable and universal (having a crush on an unattainable beauty), while others took some time to find. The discussion we had were key in helping the kids work through these situations. For example, there is a girl in the book who has an overbearing, abusive father. The main characters father is aloof and emotionally absent. Only two of the 16 students in the class have fathers in their lives, so relating to these characters took some discussion, but they eventually made connections, usually through cousins in similar circumstances.
As the Moller article suggested, reading books with social justice themes is an increasing practice, but many of these students had never actually read an entire book before. What was most heartening to me was to see their discussions act as a catalyst for the more reluctant readers to work harder to keep up with the class reading schedule, to participate in the discussions, and to make connections between the text world and their lived world.
About Me
- Joe Deckenbach
- I retired from corporate America six years ago in order to teach real world communication skills. It is the most demanding and rewarding work ever.
2 comments:
Joe,
What approach did you take with "Streetcars" as you read it in class? I would imagine that it would be somewhat similar to Moller and Allen's four "Acts". Stage One being that you went over the characters and what happened in the book, and then from there gradually moved out into different layers of meaning (Acts 2, 3, & 4).
When I look back at my Moller and Allen notes more items are making sense. For example, I wrote down "Vygotsky - sociocultural nature of learning". At the time I had no real idea of what this meant, but now I am under the illusion of thinking that this has to do with looking at the context/history of a text and examining how characters acted versus how you would expect someone to act in that circumstance and era.
Another note I wrote down was "Who are we now? How did we arrive here?" This is close to the ideas that Beach puts forward for how to take a more troubled view of literature (as compared with the personal view of reader response).
byron
Interesting to see how your perception of Read 180 changed. (FYI, another student also wrote about Streetcars--mentioning the somewhat stereotypical female roles in it--though never having read it myself, I can't judge.) It is heartening to hear that you had a similar experience to M&A--that it is indeed work to get students through the comprehension stage, but once you do, they are willing to engage with deeper meaning that has relevance to their lives (even if, as in your case, the teacher has to do some work to help them see that relevance).
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