Crossing the Threshold

I thought an explanation/discussion of a couple of assignments may be pertinent:
(am I speaking like a Lit teacher yet?)

Most of the assessments are based around essays, as the curriculum documents insist on; they’re either extended out-of-class essays or in class essays, so nothing too spectacular there.

The three that aren’t are the ones I want to look at a little closer.

At least one task must be an oral task. However, I don’t really like speeches which are about a subject. For instance, all the time you’re watching presentations, are you truly listening to content? And really, where’s the skill in that? I like speeches which have a point to them, where the rhetorical skills of the student has some kind of purpose. And far too often, an oral task throws out the student’s overall marks, especially when you have to take into account the examination has no oral component.

So I’ve tried to be a little creative with the oral task. Their task needs to be about Frankenstein and needs to be a little bit of a performance piece where they create a PowerPoint with images that symbolise the ideas of Romanticism and Frankenstein. As a study guide, I’m going to try to give them copies of the brilliant graphic novel (and it’s a graphic novel, not a comic or trade paperback) called Frankenstein’s Womb. It’s a mystical bio of Mary Shelley’s visit to a castle that inspired her novel. It’s a great examination of the novel’s themes and position between Romanticism and Modernism. Warren Ellis, one of the great comic writers from England wrote it. Absolutely awesome.

A new element of the course is the creative component. I think it’s a good idea. Try to get the students to explore the idea of literature from the other side. What I’ve decided to do is to try to combine it with revision and have two assignments at the end of the year.

The first task is to take a scene from one of the texts and change its genre. Here I mean “genre” as in “form", as defined by the syllabus. So they take a poem, for example, and rewrite it as a play. This will help their knowledge of a specific text and then two text types. I’m wondering if I should assign them random texts and text types so they may get out of their comfort zones.

The next task I pretty much stole from a dozen different sources. They have to rewrite a scene from a marginalised character’s perspective. Basically their version of The Wide Saragossa Sea. I reckon this’d help their knowledge of a text, characterisation and multiple readings.

Waddaya reckon?

Refusal of the Call

So now the texts have been chosen, task one needs to be complete:

Read the friggin texts.

In the next week, I have to have read:

• Medea
• Beowulf
• The short stories in Glass Reptile Breakout
  

Soon after I have to read:

• Canterbury Tales

And I have to re-read the rest.

The total of texts I have yet to read:

• 4

The total of texts I have yet to teach

• 7

The only text I have read and taught previously? Keats.

I'm so rooted.

By the way: check out a new magazine soon to be launched for teachers called Scribe Magazine. It's launching soon and looks like it will be extremely interesting for anyone interested in education in Australia.

The Call to Adventure

My problem with the way a lot of Lit courses have been taught (going by the students I’ve tutored) that they have no idea about what Literature is about. They often know about the texts, and often they know an awful lot about them; however, they have little knowledge in regards to where those texts stand in relation to the history of Literature. And I thought that was kinda the point of Lit.

My goal
What I thought would be worthwhile would be to try to choose an example from each major movement of Lit. Obviously that would be impossible, but I thought I could at least give the students a taster of the major movements. My initial thoughts were:

Greek drama (Drama) Medea
Beowulf (Poetry) Beowulf
Chaucer (Poetry) Prologue
Shakespeare (Drama) King Lear
Romantic (Novel) Shelley, Frankenstein
(poetry) Keats
Victorian (Novel) Stevenson, Dr Jekyll, Mr Hyde
Modern (Novel) Great Expectations
Australian (drama) Williamson, Dead White Males
(short stories) Glass Reptile Breakout

The Restrictions
Being an education course there is a syllabus to follow:

The most pertinent parts include:

• I’m doing units 2A & 2B (which are identical)
• I need to do a combination of plays, poems and novels
• I need to do at least one Australian text over the course of the year.
• There is a text list.

I’ve always loathed text lists, but at least this one is extensive (despite the lack of Byron)

The idea
I’ve already dropped Great Expectations, partly for time, partly because a friend asked quite pertinently “Why the Hell would you want to do that to children?”
I’ve swapped King Lear for Merchant of Venice. I actually prefer Lear, but Merchant of Venice just seemed richer for opportunities for discussions of values and multiple readings. Othello would work, but it’s being used in Year 12.
I’ve also decided to do a book of The Canterbury Tales other than the prologue (since I misread the text list instructions). Which, of course, means I have to read the damn thing now.
I’ve also decided instead of simply using one or two readings, I’ll focus on binary oppositions inherent in texts, then after they grasp that, I’ll give terminology for those, such as feminism, post-colonialism etc.

And so the programme (subject to lots of change) looks like:

Year 11 Stage 2 Literature 2011 Program

“What is drama? Drama, again, is the quest of the hero to overcome those things which prevent him from achieving a specific, acute goal.” David Mamet

Literature is the search for answers. It’s no surprise that literature and religion sprang from the same source, and religion always goes back to the narrative to teach its most powerful lessons.
In its simplest form, literature is the exploration of life in a fictional setting. And this exploration is always in relation to questions. These questions almost always take the form of binary opposites, dichotomies, Manichaean dualities.
Good versus evil, alive versus dead, hero versus villain, extraordinary versus ordinary, protagonist versus antagonist, divine versus human, civilised versus savage, male versus female, masculine versus feminine, light versus dark, modern versus old, progress versus tradition, familiar versus foreign, beauty versus ugliness, master versus slave.
Literature is often an exploration of these dualities, whether one is better than the other, or whether true fulfilment comes from a marrying of the two, whether externally or internally. It is symbolised through a character’s journey, either physical or spiritual. This journey is usually a quest narrative, a quest where the hero goes on a journey to save something or someone.


Waddayareckon?

The Ordinary World

I am a teacher of 11 years’ experience. I have established a reputation as a pop culture specialist. This year, however, I have been assigned a Literature class.

Fun’s about to happen.

I have a bunch of ideas - most of which aren’t going to work – and so I’d like to share my experiences and ask for any help from any teachers or interested parties.

I’ll try to update this as much as I can. My other responsibilities include Head of Year 10, being on the board of the English Teachers Association of Western Australia, three other classes, four children, a very understanding wife, a huge collection of unwatched films and television shows, and a habit of procrastinating that makes Hamlet look rash.

Sit back, and enjoy; if nothing else, you can warm your hands on the flames when I crash and burn.