One of the pressing issues is motivation of
students, particularly readers in high school.
There is also a huge performance gap between ethnicities that needs to
be more effectively addressed in the classroom. Early interventions are in place, but
somewhere along the transition from middle to high school, students lose the
interventions, and the motivations to read. Family and community involvement is
critical in all grade levels, but continued interaction between students and
families in secondary education has the potential to increase learning and
mastery of all subject content.
One area tied to
motivation is the methodology of teaching reading. Teachers want to teach literature content and
story, rather than the concepts. The
transition to the Common Core Standards is met with resistance from teachers
due to misunderstanding and miscommunication.
Most English teachers want to teach stories that they themselves love,
without grasping that teaching a love of language before concepts of audience,
plot, theme, and characterization will cross content and curriculum lines. Those students, who understand the beauty of
language and the practicality of communication, will learn that mastery of word
choice and sentence structure gives them power.
They will also gain the knowledge that the concepts learned will apply
to any form of literature. Teachers need
to understand that teaching concepts rather than canons, especially using student
chosen reading materials, will result in much greater success than if they
learn the limited aspects of one work. By allowing students to branch out from
the classics, they will expand their background knowledge and vocabulary more
readily. One of the articles in The
English Journal, Vol. 102 No.2 from November 2012, “A Case for the Autistic
Perspective in Young Adult Literature,” supports the idea of choice in reading
material. The article suggests that
students will learn to accept and embrace others with varying disabilities, as
well as give the student with disabilities a story to which they can relate if
teachers are willing to introduce new texts.
Graphic novels and films are also
discussed in articles that lobby for using student interest as a way to create
an interest in learning that will go beyond the basic brush-over that takes
place in most classrooms today. Student choice is a catalyst for motivation through
the creation of reading material that addresses the issues that students face
in their daily lives.
One article, “Reframing Resistance
in the English Classroom,” offers ways to encourage and engage reluctant
learners by re-evaluating their resistance to create understanding that will
disarm the fear of failure. Students are
resisting the traditional methods of teaching and rather than continuing to
argue and attempting to coerce their cooperation, teachers need to open the
discussion of critical literacy and find ways to affect change. If we remember
that as student ourselves, classic literature of the cannon was something we
were forced to read, so why do we questions the resistance of this generation
of students. Many English teachers fell
in love with the classics as adults, not as teenagers, so it bear consideration
that involving pop culture to teach how literature reflects society as an
essential question.
In my reading intervention class
that targets struggling readers I plan to focus on personal interest (choice)
and class discussion to engage the students.
I believe this strategy will offer assistance in creating motivated
readers. Today I had students read the
book of their choice in the 20 minutes before lunch and had to wait on several
students to finish a page or two before they wanted to put down their books. I believe this method of teaching the love of
reading before teaching the content or concepts will create a community of
readers in my classroom.
