Challenges
In the same way that Freire’s literacy is based on neither reading the word nor the world alone, most readings are not entirely aesthetic nor entirely efferent in stance, including readings of fiction; rather, they fall along a continuum (Galda & Liang, 2003). Perhaps it is as a result of this that students often receive mixed signals about how to read fiction in the classroom. Presumably, fiction is included in the ELA curriculum because of its perceived artistic merit. However, the fact that many classroom activities and standardized tests focus on building the skills associated with an efferent stance contradicts the message that students should be learning to connect personally with the literature they encounter, as one would with a piece of visual art or music.
Embarking on this inquiry, I noticed, to my dissatisfaction, that my own lesson plans and objectives had more frequently than not reflected an efferent stance. Examples from my unit on To Kill a Mockingbird include:
Rosenblatt (1982) calls using fictional texts to teach efferent reading skills “one of the most troubling instances of the confusion of stances,” using fiction to spark a student’s interest in reading to then only check for understanding “a deception,” and neglecting an aesthetic stance despite the suggestion that fiction should be taught for its literary value “disconcerting” (p. 274). The traditional teacher-centered model that continues to be upheld in many ELA classrooms positions students to look at texts as they would a puzzle with a correct solution they must find. This, in turn, can lead either to frustration, when students feel they cannot find the right answer, or to shallow responses reflecting only conventional interpretations of the text - what they think they should say, or what they think the teacher wants to hear. The latter corresponds to my classroom observations discussed in Artifact 1.
In the lessons defined by the above-listed goals, I quickly noticed a lack of personal investment in the reading I was assigning. It was an advanced class that students had chosen to be in, so I was not surprised that many of them were completing the assignments. However, they did not appear to be very happy about it. As I continued to teach, student comments made it increasingly clear that what was motivating them to do their work was the promise of an external reward - a good grade - and not a meaningful connection they were making with the texts. If learners remember what is meaningful to them, then helping students form a meaningful connection to texts deemed important enough to teach should be a top priority in the ELA classroom. I began to suspect that the plot diagrams and characterization exercises we had been doing were not the best way to achieve this.
Upon further scrutiny of my methods, I noticed that even when assigning work that might lend itself to a more aesthetic stance, I found it difficult to assess student learning without resorting to an efferent stance. For example, as a culminating project to our unit on Of Mice and Men, the students were asked to write a poem from the point of view of one of the characters (Artifact 3). To be sure, one purpose for this assignment was to get students to empathize with a character (an aesthetic experience), but the rubric used to evaluate the poems was based on students’ handling of direct and indirect characterization techniques - skills that reflect an efferent stance. Student work was graded based on the extent to which it demonstrated a full understanding of the character, sounded like the character, was grounded in the text using footnotes with quotes that supported the character traits represented in the poem, adhered to proper MLA format guidelines, and was edited from the rough draft to the final draft. While it might be necessary to understand a character in order to empathize with him/her (though this notion has been questioned - something I address in Artifact 7), the empathy expressed in this assignment (or lack thereof) was ultimately not taken into consideration in determining the “success” or “failure” of the work.
Indeed, an aesthetic stance can be difficult to assess, since “an organized report on, or articulation of, our response to a work involves mainly efferent activity as we look back on the reading event - an abstracting and categorizing of elements of the aesthetic experience, and an ordering and development of our concurrent reactions” (Rosenblatt, 1982, p. 270). A strong indication that a child has had an aesthetic experience is the request to “read it again!” Typically, this applies to situations in which a young child is listening to a story being read to her by an adult. Obviously, in a secondary classroom, this does not happen as frequently as it does in an elementary setting. Sometimes, however, I will read a passage from the novel to my students, or recite a poem for them. While it is hard to imagine a situation in which one of my students would find it appropriate to ask me to repeat one of these out-loud readings, they have at times voiced spontaneous responses that seem to reflect an aesthetic experience.
At the beginning of the unit on To Kill a Mockingbird, I read the students the poem “If,” by Rudyard Kipling. In it, the poet gives his son advice on how to be a man. After listening to me read the poem, one girl called out, “Aw, I like that.” We had not analyzed the poem or discussed what the poet meant. Rather, hers was a raw, unprocessed response likely based on how the poem sounded to her and connected to her own experience of the world. Students had similar reactions to the reading of Tusk,Tusk (Artifact 2). Emphasizing the importance of such reactions and warning against dismissing them, Rosenblatt (1982) states the following:
Embarking on this inquiry, I noticed, to my dissatisfaction, that my own lesson plans and objectives had more frequently than not reflected an efferent stance. Examples from my unit on To Kill a Mockingbird include:
- SWBAT identify and explain vocabulary in context IOT understand how the words relate to the setting, characters, and conflicts in the text (Lesson 2);
- SWBAT identify examples of courage in the text IOT analyze the characters and conflicts (Lesson 5);
- SWBAT order events chronologically IOT analyze how events, ideas, and characters unfold and interact throughout the text (Lesson 9);
- SWBAT define otherness IOT analyze how compassion applies to the characters in the text (Lesson 11); and
- SWBAT identify reasons for and against Atticus taking Tom Robinson’s case IOT analyze whether or not Atticus is a heroic character (Lesson 13).
Rosenblatt (1982) calls using fictional texts to teach efferent reading skills “one of the most troubling instances of the confusion of stances,” using fiction to spark a student’s interest in reading to then only check for understanding “a deception,” and neglecting an aesthetic stance despite the suggestion that fiction should be taught for its literary value “disconcerting” (p. 274). The traditional teacher-centered model that continues to be upheld in many ELA classrooms positions students to look at texts as they would a puzzle with a correct solution they must find. This, in turn, can lead either to frustration, when students feel they cannot find the right answer, or to shallow responses reflecting only conventional interpretations of the text - what they think they should say, or what they think the teacher wants to hear. The latter corresponds to my classroom observations discussed in Artifact 1.
In the lessons defined by the above-listed goals, I quickly noticed a lack of personal investment in the reading I was assigning. It was an advanced class that students had chosen to be in, so I was not surprised that many of them were completing the assignments. However, they did not appear to be very happy about it. As I continued to teach, student comments made it increasingly clear that what was motivating them to do their work was the promise of an external reward - a good grade - and not a meaningful connection they were making with the texts. If learners remember what is meaningful to them, then helping students form a meaningful connection to texts deemed important enough to teach should be a top priority in the ELA classroom. I began to suspect that the plot diagrams and characterization exercises we had been doing were not the best way to achieve this.
Upon further scrutiny of my methods, I noticed that even when assigning work that might lend itself to a more aesthetic stance, I found it difficult to assess student learning without resorting to an efferent stance. For example, as a culminating project to our unit on Of Mice and Men, the students were asked to write a poem from the point of view of one of the characters (Artifact 3). To be sure, one purpose for this assignment was to get students to empathize with a character (an aesthetic experience), but the rubric used to evaluate the poems was based on students’ handling of direct and indirect characterization techniques - skills that reflect an efferent stance. Student work was graded based on the extent to which it demonstrated a full understanding of the character, sounded like the character, was grounded in the text using footnotes with quotes that supported the character traits represented in the poem, adhered to proper MLA format guidelines, and was edited from the rough draft to the final draft. While it might be necessary to understand a character in order to empathize with him/her (though this notion has been questioned - something I address in Artifact 7), the empathy expressed in this assignment (or lack thereof) was ultimately not taken into consideration in determining the “success” or “failure” of the work.
Indeed, an aesthetic stance can be difficult to assess, since “an organized report on, or articulation of, our response to a work involves mainly efferent activity as we look back on the reading event - an abstracting and categorizing of elements of the aesthetic experience, and an ordering and development of our concurrent reactions” (Rosenblatt, 1982, p. 270). A strong indication that a child has had an aesthetic experience is the request to “read it again!” Typically, this applies to situations in which a young child is listening to a story being read to her by an adult. Obviously, in a secondary classroom, this does not happen as frequently as it does in an elementary setting. Sometimes, however, I will read a passage from the novel to my students, or recite a poem for them. While it is hard to imagine a situation in which one of my students would find it appropriate to ask me to repeat one of these out-loud readings, they have at times voiced spontaneous responses that seem to reflect an aesthetic experience.
At the beginning of the unit on To Kill a Mockingbird, I read the students the poem “If,” by Rudyard Kipling. In it, the poet gives his son advice on how to be a man. After listening to me read the poem, one girl called out, “Aw, I like that.” We had not analyzed the poem or discussed what the poet meant. Rather, hers was a raw, unprocessed response likely based on how the poem sounded to her and connected to her own experience of the world. Students had similar reactions to the reading of Tusk,Tusk (Artifact 2). Emphasizing the importance of such reactions and warning against dismissing them, Rosenblatt (1982) states the following:
Understanding the transactional nature of reading would correct the tendency of adults to look only at the text and the author’s presumed intention, and to ignore as irrelevant what the child actually does make of it.... It is more important that we reinforce the child’s discovery that texts can make possible such intense personal experience.... We have the responsibility first of all to develop the habit and the capacity for aesthetic reading. (p. 272)
Though spontaneous verbal responses to out-loud readings like the ones mentioned above may seem insignificant, they show that the students have formed personal connections with the texts to which they are responding. Even if we do want a text to be analyzed from a more efferent stance, it will be much easier for a student to do this who has become emotionally invested in that text. With this in mind, I asked myself: How might I reinforce an aesthetic stance toward fiction reading in my classroom?