Akhmetova G.Kh.
Arkalyk state pedagogical institute named after I.Altynsarin, Kazakhstan
Practical
principles for teaching literature at the English lessons
Although methods
of teaching foreign languages have greatly improved as a result of pedagogic
and linguistic research, the teaching of literature has remained traditional,
emphasizing exposure rather than achievement and directed to students of
superior ability. The vast amount of research in contemporary criticism and in
linguistics opens a new perspective on methodology. Diminishing the importance
of literary history and concentrating instead on the linguistic code of
literature could help us to teach literature in a manner both more interesting
and more likely to elicit the individual participation of students. Students
who are often discouraged because of inadequate linguistic preparation to work
with a literary text need preliterary exercises dealing with the lexical,
syntactic, semantic, and cultural difficulties of the text to be studied. Such
a forward build-up of the language as a means of communication, prior to the
contact with the literary language, should serve as an instrument allowing
teacher and class more time for a literary discussion, eliminating the need for
verification of understanding.
Many teachers
include literature in their list of things to work with. By literature we don’t
just mean poems and plays from fifteenth century. We would include
twentieth-century poems, whether they appear in greeting cards, as part of the
‘poems on the underground’ movement, as haikus of only seventeen syllables or
nonsense rhymes. We’d include one-act plays, stories whether short, science
fiction or fairy tales, song lyrics and prose from graded readers or talking
books. You may want to include even more types of expression such as graffiti
or TV adverts.
There
are many reasons for working with literature. It constitutes a high point in
language usage often representing quality of expression. It takes us beyond the
often rather than trivial topics of textbooks filled with their questionnaires
on shopping or sport. Literature gives us not just language but cultural
background and emotional content. It can speak to the heart and personal
experience of the learner encouraging imagination, creativity, personal
discovery and increased perspective on life. Because of the message and the
form are special they can raise the quality of the noticing, which is so important
for a true understanding of form, meaning and use.
If
a piece of literature is used as a stimulus, in the same way that a picture or
an object or a set of language items can be a stimulus, then we can apply
generalisable moves to it such as analysis and personalization.
The
most traditional way of treating literature in the classroom goes through some
of the following stages:
-
The teacher gives background
information on the work or the author.
-
There is a reading at home or
reading in class, often out loud.
-
Difficult words are explained either
orally or by reference to glossaries, dictionaries, pictures, sounds or mime.
-
There is detailed comprehension work
and perhaps some translation and memorization of key passages.
-
There is some literary criticism or
discussion of received opinions on the work. This usually involves discussion
and writing.
In this approach the literary work is central and the author’s intention
is seen as being very important. Many language learners over many years have
derived a lot of pleasure from this way of working. Learning off by heart has
often given them the pleasure of being able to say long stretches in the target
language smoothly for the first time. The remembered passages may also contain
lexical phrases or patterns from which learners can generalize. There are
practical principles for teaching literature:
·
Don’t worry that you are not
‘literature teacher’, enjoy the literature at any level that you and your
students can.
·
Start helping students to enjoy the
musical and expressive nature of language and literature at beginner/or primary
level even if the work only consists of working on rhymes such as those in ‘Bye
bye’, ‘Marks and sparks’, ‘Diddy dishy, diddy dishy’.
·
Choose pieces to work on because
they are short or funny or match student interest rather than because they are
on a ‘good literature’ list.
·
Use anything you need to for
enjoyment and understanding, including pictures, mime, role play, video clips.
·
Provided you have copies of the
pieces you are working with, don’t treat the work as sacrosanct. So, for
example, encourage students to circle, underline or change texts. Work with
paraphrases so that learners can understand the message more readily an also
see how the original choices made by the author were well chosen.
·
Make the piece come alive by helping
learners to forge connections between themselves and the piece of literature.
Here you can list all the characters or important elements of the work and then
ask students to do some of the following:
-
state which they are most like
-
rank them from the most to least
likeable
-
choose one and describe the way the
character would dress, behave, speak, shop, sign documents, etc.
-
choose one and state what they can
remember about it
-
become one temporarily and state its
relationship to one that another learner has chosen, or write a letter to
another one in role.
· Save time in class by asking students to read or listen out class.
· Treat the students’ response to the piece as being as important as the
author’s intention.
· Allow for criticism, praise, distaste, joy without worrying if this is
the response the students ‘ought to’ have.
· Allow time for students to create work of their own as well as enjoying
the work of other people.
Provided you
consider working with light and short, relevant and interesting literature as
well as with longer pieces for the class who really love literature and are
highly motivated, literature can be very fruitful to work within the language
classroom.
The teacher has an important role in teaching English through literature.
First, he should determine the aim of language teaching in relation to the
needs and expectations of the students. Giving a questionnaire or interviewing
with the students orally, the teacher can setup the aim and the objectives of
the language teaching. Second, he should select the appropriate language
teaching method, teaching techniques, and classroom activities. Then, the
teacher should select the literary texts relevant to the aim and the objectives
of his teaching. While selecting literary texts to be used in language
classroom, the students’ language proficiency, interests, should be taken into
account in order not to bore students with in appropriate materials. At
elementary levels, for example, students should be given simplified or
specially written stories. At advanced levels, however, students are given
literature in its original form so that they can develop their literary
competence in the target language. To put it another way, students learn
practically the figurative and daily use of the target language in the literary
texts and encounter different genres of literature (i.e. poems, short stories,
plays, etc.) at advanced levels. Observing how characters in a play or a short
story use figures of speech, such as simile, metaphor, metonymy, etc so as to
express their communicative intention, students learn how to write English more
clearly, creatively, and powerfully.
References
1. Duff, A & Maley, A (2007) Literature (Resource Books for Teachers),
Oxford University Press.
2. Maley, A (2001) ‘Literature in the language classroom' in The Cambridge
Guide to Teaching ESOL, Cambridge University Press.
3. McRae, J (1994) Literature with a small 'l', Macmillan Education.
4. Pulverness, A ( 2003) ‘Literature' in English Teaching Professional,
October, Issue 29, Modern English Publishing
5. http://otl.du.edu/teaching-resources/motivating-students-to-do-the-readings/.