This year, after our head's recommendation, we changed the books from the home reading programme as the context was not student friendly. It was not related to their realities so students found it hard to grasp meaning. As they were classics, the characters and the plot were difficult to relate to their daily life or their knowledge of the world. As a result interaction between student was not very successful because they could only reproduce the main ideas in the text without getting involved or feeling identified with characters or situations. However, the topics dealt with during the projects are related to the students' context so they felt motivated and engaged to interact and communicate their ideas and thoughts.naturally.
We will evaluate the new selection of stories and by the end of the year and we will have the opportunity to see if the new stories motivate sts in a different way for the simple reason of being more related to their lifes.
ReplyDeleteInteresting! It made me wonder why they are classics, why is it that they are recognised as classics if our learners cannot relate with them... or is it that their lack of knowledge of the world, is the obstacle rather than the books themselves?
ReplyDeleteThere was a time when teachers would include books which related to films of TV programmes in their classroom library... More of the same? Should not books be the bridge between the known and the unknown? And if the known is not there... isn't it our responsibility to provide it so that learners can access the books which seem not to appeal to them?
You have certainly set me thinking!!! I will meet Laura and talk this over with her. I will also consult Tuti to find out which are the classic books that we need to have read to understand whichever book we get hold on the rest of our lives (e.g. Homer's books)
For instance, A tale of two cities is one of "my" musts if you are an avid reader of the New York Best Sellers!
DeleteDracula is another....
I do consider classics are a must sometime in our lives. Maybe the lack of them during my school years made me feel this way in relation to books. The point is that for a home reading programme it was too much. Standard students or struggling readers could not follow the ideas in the book, thus, they could not participate much in the interactions. However, we can think of including classics in literary circles since there is teacher's support and scaffolding and teachers can help sts build up the knolwedge of the world necessary to enjoy classics. It happened to me that only after students had struggled really hard to understand the meaning of the book, we gathered for discussion and I could help them contextualize the story. But the process of reading Jane Austen or Charles Dickens on their own was a burden.
ReplyDeleteI would like to try out these "modern" readers for the home reading programme and work on classics during the literary circles. What do you think about it?