Research in English: Rewriting Literary History

Purpose of this blog: Reviews of interesting research in English education journals. When possible, I suggest how I might apply the findings to my own classroom.

10-second review: Suggests that in addition to the usual approach to writing literary history, the record of readers’ responses to literature, from generation to generation, be included.

Title: “Readers Responding—And Then?” Gunner Hanson. Research in the Teaching of English (May 1992), 135-148.

Why should readers’ responses be included in literary history?

Quote: “And this production of meanings takes place at two different points—at the writing of the texts, and at the reading of the texts. The latter points, the reading of literature, is in reality a series of points, since new meanings and values are produced by new generations and groups of readers for as long as the texts survive and are used by readers.”

How is literary history traditionally written?

Quote: “As we all know, traditional literary history—research as well as the writing of handbooks—has concentrated almost completely on the writing of literature: on the authors, their lives and problems, their education and reading, influences on and from them, the schools and movements to which they belong, and so on. When properly done, this is sound and solid history, derived from documents and other reliable data. There is no need to question that kind of history—it has been and will always be of vital interest as the grounding of literature. But where is the other side—the reader’s side?”

What questions might be answered in a reader’s history of literature?

Quote: “What do we know—or what could we know—about the distribution of, say, the novels of Upton Sinclair or Jack London? Who were the people who bought, borrowed, and read their books? And what significance and value did they find in the books? How were their ways of thinking and their views of life influenced by their reading of the books?”

How do different groups of people respond differently to literature?

Quote: “If a cross section is made through a population at a particular time, we shall in most cases find different groups, different communities, giving more or less different meanings to the texts.”

Of course literary critics, informed readers of literature, provide most people’s interpretations of literature. How do ordinary readers of literature respond sometimes to the critics’ view of literature? “…it would put the students in situations where they either have to protest or argue against the analysis, or have to accept the analyst’s statements—saying for instance: OK, this was said or written by an expert; I cannot see what he saw in the text, but that’s because I am a bit stupid and a bad reader of poetry.”

Comment: An interesting new dimension to the history of literature. Of course there would be problems in collecting and selecting the responses of individuals and groups. Interesting. RayS.

Research in English: Model for a Good Research Study

Purpose of this blog: Reviews of interesting research in English education journals. When possible, I suggest how I might apply the findings to my own classroom.

Title: “From the Editor.” S Stotsky (Editor). Research in the Teaching of English (May 1992), 133-134.

Quote: “Thus, if a manuscript reports a well-executed piece of research with interesting or useful information for educators or researchers, the reviewers and I (the editor) will help the authors make sure that an adequate theoretical rationale frames the research questions, that these questions emerge clearly form the review of relevant literature, that the limitations of the study are explained to the reader, that educational implications are appropriately qualified, and that whatever the authors choose to say is readable by a general audience of researchers and educators. Reports of educational research should be, and can be, reader friendly to educators as well as to researchers for the optimal communication of the authors’ ideas.”

Comment: In a way, this editor’s listing of criteria for published research in English can be used as an assessment in determining the quality of a published research study, and I will use it as such.

Theoretical Rationale: 20%

Review of Relevant Literature: 20%

Questions: 20%

Limitations of Study: 10%

Implications for Classroom Qualified: 10%

Readable: 20%

RayS.

Research in English: Peer Response Groups in Writing Instruction

Purpose of this blog: Reviews of interesting research in English education journals. When possible, I suggest how I might apply the findings to my own classroom.

10-second review: The most productive result of this study was the suggestions for future research.

Title: “Outside-In and Inside-Out: Peer Response Groups in Two Ninth-Grade Classes.” SW Freedman. Research in the Teaching of English (February 1992), 71-107.

Quote: “Results suggest that future research on response groups should carefully describe the groups under study, specifying the…activities and interactions…. Future researchers also should look systematically for the conditions that stimulate the most productive kind of peer talk. Similarly, teachers should observe response groups in the classrooms and carefully evaluate students’ interactions in the groups against the overall goals for the group….”

Comment: First describe the groups’ activities and interactions. Second, identify “productive talk” about writing and the conditions that encourage it. Third, evaluate students’ interactions. Not impossible, I guess, but need to provide the logistics. After all, there will probably be 5 groups of 5 in the classroom and there’s only one teacher. RayS.

Research in English: The Changing Nature of Research in English

Purpose of this blog: Reviews of interesting research in English education journals. When possible, I suggest how I might apply the findings to my own classroom.

10-second review: “The study examined the history of research on the teaching and learning of English.”

Title: “Promising Research: An Historical Analysis of Award-Winning Inquiry, 1970-1989.” Research in the Teaching of English (February 1992), 41-70.

Summary: Analyzed the work of recipients of the NCTE’s Promising Researcher Awards, year by year.

Quote: “Results of the analysis of studies revealed a strong but shifting influence of approaches borrowed from other disciplines, including linguistics, sociolinguistics, cognitive psychology, anthropology, and literary criticism. Findings suggest that the development has been characterized not by ‘pendulum shifts’ from one extreme to another but by the gradual discovery of a new area of interest, exploration and broader analysis of the area through a variety of approaches, followed by a move to a new focus of investigation….”

Comment: Somehow, I feel a need to have someone summarize promising ideas in research—ideas that might have practical value to the classroom teacher. In short, I think a new journal should be developed called Research in English from the Teacher’s Point of View. The ideas might not need to be “proved” by research, but be labeled “promising research findings.” In other words, the teacher needs educators to interpret the implications of research findings from the classroom point of view without the specialized language of research and in plain English.

This particular study seems to have the most value to would-be researchers and very little value to the classroom teacher except for general understanding of a trend in research. RayS.

Research in English: Males and Females as Writers

Purpose of this blog: Reviews of interesting research in English education journals. When possible, I suggest how I might apply the findings to my own classroom.

10-second review;: “Overall, the results of this study warrant the view that the writing of men and women is far more similar…than different.”

Title: “Gender-Typical Style in Written Language.” DL Rubin and K Greene. Research in the Teaching of English (February 1992), 7-40.

Quote: “Women used far more exclamation points than did men.”

Quote: “Women were more likely than men to acknowledge the legitimacy of opposing points of view.”

Comment: The authors begin with the following quote: “Everyone ‘knows’ that girls and women write differently from—i.e., better than—boys and men; that is part of the common wisdom of the classroom.” This research, however, finds that males and females are more alike than different in writing.


I never regarded my student writers as different in gender. I did notice that they were significantly different as individuals regardless of gender. RayS.

Research in English: The English Methods Course and English Language Learners (ELLs)

Purpose of this blog: Reviews of interesting research in English education journals. When possible, I suggest applications to the classroom.

10-second review: Well-meaning teacher-educator attempts to incorporate English language learner (ELL) (bilingual/bicultural) component into her methods course with the aid of a mentor. There were issues of worrying about the ELL portion dominating the course—something with which neither the teacher-educator nor the students who were consulted on the changes were comfortable.

Title: “Navigating Tensions in the Process of Change: An English Educator’s Dilemma Management in the Revision and Implementation of a Diversity infused Methods course.” M Gort and WJ Glenn. Research in the Teaching of English (August 2010), 59-86.

Summary: The authors describe the problems they encountered in trying to provide a significant component for teaching the bilingual/bicultural learners in the English methods course.

Quote: “In the attempt to re-conceptualize the methods course, Wendy faced a moment of disjuncture well before the course began. As she sat at her desk and tried to identify ways to infuse her existing course with ELL-related content, she found herself grappling with how to make room for what she was increasingly realizing was essential to her students as future teachers of bilingual learners—without losing sight of what they need to know as future English/language arts teachers…. Wendy wondered in particular, how she would find the time to include the ELL-oriented information and strategies she wanted her students to acquire, given the one-semester duration of the course, given the fact that this was the only methods course students would take.”

Quote: “…she designed the additional ELL-related content around commonly held misconceptions about bilingual learners … in the generation of essential questions she wanted her students to explore.”

Quote: “During a class session early in the semester, students began to consider two essential questions that guide the ELL-related components of the revised course: who are English [Language] Learners? And what experiences do they bring to the classroom?”

Quote: “The major focus of this shared self-study was to articulate, document, and analyze the challenges and complexities associated with an English educator’s experiences as she, with the support of a (bilingual education) colleague mentor, revised and implemented secondary English methods curricula with explicit attention to the needs of bilingual learners.”

Quote: “This portrait of Wendy’s teaching and thinking contribute knowledge about the complexity of teacher education practice.”

Comment: One purpose for research is to highlight the problems in learning how to do something. In this case it was problems in changing the curriculum in the English methods course in order to include a significant component for teaching English Language Learners. Much can be learned about the process of change from identifying the problems in attempting it. Maybe the next person who tries to change a curriculum will anticipate ahead of time the problems identified by these two researchers. RayS.

Research In English: Literature Curriculum in the U.S. and Canada.

Purpose of this blog: Reviews of interesting research in English education journals. When possible, I suggest applications to the classroom.

Research in English: Literature Curriculum in the U.S. and Canada

10-second review: British literature permeates the curriculums of both American and Canadian high schools in Massachusetts and Ontario. American literature also permeates the curriculum in the school in Ontario, but no Canadian literature was taught in the Massachusetts school.

Title: “Of Literary Import: A Case of Cross-national Similarities in the Secondary English Curriculum in the United States and Canada.” A Skerrett. Research in the Teaching of English (August 2010), 36-58. ‘

Summary: The literature curriculums in a high school in Ontario and a high school in Massachusetts were compared. Not surprisingly, both high schools emphasized British literature. American literature was also taught in the Canadian and American schools. But no Canadian literature was taught in the American high school.

Quote: “Two strong patterns in relation to the national origins of the literature were found in both schools. First, at both schools literature of British origin was afforded the highest status—a somewhat unsurprising finding given that both the United States and Canada bear historical cultural ties to Britain, which has colonized the literary imagination of much of the world…. However, a second more noteworthy ;pattern emerged in relation to the role of U.S. literature on the Canadian school’s curriculum. And, in fact, U.S. literature was taught more frequently than was Canadian literature at this school [in Ontario]. In a significant contrast, no Canadian texts were studied at the U.S. school.”

Comment: Not surprising. The literature departments at U.S. colleges emphasize British and American literature. However, even such sources as Benet’s Readers Encyclopedia do not include much in Canadian literature. If Canadian literature had the significance of American literature, Canadian literature would also be taught. Another warning to the U.S. not to be so provincial. Need to search out worthwhile Canadian literature. RayS.

Research in English: Research Briefs.

Purpose of this blog: Reviews of interesting research in English education journals. When possible, I suggest applications to the classroom.

10-second review: Teachers’ feedback on writing. Curricula for pre-service teachers. Academic journals.

Title: “Annotated Bibliography of Research in the Teaching of English.” RLO Larson and A Bechan. Research in the Teaching of English (December 1992), 446-465.

What helps weak writers learn to write better? Students who improved most (1) found a way to “remedy misunderstandings about teachers’ feedback” on their writing and (2) learned to use effectively the concrete, specific revision strategies developed by the teachers. BC Bushey. P. 462. 1991. [Comment: (1) Need to ask students how they interpret teachers’ comments on their papers. I maintain that most students do not understand what teachers are saying when they write “awk.,” etc. Maybe we should take the time to explain the most frequent comments. (2) Of course, from this brief summary of the research, I do not know what the teachers’ specific suggestion for revision were, but the idea of being specific about steps in revision is a good one. RayS.]

Curricula for pre-service teachers: Curricula for pre-service teachers should include “models of the teacher as a reflective practitioner and researcher.” CL Pippen. P. 463-464. 1991. [Comment: As I’ve said before, teaching is only a part of the teacher’s role. Reflecting on one’s teaching and on research is another important element in improving teaching. How does one model reflecting on one’s teaching and research? Keeping a journal is one way to record reflections. Brainstorming is a way to begin reflecting. Raising questions. Doing one’s own research in the classroom is another method for reflecting on and evaluating one’s own teaching. RayS.]

Academic journals. Reports that an experimental study of an art class in which students wrote journal entries and comments on their assignments confirmed that students in the experimental group (with journals), because they focused on their problems through writing, learned more than did the control group, which did no writing. Reports also that journals were  “useful for understanding and following student learning and for improving teaching.” W Murdick. P 464. 1991. [Comment: I think this is an important study, showing the usefulness of writing in learning, understanding student difficulties, following students’ progress in learning and for improving teaching. This assumes, of course, that the teacher reads the student journals. Academic journals can be used with any subject. RayS.]

Research in English: Research Briefs.

Purpose of this blog: Reviews of interesting research in English education journals. When possible, I suggest applications to the classroom.

10-second review: Writing assessment. Writing apprehension. Planning a writing curriculum.

Title: “Annotated Bibliography of Research in the Teaching of English.” RLO Larson and A Bechan. Research in the Teaching of English (December 1992), 446-465.

Writing Assessment. Interprets the results of a fourteen-nation inquiry into students’ achievement, in composition. Judgments about writing inevitably look at the written product, not the process that shaped it. A Purves. P. 456. 1992. [Comment: Stands to reason. Students in writing assessments don’t have time to use the writing process in the 25 minutes allotted in the SAT exam or even in the typically one-hour state tests. And if the writing process could be measured, how would you do it? RayS.]

Writing Apprehension. From a study of students in public and private colleges in California, concluded that apprehensive students should be encouraged to engage in journal writing and other kinds of personal writing. AM Walsh. P. 458. 1989.

Planning a Writing Curriculum. This work examined the collaboration among teachers and students as they “jointly constructed the writing curriculum.” K Schultz. P. 459. 1991. [Comment: Never thought of it. Why not? RayS.]

Research in English: Research Briefs.

Purpose of this blog: Reviews of interesting research in English education journals. When possible, I suggest applications to the classroom.

10-second review: Statistics on leisure reading. Summer writing institutes. Achievement in composition.

Title: “Annotated Bibliography of Research in the Teaching of English.” RL Larson and A Bechan. Research in the Teaching of English (December 1992), 446-465.

Statistics on Leisure Reading. Found a statistically significant difference between females (85%) reported reading for leisure and males (65%) reported reading for leisure. MAS Moffitt and E Wartella. P. 452. 1992. [Comment: I wonder if the same percentages would be true today, (2010)? RayS.]

Summer Writing Institutes. Teachers made changes in their teaching strategies as a result of the California Writing Project experiences. The prewriting and sharing aspects of the writing process were most frequently implemented. S Dimililer. P. 455. 1992.

Achievement in Composition. Argues that in the assessment of a piece of writing with holistic scoring, scorers are judging nothing more than “perceived drafting quality of one performance, and that the profession errs seriously in attaching durable labels to student writers on the basis of one performance. A Purves. P. 456. 1992. [Comment: Raises a question. To what degree is the “draft quality” of writing on a writing assessment an accurate predictor of how the student writer writes? Common sense says to me that even accomplished writers vary in performance depending on the situation. On the other hand, the student writers in my community college classes who were judged ready for first-year composition on the basis of a writing sample could already write well and would suggest to me that the draft quality in the assessment is a pretty accurate predictor of writing performance. RayS.]

Research in English: Research Briefs.

10-second review: Invented spelling in first grade. Journal writing. Literary criticism.

Title: “Annotated Bibliography of Research in the Teaching of English.” RL Larson and A Bechan. Research in the Teaching of English (December 1992), 446-465.

Invented Spelling in First Grade. Results indicated that encouragement of invented spelling does increase the quantity and quality of writing produced by first-grade students when compared with traditional-spelling peers. NA Healy. P. 450. 1992. [Comment: Stands to reason. I assume that “traditional spelling” means stopping and checking every word before moving on in the draft. Students and even adult writers will write more effectively when they do not have to be concerned with correct spelling in drafting. Spelling is a mop-up that can be taken care of when the final, corrected copy has been completed. RayS.]

Journal Writing. Found that vocabulary and the writing scores of fourth-and fifth-grade students who had a journal writing component in their reading instruction were significantly higher than those of students who did not have this component in their reading instruction. CP Roy. P. 451. 1991. [Comment: I’m assuming that the journal writing was in conjunction with responding to reading. In that context, I am willing to believe that students would improve their vocabulary and writing scores. RayS.]

Literary Criticism. Discusses the need to include the reader’s role when the history of literature is written. G Hansson. P. 452. 1992. [Comment: I’m not sure what the “reader’s role” means from this brief summary, but including ordinary readers’ responses in a history of literature is a fascinating new dimension in literary criticism. RayS.]

Research in English: Research Briefs.

10-second review: Teachers’ questions. Response to literature. Pre-reading activity.

Title: “Annotated Bibliography of Research in the Teaching of English.” RL Larson and A Bechan. Research in the Teaching of English (December 1992), 446-465.

Teachers’ questions. Found that participation in literary discussion groups did not significantly affect fourth-grade students’ critical thinking performance, reading comprehension or attitude toward reading. A qualitative analysis of questions revealed that all but one treatment-group teacher asked predominantly lower level questions. CF Schulhauser. P. 449. 1991. [Comment: Implication is that asking higher level questions might improve fourth-grade students’ critical thinking, comprehension and attitude toward reading. RayS.]

Response to Literature: Only five 10^th-grade students. Two responded to both real situations and literature with absolutest interpretations of both. Two responded to both real situations and literature with multiple, competing versions of both.  R Beach. P. 449. 1991. [Comment: If students respond to reality with locked-in opinions, they will respond similarly to literature. If students respond with multiple interpretations of real situations, they will do the same with literature. Only five students, but worth thinking about. RayS.]

Pre-reading Activity. Found that when middle school students wrote about relevant personal experiences before reading on the same topic, they enjoyed and comprehended the text more, were on-task more often, offered more sophisticated responses to the text and liked the text more. LS Hammon, et al. p. 450. 1991. [Comment: Writing about personal experiences on a topic produces better results with reading something on the same topic. Interesting. The same thing might be true when writing about nonfiction topics. RayS.]

Research in English: Research Briefs.

10-second review: Writing assessment. Peer wring response groups. Interpreting literature.

Title: “Annotated Bibliography of Research in the Teaching of English.” RL Larson and A Bechan. Research in the Teaching of English (December 1992), 446-465.

Writing Assessment. “Concludes, based in interview data obtained from English department chairpersons, testing officials, and managers of assessment centers, that colleges that included a multiple-choice test together with an holistically scored essay were using the most reliable, valid and appropriate method of English testing available.” SW Cummings. P. 457. 1991. [Comment: Of course that’s how the SAT measures writing. RayS.]

Peer Writing Response Groups. “Within groups guided by response sheets, which were more productive than groups not guided by response sheets, students focused 60% of their talk on these sheets.” “For other 40% of their talk, for the most part, they spontaneously and informally discussed the content of their writing.” SW Freedman. P. 447. 1992. [Comment: To guide or not to guide peer responses to writing: I’m for the “guiding” point of view. RayS.]

Interpreting Literature. “High school students in the experimental group analyzed examples of…dialogues in order to identify strategies they used to understand the dialogues. They then applied these strategies to answer complex inferential questions about two novels. CO Lee. P. 448. 1992. [Comment: Not much explanation of method in this abstract, but I would apply it to my classroom by excerpting complex passages from literary works and have students analyze how they understood them. Key word is strategy. RayS.]

Research in English: Change.

10-second review: The change to literature-based reading instruction and away from basal reading programs is fraught with problems. The advice of the researcher? Go slow and pilot innovations.

Title: “Teachers in Transition: An Exploration of Changes in Teachers and Classrooms During Implementation of Literature-based Reading instruction.” PL Scharer. Research in the Teaching of English (December 1992), 408 – 445.

Quote: “Although the use of children’s literature independent of basal readers is growing in elementary classrooms, teachers and administrators are challenged by the practical considerations of how to go about making this change in ways that are educationally sound…. Without the step-by-step suggestions in the teacher’s manual for a basal reader, teachers are faced with a multitude of decisions that affect their instruction….” P. 408.

Quote: “If, either through administrative mandate or their own interest, teachers try to implement literature-based reading instruction, the transition to this approach necessitates many changes in the ways teachers make decisions about classroom practices.” P. 409.

Quote: “The results of this study suggest that districts might be cautioned to avoid rapid, large-scale, mandated changes and to attempt implementation slowly by first identifying a few interested teachers to pilot the innovation, supporting those teachers in significant ways, and employing the successes of the pilot group of teachers to encourage the participation of other teachers.” P. 441.

Comment: Long before December 1992, we all knew this about the process of change didn’t we? RayS.

Research in English: English Teacher Survey Questions in a Different Format.

10-second review: These questions from the UK survey of English teachers might be in a different format that can be more inviting to answer.

Title: “How English Teachers See English Teaching.” R Protherough and J Atkinson. Research in the Teaching of English (December 1992), 285-407.

UK Survey Questions:

.In view of your later experience, what would you say were the major omissions from your course of preparation for English teaching?

.In what ways has your view of the nature of English teaching changed since you began teaching?

.What do you see as the most urgent problems facing English teachers over the next ten years?

.In what ways (if any) do you think that English teachers as a group are different from teachers of other subjects?

.What seem to you the essential qualification for someone who is going to be an effective English teacher?

.Ideally, how do you think teachers of English should be trained?

.If you had friends (or children) who were thinking of becoming English teachers now, what advice would you give them?

.In what respect do you think your English teaching now is most different from when you began?

.What at present are the chief obstacles to being able to teach as you wish?

.For your own development, what kinds of in-service course would you most welcome?

Comment: Some of these question would be of interest to me. Which questions are my readers interested in answering? Care to offer your answers? E-mail to raystop2@comcast.net. RayS.

Research in English: Survey of English Teachers in the UK.

10-second review: A survey of English teachers in the UK has caused the authors of this article to suggest questions for English teachers in the United States. In general, the English teachers from England and Wales loved their job of teaching English but the morale was low.

Title: “How English Teachers See English Teaching.” R Protherough and J Atkinson. Research in the Teaching of English (December 1992), 385-407.

Suggested Survey Questions from the UK Survey:

.On what basis should entrants to the profession be selected?

.What patterns of teacher preparation seem to be most effective, and by what criteria do we assess that effectiveness?

.What should be the relationship between initial teacher education and continuing professional development?

.What competencies can reasonably be expected of a novice teacher and which are to be acquired with experience?

.What contribution to teacher development can be made by subject associations and their publications?

.Are English teachers justified in the belief that they are somehow different from those working in other subjects, and if so how is this a potential strength or weakness?

.How can teachers’ autonomy be balanced with accountability and professional freedom co-exist with a national strategy?

Comment: Some of these question would be of interest to me. Which questions are my readers interested in answering? Care to offer your answers? E-mail to raystop2@comcast.net.

Research in English: Inexperienced and Experienced Readers of Literature.

10-second review: How do inexperienced readers of literature and experienced readers of literature respond to what they read?

Title: “Creating the Virtual Work: Readers’ Processes in Understanding Literary Texts?” EA Earthman. Research in Teaching English (December 1992), 351-384.

Summary: Compared literary responses of 8 college freshmen and 8 graduate students in English. “While freshmen retained their initial view of a work, graduate students assumed varying perspectives. Generally, graduate students read in a more “open” manner, using the text extensively and searching for alternatives. Freshmen’s reading, though satisfying to them, were much more “closed,” remaining relatively unelaborated and not often being revised.”

Comment: Sounds to me as if inexperienced college readers do not ask questions about what they are reading. They make quick judgments about the reading of the text. Graduate students, on the other hand, explore the ideas in the text before making judgments.

What would I do with this research? I suggest the following: when reading a poem, students should formulate questions about what they do not understand. And then discuss the answers to these questions.

When reading a novel, students should preview by reading for five minutes near the beginning and then raising questions; read for five minutes near the middle of the novel and then raising questions; reading for five minutes three-fourths through the novel and raising questions; and, finally, reading for five minutes near the end and raising questions. Then they should sort the questions, organizing them into types of questions (literal, interpretive and judgments). Will allow high school and college students to explore all aspects of the ideas in the text. RayS.