Passages that Pop #2

This week I thought I'd treat myself to something a little more visual than the wonderful, but sometimes impenetrable, Infinite Jest.  And if I'm to quote a passage this week...it shall be one I respect.

Of course, this week I'll be giving a media source for the seminal graphic novel written by Alan Moore and given visuals by Dave Gibbons: Watchmen.  In the modern literary discussion, graphic novels have a prominent and interesting place.  My ENGL 300/Literary Theory and Criticism course at Towson University used a reading list comprised entirely of graphic novels, including Art Spiegelman's MAUS and Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis.  One can only assume (and in my nerdy case, hope) that these novels find their way into Advanced Placement classrooms across the nation.  Watchmen is an especially challenging read for comics experts and newcomers alike.  The story takes place across the entire twentieth century, while also interweaving different forms of prose (the full text is littered with news clippings and journal entries), such as the subject of this passage: an excerpt from an autobiography of a fictional superhero.  Hollis Wadsworth Mason Jr., the first Nite-Owl of the novel, reflects on his youth in the following passage:

"The saddest thing I can think of is 'The Ride of the Valkyries.'  Every time I hear it I get depressed and start wondering about the lot of humanity and the unfairness of life and all those other things that you think about at three in the morning when your digestion won't let you sleep.  Now, I realize that nobody else on the planet has to brush away a tear when they hear that particular stirring refrain, but that's because they don't know about Moe Vernon."

The supplements between the traditional graphic novel chapters of the book may help to teach students reading strategies and skills further down the line.  When I first read Watchmen, I was twelve and being forced to read in the margins to get the most out of the story, such as the tragic and quiet backstory of Hollis Mason, gave me a valuable skill for reading textbooks later on in college and graduate school.  In today's ever-changing technological education landscape, differentiation in story delivery cannot be underestimated.

Below is a video by musician Franz Nicolay, detailing the motivations of Hollis Mason.  The song, titled "The Ballad Of...", was recorded as part of the Bushwick Book Club, an incredibly interesting songwriting collective operating in Manhattan.  Every month, the concert collective is instructed to read a novel (great installments have included Toni Morrison's Beloved and Kurt Vonnegut's The Sirens of Titan).  Then, independent musicians are invited to perform songs based on the work.

Reading Next: Online Activity

1. Of all the research and statistics presented in Reading Next that startled me (particularly the information regarding the growing competition in "blue-collar" jobs and the necessity for even those seeking low-level positions to pursue secondary and collegiate degrees), much of it read similarly to what we have read from the rest of the course.  The passage focuses on the importance of not only relaying literacy skills to those in elementary and middle school settings, but also reinforcing them so as to prepare students for collegiate environments (including the shocking statistic of only 32% of incoming college freshman being "prepared" for reading comprehension in college).  These passages reminded me of Chapter 8: Reading Guides, because of the emphasis that chapter carried of using differentiated reading strategies and reading guides for readers of all ability and grade levels, in order to not only facilitate reading but to also increase critical reading/thinking skills.  Reading Next, taken holistically, deeply values an instructor willing to self-reflect, and this practice is encouraged in Chapter Three: Getting to Know Your Students, Your Materials, and Your Teaching.  Tying these ideas into the S of the RSVP framework of the College of Education is quite easy: self-reflection is a must for teachers looking to regularly, and effectively, differentiate their instruction to reach as many students as possible.  Finally, many of the Instructional Improvements suggested by the chapter could be related to Chapter 9: Curricular Inquiries, such as using "diverse texts" and "intensive" writing to emphasize independent learning by students of all grade levels.
2. The most obvious inclusion to be made is the use of "intensive writing" within an English Language Arts classroom.  While the instruction of reading and writing fluency should, ideally, occur in every class, the English teacher is often tasked with the heavy lifting of this instruction and intensive writing can ease this process.  If writing is made constant, and collaborative between a teacher and students, the stigma and fear of writing is taken away, replaced by zeal and excitement at possibilities each day: students can write short stories or questions about the homework for their warm-up; readers can write profiles of characters or poems/songs about them while also conforming to a specified rhyme scheme.  Using "diverse texts" within an English Language Arts class also helps to confront the disparity between what students have to read, and what they are interested in: some female students may not relate to The Outsiders as well as the boys in the class...but they may enjoy some Edwidge Danticat short stories.  There is no homogeneous group of students, so the classroom libraries offered to them should also be diverse.  When students interact around one another using a variety of texts, "text-based collaborative learning" occurs.  Jigsaw literature circles could be a great way to incorporate this practice, allowing students to use trade books from the library to acquaint the rest of the class on historical contexts surrounding some of the poetry and novels at the time.  For a unit on MacBeth, students could research the history of the Globe Theater while other groups read a biography of Shakespeare (and others still could read and present the history of Scotland).  Having a small group of students become excited about a particular text could aid in the reception of that work with other readers, as well.  

2 Websites 11/14

For this session of website updates, I tried to focus on sites to help students digest some of the literary devices present within To Kill a Mockingbird.

1)  It's a wonder I haven't looked up music to help students comprehend concepts in my Language Arts classes before now.  Because I tend to be a very conventional, by-the-text learner when it comes to reading and writing, I need to focus on expanding my instruction for students who may learn through kinesthetics...or music.  Rhythm Rhyme Results offers teachers several links to songs that students can access in class or at home, dealing with content areas as diverse as physical education and chemistry.  The particular link I've listed for this blog is actually a rap dealing extended metaphor and simile, giving students a brief session of levity while dealing with some of the headier subjects in the novel.  Because the character of Boo Radley is an extended metaphor for the concept of a mockingbird throughout the novel, students comprehending these concepts is an important objective for the unit.

2)  In addition to auditory learners, it may be helpful to lend understanding of literary devices to visual learners in the classroom.  Scott McCloud, an award-winning cartoonist and semiologist, has written many books on the visual power of loaded symbols within comic books and cartoon strips.  One of his most popular web-based comics, a visual adaptation of Robert Browning's Porphyria, can allow visual learners to link the extended metaphors within the poetry to visual concepts.  Using this framework, I would allow students to make their own comics of different testimonies from the story, as well as linking Boo Radley to the mockingbird idea.

Passages that Pop #1

Earlier tonight I was revisiting a few sections I dog-eared within David Foster Wallace's brilliant Infinite Jest, the mammoth tome dedicated to eviscerating entertainment media, privatized education, and of course, youth tennis.  After being struck by a passage on p.167, concerning a father relating to his son, Jim, I thought I would try to share the passage on the blog and include some modern media that might be used to kick-start young readers into it.

"Kids today...you kids today somehow don't know how to feel, much less love, to say nothing of respect.  We're just bodies to you.  We're just bodies and shoulders and scarred knees and big bellies and empty wallets and flasks to you.  I'm not saying something cliche like you take us for granted so much as I'm saying you cannot...imagine our absence.  We're so present it's ceased to mean.  We're environmental.  Furniture of the world.  Jim, I could imagine that man's absence.  Jim, I'm telling you you cannot imagine my absence.  It's my fault, Jim, home so much, limping around, ruined knees, overweight, under the Influence, burping, nonslim, sweat-soaked in that broiler of a trailer, burping, farting, frustrated, miserable, knocking lamps over, overshooting my reach.  Afraid to give my last talent the one shot it demanded.  Talent is its own expectation, Jim: you either live up to it or it waves a hankie, receding forever.  Use it or lose it, he'd say over the newspaper.  I'm...I'm just afraid of having a tombstone that says HERE LIES A PROMISING OLD MAN."


For a passage that does begin with the hackneyed "kids today", there is so much verbal potency packed into a few sentences.  The repetition of the Father's symptoms building on themselves, culminating in the wonderful, coach-able quote of "talent is its own expectation".  Wallace works mostly in humor and outlandish concepts taken to insane levels in the novel, but when real human failure and emotion is allowed to peek through, it is hard to deny his power.

One of the main extended metaphors in the novel is tennis.  Below is a music video for "Calamity Song", by the Decemberists, in which the lyrics AND visuals reference Infinite Jest in a humorous way.

I hope to post more "Passages that Pop" in the future, preferably once a week if I can gather some relevant media for whatever I'm reading/gushing over at the time.  The plan for next week?  An excerpt from a classic graphic novel that I discovered in the 8th grade, about the all-too-thin line between vigilantism and heroics.

Boys, Books, and Blogging: Effective Techniques on Getting Boys to Read

After a full quarter in a high school and feeling the opening throes of the second upon me, I'd like to make a broad generalization about the modern Language Arts classroom: at first, it feels much easier to get girls to read than boys.  Was there a connection that I was constantly missing in class?  Were they separated at age 7 and herded into different classrooms?  I turned to the internet to put to rest any nagging suspicions, and to find out: What are some great strategies to motivate teen boys (and of course, all teens), to read?

Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes,
a favorite childhood book of mine

At the Reading is Fundamental website, many parental strategies are outlined in order to make reading seem more enticing for all teen students, but so many of these can be adapted to a classroom setting that including the website feels right.  Many of the outlined strategies are familiar to incoming teachers, such as setting an example of making reading "cool", or at the very least vital to a regular academic routine.  A complicated pitch to teens on the subject of reading, at least for many of them, is the idea of "becoming an expert" on whatever they are interested in.  Twenty years ago, sure, a teen could learn all there is to know about basketball by perusing a few books written by historians and retired coaches. Today, however, their standards for the intake of information have changed, with information on both how the game is played and the history of it bombarding them at all times, if they so choose.  Does taking in this information count as "reading" if it comes in the form of an app on their mobile device, or a Bill Simmons blog on the ESPN site?  It may, especially if those holding the keys to such valuable information continue to take to the digital formats.  It might be the responsibility of parents and educators to adapt instruction to include these formats, so long as they can include the classics of literature that shaped current educators to be rabid about Language Arts.  

Imagine my delight, when searching for ideas on motivating boys to read, I came across the website dedicated to it.  On a popular entry on the Getting Boys to Read page, Holly J from the Rochester Parenting Examiner details the important relationship between any youngster and the literature they are allowed to access.  She astutely points out that adult writers constantly target adults; therefore, those producing young adult literature are able to more aptly write "to" young people, including describing issues and developmental "tasks" outlined by Robert J. Havinghurst.  These tasks include "selecting and preparing for an occupation", "acquiring more mature social skills", "achieving a masculine or feminine sex role", "accepting the changes in one's body", and "achieving emotional independence from parents and other adults".  Holly cites defenses of distributing YA literature in public schools, using their points to drive home the point that modern teen juggernauts such as Twilight and The Hunger Games were inspired by Bram Stoker and Shirley Jackson, respectively.  

Overall, it seems like the key to motivating boys to read is mixing a solid amount of literature dedicated to the classics in with YA literature, and ensuring a balance between male and female-directed reading.  Holly J reminds readers that the first "young adult" novel was The Outsiders, written about a gang...of boys.  For my part, I recall my love of reading truly igniting in 8th grade when we were asked to read Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes.  A potent extended metaphor for not only the cyclical nature of being born, getting older and losing control but also the changing body and raging emotions of puberty, the novel enamored me for reasons that I would be unable to describe until college.  Not only did the thematic strands of the text resonate with me, a special note must also be made of the form of the novel, taking shape with Charley's journals throughout the story.  As it begins, the journals seem hastily written and poorly constructed and as his treatments improve his intelligence, the reading level of the journals nears college-level.  Imagine my heartbreak, as a child, spotting the first typos in the middle of the novel, signalling Charley's descent into fear and madness again.  These techniques are present in popular fiction today; in one of my classes I spotted a student reading Push, the source material for the 2009 film Precious.  I believe that these interesting textual presentations can enthrall students as easily as recognizable characters, but when they can get both out of one novel, lifelong readers may be born.