This qualitative study reveals the ways in which reading and reflecting on two counter-narrative young adult novels fostered opportunities for preservice English teachers to think more acutely about their understandings of race within and beyond the text. Participants expressed feelings of empathy with and connection to characters whose cultural…

This qualitative study focuses on ten graduate students in an English education master's program, who were enrolled in a course that I taught on teaching literature in the secondary school. I had restructured the course to make students the center of a series of conversations. For the study, I drew upon memory theory to examine their imagined…

By examining a class discussion between an eighth grade student and her teacher around the reading of a literary text, my intent in this paper is to further the discussion around one of the central issues in English education today--the inquiry around whether it is more productive to teach literature by first connecting students' cultural…

Uses data from case studies of literature classrooms to suggest that contemporary literary theories can enrich literature instruction in both high school and college classrooms. Claims that theories of interpretation offer not only ways of reading texts, but also ways of seeing and interpreting beyond the world of the classroom. (NH)

Argues that more is needed than a generic, Euro-centric, or culture specific set of teaching strategies to address the issue of equity in schools. Offers a critical perspective on the working principles articulated in the report of a special commission on how best to prepare English teachers to work effectively with increasingly diverse students.…

Describes an experiment in pairing the novels "The Great Gatsby" (F. Scott Fitzgerald) and "Jazz" (Toni Morrison) in a teacher preparation class. Relates that the students (all European American) initially resisted "Jazz" and accepted "Gatsby" as a timeless classic. Includes responses about another Toni Morrison novel, "Beloved." (PA)

Describes the ramifications of a writing assignment for preservice teachers about their relationships with literature. Reports on several of the students' personal writings in response to the assignment. Presents responses of two teachers, Greg Hamilton and Deborah Kinder, about doing personal writing assignments. (PA)

Focuses on the use of writing frames in a secondary school in order to raise the achievement of boys in GCSE (General Certificate of Secondary Education) English Literature. Discusses the inadequacies of some earlier frames before outlining a new departmental approach. Analyses examples of boys' work to show what a difference the frame made. (SG)

Examines George Herbert's sonnet "Prayer" to argue for the integration of literary and linguistic approaches to the critical appreciation of poetry at both A/AS and university levels of the GCSE (General Certificate of Secondary Education). Presents a model analysis of the sonnet and discusses why its distinctive linguistic and literary features…

Attempts to represent the complexity of the web of literary relationships and their transformational space using fragmentary texts that circle around the novel "The English Patient": self as relationship and the dialogic engagement with a book by the patient himself; and the relationship and engagement with this book and with each other of a group…

Relates the journeys of two English teacher/professors through their changing field: how their approach to teaching and research has been challenged along the way by critical incidents in classrooms and with individual students; and how their stances on what literature teaching is and should be, and what research is and should be, have changed.…

Tells the story of one English department's struggle over curriculum controversies and the implications of that struggle for the integrity of specific teachers' classroom curriculum and the literary education of their students. (TB)

Argues that the literal and cultural "text" of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) calls into question the entire project of teaching English at the secondary level in this country. Teases out the connection between the study of NAFTA and the study of text and what it might mean for the teaching of English in the next century. (TB)

Describes a creative writing course offered to 60 inmates of China state prison and involving class discussion of literature. (DD)

Provides a list of more than 100 titles of young adult books which beginning English teachers should read, describes the stages of adolescent reading, and urges teachers to present literature as a vision of life. (DD)