To visiting teachers, first let me first
say "Welcome to my course!" Before proceeding to the specifics
regarding assignments, evaluations, etc., here is a brief description
of "Social Justice and Adolescent Literature."
I.
Introduction: Making schooling more applicable
requires that language arts classes venture beyond traditional school
practices and common educational outcomes. The goal must be to create
classrooms and curriculae that emphasize critical pedagogical teaching
theory and social education.
What follows are lesson plans and teaching strategies
designed to focus students' attention on how reading and writing connects
to critical issues in society. Through these lessons, students will look
at the many social, historical, philosophical, economic, and legal factors
affecting human beings. To succeed, students should be expected to think,
discuss, and write about social and historical factors that affect people's
lives.
Noticeably, the lesson plans and teaching approaches in this website support
the notion that teachers should not lock themselves into one type of critical
approach when it comes to teaching students about writing or about literature.
As Carol Booth Olson rightfully suggests in The Reading/Writing Connection,
teachers who truly wish to “broaden the lenses through which students
move from reading to interpretation” should make them aware of “all
of the factors that shape their processes of meaning construction - the
reader; the text; and the context (of the reader, of the writer and of
the text), which might include social, cultural, historical, political,
and even psychological approaches” (Olson 125).
This said, the overall goal of the lessons and teaching strategies available
at this website is to promote cultural studies pedagogical theory: a critical
theory informed by a variety of approaches to teaching reading and writing.
As a whole, the resources, and the reading and teaching strategies not
only reflect insight from educators such as Jeff
Wilhelm, Lev Vygotsky,
Louise Rosenblatt,
James Moffett,
and Harvey
Daniels, they also draw liberally on ideas formulated by cultural
and critical theorists such as Allen
Webb, Bruce
Pirie, Lisa
Delpit, Paulo Freire,
Henry
Giroux, Joel
Spring, and
Peter McLaren.
For a more pointed discussion of my own personal teaching philosophy regarding
this course, click here.
II. Description/Expectations:
The lesson plans and teaching strategies outlined in this website have
been created with flexibility in mind. A language arts teacher could,
for instance, use all four of the teaching lessons to create a semester
long class. Whether working in a 'block schedule' or in a 50 minute class
period, those choosing to utilize these books and teaching resources should
have little difficulty adopting or adapting the material to fit their
needs.
The
plans and lessons are meant for juniors and/or seniors, and are designed
not only to help increase students' reading, writing, and critical thinking
skills, but also to heighten their awareness of critical social justice
issues. To do this, the lesson plans draw
upon issues central to four excellant young adult novels: Sharon Flake’s
The Skin I’m In; Walter Dean Myers’ Monster; Laurie
Anderson’s Speak; Lois Ann Yamanaka’s Name Me Nobody.
Specifically,
lessons for each of the books are designed
to help students examine issues related to
identity. It is suggested that Flake
and Myers’ books could be used as part of a teaching unit focusing
on issues related to identity and the black experience, particularly social
issues connected to identity, violence, race, truth, and justice in America.
As for Anderson and Yamanaka's novels, they could be used to help focus
students on identity and cultural issues related to gender, particularly
gender-specific expectations, and age-appropriate social issues related
to homosexuality, such as homophobic harassment, stereotyping, name-calling,
and other kinds of bullying and abuse.
Ultimately, it is believed that by creating classrooms that challenge
students to examine critical issues raised in the aforementioned young
adult novels, teachers not only move a step closer to connecting classrooms
to students’ lives, but they also prepare students for real-world
pressures and societal discourses regarding complex social issues such
as cultural identity, communication, oppression, and marginalization.