Literature-Based Curriculum

1. Literature-Based Curriculum A PowerPoint presentation by Elena Chiaburu

2. What is literature? Stories, poems, and plays, especially those that are considered to have value as art and not just entertainment. (The Macmillan English Dictionary) Cultural documents that offer a deeper understanding of a country or countries. (Basnet and Mounfold) The interpretation that the reader gives to the text. (Eagleton)

3. DIFFERENT MODELS OF TEACHING LITERATURE IN CLASS • THE CULTURAL MODEL: • views a literary text as a product (a source of information about the target culture) • the most traditional approach • will examine the social, political, and historical background to a text, literary movements, and genres • there is no specific language work done • teacher oriented

4. DIFFERENT MODELS OF TEACHING LITERATURE IN CLASS (continued) • THE LANGUAGE MODEL • learner centered • the teacher can choose to focus on general grammar and vocabulary • the teacher can choose to use stylistic analysis (to help learners read and study literature more competently)

5. DIFFERENT MODELS OF TEACHING LITERATURE IN CLASS (continued) • THE PERSONAL GROWTH MODEL • process-based approach • learner-centered • encourages learners to draw on their own opinions, feelings, and personal experiences • it aims for interaction between the text and the reader in English

6. HOW TO CHOOSE THE BEST Multicultural Books

7. JOSEPH BRUCHAC--suggestions for selecting Native American literature: • Select books that depict characters from a well-defined individual nation, as opposed to generic Indians. • Make available books that reveal today’s Native American cultures. • Talk about values Native American cultures share, such as respect and reverence for living things. • Avoid books that suffer from “the Dances with Wolves Syndrome”--books in which all Indians are noble and all white people are bad.

8. GARY SOTO: “Find out whether the author is from the Mexican-American culture. If not, be wary. It can’t be done from the outside--it’s too hard to get it right.” • Select books that show Hispanic women in contemporary roles. • Share biographies of Latinos so students understand Latinos’ contributions to the U.S. and to the world. • Use picture books and novels as a way to inspire students to learn more about the history and culture of the Latino groups. • Look for stories that use Spanish words and phrases.

9. FLOYD COOPER (illustrator): “I try to be true to the culture and take the reader there. (…) Hopefully my illustrations will strike a certain chord, bring back a certain memory, and help you feel the characters are someone you know.” • African-American experiences are diverse and unique. • Reject books with offensive expressions, negative attitudes, or stereotypes. • Don’t ignore these books because there are no children of color in class.

10. PATRICIA POLACCO: “My mother’s people were Russian Jews who emigrated here at the turn of the century. My father’s family is shanty Irish. (…) I’m used to seeing people of different races and cultures and religions in my living room. Most kids don’t have that environment. When they can hear stories that celebrate our diversity, hopefully they’ll come away from them with a renewed respect for people who are different from them.”

11. PATRICIA POLACCO: • Seek out good literature with a strong plot and believable characters development. • Make sure the illustrations and text do not leave the students with stereotypes. • Before sharing a book about the Holocaust with students, think whether your students are mature enough to handle it. • Avoid books that infer that there was a single cause for or a simple answer to the Holocaust, or that stereotype events or characters, whether Jewish or German. They should address issues of human rights and oppression in a way that shows that people living under brutal conditions often did so with dignity.

12. YUMI HEO: “I came to America from a small town in Korea six years ago. When I was at the School of Visual Arts in New York City, I did a book about the racial disharmony there. An editor said it would be difficult to publish, but she encouraged me to write a Korean immigrant story. So I wrote and illustrated <One Afternoon>” • Search for stories that exhibit values inherent in many Asian cultures such as cooperation and a respect for family and tradition. • Ensure that the events depicted are historically accurate or plausible.

13. YUMI HEO • Asian-American children, as well as others in the class, should perceive the characters as competent problem-solvers, responding in positive ways to the challenges they confront. • Include stories set in other countries, thus providing students with a richer description of the cultural roots of Asian-American students.

14. SELECTING MULTICULTURAL BOOKS Important points to consider: • illustrations • author’s perspective • appealing stories • tough issues • general accuracy • stereotypes • setting • language • epithets Source:Mary-Louise Newling

15. Let us put our minds together and see what life can make for our children. Tatanka Iotanko Sitting Bull, Lakota Sioux, 1877