Hot issues

Dear Colleagues, Oxford-Russia Fund project participants,

Normally working with this or that novel we have chosen for our students we organize the teaching process in a form of discussions, focusing on the author’s style and ideas. But who leads the choir in your case? Is it the teacher who offers the topics for discussion? Or the students who share their personal opinion on the contents?

The reason for my curiosity at this point is that my students tend to concentrate on hot issues only such as bullying, inequality, racism, etc. These aspects resonate with them and give the basis for hot debates or vivid speeches no matter the aspect under discussion is minor in the text. Thus inequality, for example, becomes the key element of Nice Work by David Lodge, while ethnicism is a turning point in A Week in December by Sebastian Faulks.

The probable reason for such a narrow view is our inability to devote enough time to extensive reading as it has become mainly an extracurricular activity, especially in the case of senior students. In such circumstances we share our reading experience during exams or credits as one of the questions to be answered.

So what is your strategy of book reading and discussion with your students in the framework of current curriculum?

Oksana Khrushcheva, Orenburg State University

Here is an extract from Lydia Bondarenko’s letter in Footpath-12

One problem is that the discussion of the book does not always go the way you plan it to. I do not mean it is wrong or unusual, but sometimes, disappointing. When we were discussing Waterland by Graham Swift with the fourth-year students, they were quite enthusiastic about the personal lives of the characters and their relations, but rather passive, even reluctant to consider the representation of history in the book. While reading and discussing Atonement by Ian McEwan, the attention of the students was focused on the relationships and feelings of the characters, mysteries-solving and there was not much interest in the presentation of historical events in Dunkirk. There are plenty more examples.

The question is, should we follow the trend and let the students simply enjoy the content or should the teacher still push the discussion in another dimension to encompass maybe not-so-exciting but important and serious literary and thematic issues?

Lydia Bondarenko

Crimean Federal University

Several teachers picked up the question: ‘Who leads the choir?’

Basically, I do not think that the question of who leads the choir is correct. Can you imagine that any other discipline teacher consults with students about what to teach? The answer would be – ‘No, we’d rather not (study this)’. Yes, I agree that reading with interest and enthusiasm is a blessing. Only such a happy coincidence occurs not in every group of students.

Bayarma Bazarova,

Buryat State University, Ulan Ude

It is not our students’ task to “share their personal opinion on the contents” of the book. It is the teacher’s task to guide students in their understanding of the multilayered issues from a different cultural perspective: historical context and ethnical background, analyzing the form in which the author molds and presents ideas in order not to diminish the aesthetics of an artwork. A novel, a play and a poem are different containers of the same ingredients, spiced by each author’s individual preferences, served with a different sauce for every connoisseur of art. Think twice if you will read poetry or prose today in your classroom. I am convinced students need both.

Tatiana Klimenko

Trans-Baikal University, Chita

The way I see it, since we assign the books to be read and later discussed in an academic setting, as teachers, we have a responsibility guide our students through the process of reading. This means that I should ask them questions to help them address their attention to the aspects of the text that they otherwise may overlook.

Olga Kolotina

Herzen State Pedagogical university of Russia, St Petersburg

As for our methods of studying the book, there is no need to figure out the Big Boss here ‘leading the choir’ because all the lessons are based on the principals of equality. A teacher and a student have basically the same requirements – to read the book or some passages at home and prepare the tasks based on it to spark other students’ attention. A teacher is no longer a Ruler and Dictator in the world of literature, he has more the role of the Observer or Moderator of the discussion. That’s why as a part of the home assignment students are given the task to write down not less than 20 questions (on both text and moral issues) based on the given book. We normally start working in pairs and mini-groups and later on emerge into whole-class discussion.

Such approach is really fruitful as students tend to come with some witty unexpected ideas.

Svetlana Makarova,

Siberian Federal University, Krasnoyarsk

On the one hand, I tried to ‘lead the choir’ by introducing short extracts for close reading, this approach gives an opportunity to study some literary and stylistic devices to develop my students’ awareness of detail and careful thoughtful reading. On the other hand, I prepared some basic tasks on the stories and thought of some questions to lead and control our discussions in class. My students also like to introduce hot issues in our discussion, for example, some of them saw Joyce’s collection as ‘purely feminist writing’. To prove that these points are relevant for our discussion and the texts under study I asked my students to pick out quotes that could prove their point of view and later we analyzed those quotes in class. We also drew mind-maps of some ideas, problems and themes presented in the stories and in the collection as a whole to visualize their complexity.

Yulia Khokhlova

Northern (Arctic) Federal University, Arkhangelsk

My own classroom practice has shown that the best way at the beginning is to have classroom reading guided. Thus, when I start teaching a class I use a template to organize reading activities. Typically, it includes tasks with focus on language; tasks focusing on culture and tasks for discussion of topics covered in the text. I believe it is the responsibility of the teacher to create a context and purpose for learning. Later, students participate in designing similar activities themselves within this framework or introducing something else that interests them as they do the reading.

Marina Rassokha

Far Eastern Federal University, Vladivostok

Answering your question I, first of all, must admit that teaching literature to foreign learners is totally different from discussing books with native speakers. For us, the language aspect will always be key – which does not mean, of course, that we are unable to discuss the main questions raised in this or that book.

I do not find it shameful at all to give the students some cues – or questions to think about – when they are getting ready for the next home reading session. It is our task to guide them (without telling them what to think or believe) simply drawing their attention to what really seems to be the focus of the author’s attention.

That being said, I totally agree that the easiest thing is discussing something you can personally relate to, so I tried to diversify the discussion by including some questions about the academic world (when we were talking about David Lodge’s Nice Work ), the choices the main characters make (e.g., a middle-aged family man with three kids and a wife he has become alienated from is not something a 20-year-old student can easily relate to, yet they had to talk about that too – and they did! We had some hot discussions there.)

So, yes, sometimes you need to ask the right questions, and even assign some for their home task to dwell upon, instead of simply talking about a book in a way you would discuss a newly-read novel with your close friend.

Svetlana Filon,

Petrozavodsk State University

Does the teacher need to insist on ‘sticking to the text’ in classroom discussions or should she just allow students to use it as a starting point to discuss whatever they take interest in? In my view, this depends on what the teacher sees as her primary aim: if it is to provide students with sufficient speaking practice, then it is no problem if they occasionally get ‘carried away’. On the other hand, if the teacher’s goal is to help students learn the skills of in-depth reading, comprehending and appreciating of the literary text, then more attention should be paid not only to the problems and themes raised by the text but also and maybe even more importantly, on ‘literary mechanics’ (how the text is structured, the use of the figurative language and so on).

Ekaterina Purgina

Urals Federal University

As a rule, it is me who offers the topics for discussion. It is rather difficult for the majority of my students to offer the topic, although they always take a very active part in sharing their opinion on the problems raised in the books.