Background
I teach at a culturally diverse high school in Northern California, a high-performing yet crowded school whose population is primarily Asian, Filipino, and Hispanic. A large number of our students are the children of immigrants and many are English Language Learners (ELL). The challenge this poses is that of cross-curricular focus on the background necessary to establish the beginnings of American literature—including basic Christian theology and enlightenment ideals of the Renaissance.
Teaching both English and American History for the past 8 years, I have continually recognized the striking duality that comprises them both: both contain their prosaic and poetic moments. We are the nation of Abraham Lincoln who can still startle with the symmetry and wonder of a line such as "Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away" 1 that categorically cements a pivotal moral imperative in the heads of successive generations of Americans. We aspire to lyricism in our ambitions and our enterprises and yet still do not entirely take to a consistent diet comprised of lyric or ballad. While Lincoln might interject a rhyme or rhythmic pattern in his prose, we are not populated by Lincolns, nor Kennedys or Reagans for that matter. I bring up presidential examples because I have doggedly straddled between disciplines for so much of my career, with moments like a Lincoln speech illuminating for me what is revelatory and reassuring: facility and precision with language (be it prose or verse) can emerge from nearly any corner of our country and from any background. Likewise teaching history has demonstrated that the contrast in backgrounds of three such men (dire poverty, working class, and elite) helped define the diversity and opportunity of America.
Lincoln stands astride another tradition of relevancy: he is a self-made man and autodidact extraordinaire whose bookshelf was comprised of Blackwell's Law, the Bible, and Shakespeare—cobbling his intellect and articulation from a sparse wellspring and supplementing it with voracious observation (within a diverse environment) and a healthy auditory appetite. While I wouldn't recommend autodidactic pursuit (via the internet or television) the latter elements of Lincoln remain the goal and mean towards spring-boarding my students to proficiency—training their skills of visual and audial observations. Though they are not (or scant few of them) Lincolns—where their experience correlates is in their capacity (from any background and environment) to produce novelty, nuance, and qualitative lyric expression in both their prose and verse. I find their present facility can, like Lincoln, benefit from effective exposure and skill instruction with a relatively finite set of curricular materials. The more discrete the materials, however, the greater the intensity of practice and rigor necessary to fully develop their talents.
I find three principal factors can hamper my students' progress in English: lack of verbal dexterity, lack of interest in American literature, and inability to apply their study of English to their larger extra-curricular environment. Teaching history has highlighted a key distinction that can sometimes make it frustrating to teach across disciplines: US history possesses a narrative thread they can follow—one that supersedes mere chronology. Though sometimes it can seem like one damned thing after another, students generally comprehend the impact of prior ideas upon later ideas. At the end of a school year students recognize the terminus of US history in their own lives; hopefully considering themselves as an evolutionary advance, inheritor of cumulative wealth and or effort.
Junior English can leave them quizzical as to the value or meaning of their course from August to May—wondering "what did it all mean?" I believe that English consequently suffers from not establishing a similar thread and narrative that can be traced throughout the school year. Though students have gained vocabulary and greater verbal potential, they don't always recognize it. Though they may not see American literature has having a set identity—its character can be established through the works encompassed in their texts and associated materials. Lastly, the relevance of American English to enable students to actively and creatively engage their world is continually modeled in the literature of the last three hundred years—what can testify to that fact is its most succinct expression: verse.
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