Strategies
Student work
I want student work to show that they have begun to be able to move back and forth between their reality and their and others’ versions of fantasy. In addition to close reading and annotation, and viewing exercises and tracing plot structures and other literary elements, we will exercise our own imaginations in two planned final assignments. The first is an individual written example of imaginative fiction. The second is a collaborative piece of installation art based on an issue of the students’ choice. The first assignments will be preparing students for the final two. Along the way, in trying to get students to interact richly with the works, I will also encourage them to follow their own questions and interests to let the works open up to them and to display their understanding in methods that make sense to them. The strategies here are intended to tie in to the hermeneutic and multimodal literacy theories of making meaning from literature explained above.
Visual literacy
We are bombarded with imagery all day. It makes sense that we include critical “seeing” along with our critical reading. We know the importance of this multimodal literacy for struggling students. My students, especially those who struggle, are very responsive to still and moving pictures. Image fills in gaps in understanding and reinforces strategies for analysis. Some see form or tone in image more clearly than in text. They learn to slow down and see details as they are not inclined to do with text. The learned skills can translate to finding meaning in text or other forms of media and provide a sort of hermeneutic approach to understanding. My students are often more comfortable working collaboratively around an image than a text, as well. A good starting place for teachers seeking information on visual literacy is the Visual Thinking Strategies website; of course, there are countless others that are easy to find and tailor to specific lessons.
If a film is an unceasing series of images, are some more valuable than others? What is the cumulative effect of a scene? We will apply tone and mood words, of which there are dozens of lists online, to isolated scenes and search for details that define the selected scenes. We will look from the audience’s point of view as well as the characters’. What does the filmmaker do to get us to experience a specific emotion? We’ll move also from the objective details to the more subjective interpretations then analysis with leading questions and graphic organizers. In addition to still shots and maybe short clips from Oz, we’ll also look at images from the installation of Subtlety.
Model writing
Bloodchild lends its way to deeper consideration of tone, a constant struggle in my classroom now and in my AP classes in the past. They rarely can identify it. Less likely even are they to write it into their own work. However, my students tend to use limited emotion and tone words in their own vocabularies. Not only does building this vocabulary enrich their understanding if the text, it also does so for their own experiences. These words can fill in the space between image and meaning. The associated activity encourages students play with the text by speaking and seeing. Butler frequently wraps dialog in action, potentially clarifying a scene in which the dynamic is unexpected and probably confusing to a reader who doesn’t know to be expecting it in this new genre. For example, “‘Not for anything,’ T’Gatoi said, stroking my mother’s shoulders, toying with her long, graying hair.’” And she guides the dialogue with description that facilitates tone: “‘Lien, can you stand up?’ T’Gatoi asked suddenly.’” The action of the strategy is students modeling pieces of text rich with tone and dialogue but emulating some of Butler’s methods. The intended outcomes are closer readings, deeper connections with tone and character, and more vivid writing of dialogue in the students’ own works.
Visual reading
This second multi-modal strategy should be a nice break for some and a very effective reading strategy for my more struggling readers. Drawing key elements or characters early in a text forces a reader to create mental images. The first benefit is that the words take on meaning. The second is that the reader now has an image to do the action in her head through the rest of the story. I have learned that many of my readers are not able yet to visualize a story mentally as it plays out on the page, so they miss the visual hooks that help them retain the words and information they read. Forcing image works for setting, character, and action. After drawing the images as they see them, they can turn around and describe them again, this time with their own word choices, adding layered and more individualized understanding of the scene or character. How are their word choices different from the writer’s? What is the text image saying to them?
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