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Dr. Margaret A. Deitrich
Professor of Education
Austin Peay State University
Clarksville, TN USA

Recently I asked a veteran primary teacher to identify the book titles that she must share with her students each year. After giving me the list, she made a comment that I was not expecting,” why don’t people understand that students need to read good books and have time to write. Why is it so hard for some to include reading quality books and writing each day?” I knew we shared the same passion for reading and writing but she never expressed it with such frustration before.

Best Practice says or indicates, has been the buzz phrase for the last few years so it was important to reconnect with what is considered Best Practice for reading and writing. The practices that directly relate to reading (literature) and writing are: (Zemelman, Daniels, Hyde, pp. 54,82)

Reading Increase

Writing Increase

Reading aloud to students

Time for independent reading

Student selected reading material

Exposure to all genres

Writing before and after reading

Reading in the content fields

Helping students choose topics

Establish real purposes for writing

Use all phases of the writing process

Writing for real audiences

Publishing written works

Writing across the curriculum for learning

Most teachers have had at least one literature course and most will say they enjoyed the course. However, the positive aspects of the course are being lost or overshadowed by the increased emphasis on accountability and high stakes testing. Some teachers start teaching for the test the first week of school. Several years ago while presenting a workshop on using poetry in the classroom a teacher said “I can’t do anything with poetry until after testing.” At the conclusion of the workshop, this same teacher remarked, “I guess I should be using poetry all year!” Many teachers are convinced that they must use the adopted textbooks exclusively with literature being used only if all other work is completed.

The International Reading Association (IRA) and the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) stated that, “the single most important activity for building these understandings and skills (literacy Skills) essential for reading success appears to be reading aloud to children. Children who are read to frequently during their preschool years have been found to have better language skills and reading comprehension when they enter school. Moreover, these advantages appear to persist into the later schools years”. (Kuder and Hosit p. 107)

The first literature class of the new semester I tell the students that they must do three activities every day when they have their own classes. These three are: read aloud daily, provide time for students to read their self-selected book, and provide time for students to write authentic responses to what they are reading. No doubt the first and every year is overwhelming but including literature, with all its aspects, has more positive results on students: acquisition of knowledge, becoming more global in their perspectives, gain empathy, increase vocabulary, word knowledge, and comprehension.

Working with a special education teacher who has a self-contained Comprehensive Development Class (CDC) helped me gain more information about her daily schedule and routines combined with her drive to help the students gain information and be successful in all curricular areas. She was required to teach Social Studies with continents being a major topic. Each student was given a booklet for each continent that helped them focus on the areas and specific countries. They completed various assignments that were in the booklets, such as: country or countries, imports and exports, food, geographic features, and major cities. Literature from one country was used to help with the cultural aspects. Patricia Polacco and Mem Fox were favorites.

Poetry is the most avoided/neglected genre. Educators feel uncomfortable with it so it is very seldom presented. With elementary students, we need to provide opportunities for enjoyment and growth. They like to hear the rhyme and rhythm, participating in choral reading, reciting poetry written for two voices, writing autobiographic list poems, plus extending poetry experiences with art, music, and movement. Two unplanned results from using poetry occurred with a kindergarten and first grade students. The kindergarten students had experienced a tragic event in the school district and the teacher was doing a poetry unit, which she decided to continue. Once she began sharing the poems she could visibly see the children relax and enjoy the poems. Several first grade students were able to grasp money amounts while listening to the teacher read Smart and manipulate paper bills and coins as they were mentioned in the poem.

Over the years I have made the statement that a poem can be found for every subject but none could be found last year when working with latitude and longitude so we wrote acrostic poems for these topics. Oral poetry reciting helps students improve fluency while the writing activities help convey how important each word is and how important the supportive writing skills of capitalization, punctuation, and spelling are to the writing process.

Literature groups are important because they provide readers with an opportunity to select a book they want to read as part of a peer group of six to eight students. While involved with the group, all the readers use the Language Arts skill of: listening, speaking, reading and writing. Since the groups are heterogeneous the students gain in self-efficiency and social skills. So often students are grouped homogeneously thus diminishing content interactions among students with different academic abilities.

In 1995, the International Reading Association (IRA) and the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) combined their efforts to recognize the communication changes that have occurred worldwide. Now, viewing and visually representing are included as part of the Language Arts along with listening, speaking, reading, and writing. More and more books are being reproduced in film versions, which can be used to tap critical thinking skills during discussions of book vs. film. Film versions are available for: Sarah, Plain and Tall, Because of Winn Dixie, Harry Potter, Ella Enchanted, The Polar Express and Lemony Snicket.

Visually representing is a required activity in my Literature and Language Art classes. Students read a chapter book then develop a project that depicts the essence of the story. Doing these helps students who struggle with the traditional Language Arts activities or those who have abilities in art, music, design, construction, and cooking. Recent projects have included: a swing and a plate with the dust jacket picture painted on it for Everything on a waffle, a box made into a tavern with a green man on the outside to represent the Greenman Tavern in Crispin: The cross of lead, a door for The Devil’s Arithmetic, kite with Korean symbols for The Kite Fighters, a boat with a secret bottom for Number the Stars and singing a Negro Spiritual after sharing F is for freedom.

Literature can add so much to the curriculum but the balance must be preserved. Districts spend thousands and thousands of dollars purchasing textbooks for classroom use and they expect them to be used for instructional purposes. However, no matter what books are used, they do not contain all the information about a subject so additional materials should be available to increase and extend knowledge, which literature can do. Another aspect of literature that is important is its ability to give a reader “feeling knowledge”. A History text gives information about the Holocaust but only through reading the stories of survivors and those who risked their lives to save others do we encounter “feeling knowledge”.

Another major issue that must be addressed is assessment. How to determine what grades to put on report cards? Again a balance is needed between formal and informal assessment. The district and state standards can certainly be addressed with the formal and informal assessments. Rubrics are helpful with writing and non-written responses, along with writing samples, lists of books read during a grading period, teacher recorded observations, and tapes of students reading aloud. So many other ways are available that convey information about student learning. Using only formal tests results does not give the whole authentic learning picture of students.

It is essential to create enthusiasm for learning within the teachers and students. Teachers must take up the challenge to reevaluate what they are or are not doing. How can “legal” changes be made in the classroom? How can literature and writing be integrated into all curricular areas? What activities will feed the learning soul of the teacher and students? What changes will make Monday mornings magical for all who enter the classroom?

Zemelman, S., Daniels,H., & Hyde,A. (1998). Best practice. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Kuder,S.J. & Hasit, C. (2002). Enhancing literacy for all students. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill Prentice Hall.

Snicket, L. (2001). The Trouble Begins Series. Harper-Collins. (US Publication).

Literature in the Diverse Classroom: Positive Effects on Student Achievement

Literature in the Diverse Classroom:
Positive Effects on Student Achievement