Planning for progression? Norwegian L1 teachers’ conception of literature teaching and literary competence throughout lower secondary education

Starting from the premise that there may be a discrepancy between how teachers and students understand the term ‘literature’, this article explores the ability of 10th grade students to define the concept of ‘literature’. It argues that such an undertaking is relevant in light of a similar discrepancy between literary studies and literature: while the first adopts an increasingly inclusive definition of ‘literature’, publications on the concept of literary competence still employ a strongly normative view of literature. Drawing on empirical observations from a Dutch research project in which students discussed the literary quality of text fragments in jury groups, the article demonstrates that students hold highly heterogeneous ideas about the definition of literature. The analysis of survey responses, transcribed student conversations and jury posters reveals that a minority of students are able to provide a reasoned definition of ‘literature’, while a significant portion equates literary texts with books in general or stories amenable to narratological analysis. Based on these observations, the article suggests expanding the operationalization of literary competence in Alter & Ratheiser’s recent model to include the concept of ‘taxonomic competence’, which encompasses students’ ability to differentiate between literary and non-literary texts through reasoned argumentation.

Section: The Notion Of 'Literature' In Literature Didactics and Liter...supporting

confidence: 61%

“She doesn’t consider it to be real literature”

Jeroen Dera

2024

“…Several labels could be applied to justifications of this kind. As mentioned, "life skills" (Fodstad & Husabø, 2021) or "personal/individual growth" (Gourvennec et al, 2020;Witte & Sâmihăian, 2013) are terms suggested in previous research. One higher education professor highlights the close connection between developing a language for emotions and becoming surer of one's own identity: "Through literature we gain the distance provided by fiction to what is at issue, which makes literature especially apt for approaching experiences and emotions we are otherwise silent about, have difficulty sharing, or difficulty exploring."…”

Section: Knowing Me Knowing Youmentioning

confidence: 86%

Justifications for Teaching Literature

Myren-Svelstad

Gruters

2022

The role and importance of imaginative literature in L1 education is a topic of continuous debate. In Norway, working with imaginative literature in several genres, and from various linguistic origins, is only one of several components in the L1 subject. In this article, we present the results of a survey aiming to investigate what literature can and should do in school, according to teachers. Using a qualitative hermeneutic content analysis, we analyze and categorize the survey results. We are guided by an affirmative approach to teachers’ competences, discussing the extent to which respondents demonstrate subject matter content knowledge. Our analysis enables us to isolate eight categories of justification, many of which show significant overlap with central tenets in literary theory, the curriculum, and L1 scholarship. However, we also find indications that critical literacy is undervalued. Furthermore, the Norwegian curriculum arguably motivates an instrumental use of literature as a way of developing general literacy or adding perspectives to topics addressed in other subjects. We propose visualizing the justifications teachers express in a model taking into account two dimensions: 1) whether they imply a primary focus on the text, the reader, or the context including the author; and 2) whether their goal is benefitting the student (e.g., in terms of skills) or promoting societal change. This model is intended to provide a flexible typology which literary educators at any level can use in order to critically assess their practice.

“…A number of recent studies suggest that students' experiences of having their interpretive conventions challenged by defamiliarization in complex literature can provide a specific pedagogical potential both by encouraging students' interpretive engagement for interpretation (Gourvennec, 2017;Johansen, 2017;Sønneland, 2019), and by articulating critical aspects of the reading process (Levine, 2019;Miall, 2006). This orientation represents a shift from experiencebased pedagogy, in which students' familiarity with the literary content is the means to promote engaged reading (Alvermann & Hruby, 2001;Fodstad & Husabø, 2021).…”

Section: The Quality Of Openness and Ambivalence In Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

Dialogue and defamiliarization

Tengberg,

Johansson,

Sønneland

2023

To lead discussions about complex literary texts in a classroom of teenagers is no doubt a challenging task for many teachers. It is therefore meaningful to explore how teachers’ management of literature discussions can be supported and improved. Prior research indicates a positive relationship between certain modes of discussion and increased literary awareness. Yet observational studies underscore that open-ended, probing discussions about literature are scarce in today’s classrooms. This article elaborates the theoretical framing of an intervention designed to improve the quality of teacher-led discussions about complex literary texts. We argue that dialogic theory, appropriate for highlighting the processes of classroom interaction, needs to be supplemented by theory that offers an explanation for the role of the literary text and its impact on both readers and their interaction processes. For this purpose, we examine the conceptual matching between theory of dialogic teaching, drawing on Bakhtin’s idea of meaning making as inherently dialogic, and theories of literary reception, specifically Shklovsky’s concept defamiliarization and recent didactical analysis of Derrida’s concept undecidability. The intention of the paper is to suggest a theoretical framing of the intervention, one that allows for both analysis of the aesthetic processes of reading and talking about literature, and specific guidance of teachers’ management of those discussions.