Language arts teachers have usually restricted themselves to showing video interpretations of novels or filmed renderings of Shakespeare's plays, for fear of being labeled as that "person who shows movies." But film can be used as a "bridge" to other works of literature, i.e., terms, devices. For example, if the teacher wants…

Reviews the 1990 conference on children's classics that was sponsored by Drexel University and the Free Library of Philadelphia. Highlights include summaries of and excerpts from papers by author and illustrator Wendy Watson and Anita Lobel, and information on the recipient of the 1990 Drexel Citation, author and illustrator Carolyn Croll. (LRW)

The teaching of writing and formation of the literary canon are influenced by two myths. First, writers must assume they will be neglected, misunderstood, and unappreciated in their lifetimes, and second, the writer will prevail if the work is good. Both ideas are examples of underlying religious metaphor in writing instruction and publication.…

This paper illustrates several examples of visual science fiction use in teaching literary classics, and is based on the philosophy that students share a visual cultural literacy through movies and television, types of representation with which they are more familiar than with literary texts. It claims that visual science fiction can be utilized…

Popular literature consists of novels, stories, and essays--and by extension, plays, movies, and teledramas--that attract a significant audience. Having students study popular fiction in English classes can help to "hook" the non-reader because popular fiction is more accessible and simpler in structure and language than the literary classics.…

Contrasts world of the 1970s with that of today with special reference to publications for children and young adults. Discussion covers adult and adolescent best sellers, librarian selection and review of new materials by librarians, trends in juvenile publishing, use of paperback books, reading interests, minority representation, and the…

As most any high school or college English teacher can verify, it is the rare group of students that approaches the study of Shakespeare with anything other than a mixture of anxiety over the difficulty of making sense of the plays' language and annoyance that, once again, they will be forced to engage in an activity they find both unjustifiably…

A founding co-editor of Bryn Mawr Classical Review (BMCR) examines the costs and benefits of networked electronic communication for scholars. Some of the tools that have the potential to change the way scholars work include: online reference; online productivity information; e-mail as a productivity tool; and formal online publishing endeavors. A…

A study compared the results of a 1986 survey on the opinions of preservice teachers with those of a survey conducted in 1984 by William Bennett (at that time chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities). Bennett's survey asked respondents to list 30 works that students should be expected to read before high school graduation.…

Often regarding the "great books" as too difficult for elementary school age children to comprehend, teachers have given students reading assignments that are less than challenging and have risked causing them to dislike reading because it is relatively uninteresting. However, it is possible to expose very young children to works such as…

A two-year ethnographic study of dialogic literary circles in Spain explored the learning experience of adults who participated in them. In a dialogic society, educational projects providing real opportunities for transformation and overcoming inequalities usually had a dialogic orientation and promoted instrumental learning as well as critical…