Provides an update on the progress being made at the National Research Center on Literature Teaching and Learning. Discusses research-in-progress with teachers struggling to adapt their instruction to a response-based approach to reading literature. Presents a framework of optional strategies for teachers. (RS)

As teachers experiment with the many related types of response-centered approaches (including whole language and literature-based instruction), many are uncertain about the place of instruction in these paradigms and their role in it. For pedagogical purposes, it is unproductive to conceptualize the teaching and learning of reasoning in general…

The current national focus on critical thinking is unnecessarily narrow in its scope, and this mitigates against essential changes being made in the thinking and reasoning activities experienced by students. Two shortcomings, however, restrict the possibilities for change: the first results from taking a generic (versus discipline-based) view of…

Examines the approaches students use when reading for literary and informational purposes. Finds four recursive stances readers take in relation to the text: (1) being out and stepping into an envisionment; (2) being in and moving through an envisionment; (3) stepping back and rethinking what one knows; and (4) stepping out and objectifying the…

A series of studies conducted over an 8-year period by the National Research Center on Literature Teaching and Learning examined the ways people think when they read literature and the ways in which instruction could support those kinds of thinking. The research studies were based on both a constructivist and social/communicative tradition. Some…

Based on a series of studies of the ways in which literary imagination can be used to explore options, solve problems, and understand others, this book is about reading literature, thinking about it, and teaching it. The book, focusing on literature instruction, offers a way to rethink the contribution of literature to intelligent thinking as well…

To better understand the nature of students' approaches to literary understanding, a study compared the meaning-making approaches of traditionally judged above and below average readers. In all, 144 protocols were analyzed from 24 students (12 seventh graders and 12 eleventh graders, half in each class judged as above and half as below average…

To investigate how Mexican-American students constructed meaning from English texts when engaged in reading and writing activities, a study examined 12 fifth grade Mexican-American students who lived in a "barrio" with literacy in both Spanish and English. The aim was to tap the envisionments (text interpretations or understandings, and…

A qualitative study examined the ways in which middle school and high school students create meanings when they are reading literary and non-literary texts. Subjects, 18 seventh-grade and 18 eleventh-grade students attending schools in an inner city or a suburban school district and judged by their teachers to be either above, at, or below average…

A study analyzed in detail one 37-minute classroom literature discussion to better understand how to foster students' critical reasoning. It investigated the characteristics of classroom interactions that support students in the process of responding to literature, the roles of the participants, and how the teacher can structure the tasks and use…