Newmark: Navigating between YA & Classic Lit

Although I am still a firm believer in teaching classic literature to adolescents, I have seen my students yearn for a “mirror” to better understand their lives, and classic literature, unless explicitly tied to other texts, cannot provide this “mirror” for urban adolescents to explore their identities and the communities to which they belong. Gibbons et al. (2006) argues that Young Adult literature is, in fact, the mirror students long for, and finds that “part of the problem, as most teachers are fully aware, is that the classics are often too distant from our students’ experiences or the reading level is too difficult” (Kaywell in Gibbons et al., 2006, p. 56). When students do not read at grade level and we ask them to analyze a text that is levels above—and too far from their own lives—are we asking something unreasonable of our students? Perhaps.

Yet, “part of the problem of students’ dislike of classic literature may—I’m hedging here—lie in outmoded and uninspiring methods of teaching that literature (Hipple, 1996, p. 16). If we choose classic texts that are at or near our students’ reading level, and we manage to develop lessons that evoke thought and feeling, that allow for reflection and interaction with peers, perhaps, the teaching of classic literature can be saved. Its purpose will be two-fold: students will learn to work within a community to problem-solve, to ask for help, to teach one another, and students will learn to value “windows” to people, cultures, and language other than their own.

In a unit on Romeo and Juliet, my students adapted scenes to contemporary settings, and to do this, they had to understand and appreciate Shakespearian language—they had to “translate” his language into their own and to navigate the similarities and differences. They saw the usefulness of each discourse and learned to travel between two vastly different times and people. Not only did they have a ball developing and performing their plays, they also learned the value and purpose of multiple discourses. Although they had difficulty reading the play at certain points, when working as a group, they took to the challenge. Furthermore, what appeared as “vastly different” people became as real and relevant to them as characters from their own lives.

Teaching Romeo and Juliet was not all fun and games. When we were not role-playing, there was some moaning and groaning, especially because we read the play slowly and they began to lose interest over time. Next year, I would pair it with Street Love by Walter Dean Myers, and in doing so, my students will once again be able to connect their own lives, their own language, to that of Shakespeare. They will come to see that poetry is poetry, no matter what century it is written in. I think the key to reviving classic literature is to ensure that students are involved in authentic and “inspiring” projects while also providing that “mirror” adolescents so desperately need in their search for the self.

References

Gibbons, L. C., Dail, J. S. & Stallworth, B. J. (Summer, 2006). Young adult literature in the English
curriculum today: Classroom teachers speak out. The Alan review, 33 (3), 53-61.

Hipple, T. (March, 1996). It's the THAT, teacher. English journal, 86 (3), 15-17.