English 480H: Methods and Materials of High School English

English 504: Methods and Materials of High School English

English 565: English Literature Since 1900

Pol: "What do you read, my Lord?"
                                                                   Pol: "I mean the matter that you 
                                                                           read, my Lord."
Ham: "Words, words, words." 
                                                                    Ham: "Slanders, sir ..."
Pol: "What is the matter, my Lord?" 
                                                                     Pol: "Though this be madness, yet 
                                                                     there is method in't." 
Ham: "Between who?" 

**************************************************************** 

Required Text: Evans (ed.), The Riverside Shakespeare. Houghton, Mifflin. 

Recommended Text: Reynolds, Text Into Performance. Penguin 

Course Requirements: 

1. Regular attendance and active participation; you will be told to drop the class if you have more than three (3) unexcused absences or if you are chronically tardy (more than two or three minutes late on more than three occasions). 

2. Regular (every week) *response paper or *quiz; papers collected in a folder and graded at end of semester; quizzes graded traditionally. Papers due on date assigned; late papers automatically reduced by one letter grade per day late. 

3. Reading one play on your own for final examination (not discussed in class). Selection due by ..... 

4. One final comprehensive examination and one major paper of approximately 12 -15 pp., due according to first letter of your last name; papers of fewer than 3,000 words will be returned ungraded. All work must be YOUR original work; any work not your own must be properly cited and noted at the end of the paper. Failure to do so will result in a failing grade for that paper. Plagiarism will result in a failing grade for the course. 

5. Adequate daily preparation (keeping up with the reading) and appropriate work habits within the workshop groups. 

Grading Scheme: 
*Quizzes collectively (less worst grade).......   20% 
*Folder Grade (final drafts only)......               15% 
Major paper (3,000 words; final draft only)... 25% 
Final comprehensive examination .............      25% 
Workshop & class participation, attendence.. 15%

English 480H: Methods and Materials of High School English

"All men [and women] by nature desire to know ... we think art more truly knowledge than experience is: for artists can teach, and men of mere experience cannot." Aristotle, METAPHYSICS 

Ground Rules for Teachers in Training. 

1. Although this course is aimed at undergraduate students who have not had previous teaching experience, you will be expected to conduct yourself as a professional. I will treat you as a principal would treat a first year teacher. You prove to me that you're worthy of being re-hired (i.e., passing 480 with a "B" or better) at the end of a given time period. This new "role" has a number of interesting dynamics; you now have more "power" than an ordinary student if you can find out what it is and how to use it effectively. It is absolutely vital that you do. 

2. Two to three lesson plans are required for your final grade -- one each on drama, fiction, and poetry, with each plan having a writing component to it as well. Generally, at least one of the lesson plans must be made for a one-period class, and one for a unit of two to four weeks. Drafts of each plan will be given a critique by your peers in several workshop sessions before I see near-final form. 

3. All lesson plans (in final form) must be copied (xeroxed) for the whole class to share -- that is, a copy of each plan for each student in the class and one of each for me. These will be due during the last week of the semester. 

4. All lesson plans will be evaluated by a) your peers in class, and b) by me in conference; they will be judged initially as AC (acceptable) or UN (unacceptable). If judged the latter, the plans must be redone before the final due date all work is to be handed in. Final course grade will be computed by my summary evaluation of the two or three acceptable lesson plans; otherwise, NO grades will be given during the semester (ask why in class). Conferences will be held in my office, Reavis Hall 330; phone & voice mail (815) 753-6632. For messages when I'm not in the office, call 753-0611 M-F between 8:00am and 4:25pm, or feel free to call me at home (608 873-7961) during reasonable times on the weekend. My e-mail address is: tb0jvk1@corn.cso.niu.edu (all lower case).

5. You will be required to do one or more video-taped lessons in front of your colleagues as well as to participate in several teacher-training simulation games of "it;" I will explain "it" later. 

6. You are required to sign-up immediately (that's as soon as possible, quickly, now, pronto) for an e-mail address; the university provides them for all students. You merely have to go to the computer center (in Sven Parson Bldg), get a log-on ID, go to the nearest computer accessible to NIU e-mail and send me a message. I expect this done within the first week of classes. Check your e-mail box at least twice a week - Mondays and Wednesdays; I will be sending you regular messages about work, preparation, reminders, etc. Feel free to e-mail me as often as is necessary or even just because you want to say "hello." 

7. You are required to observe a HS and/or Middle School classroom (at your assignment site) during the Methods semester for a total of 40 clock hours; these 40 hours are part of ILAS 401, a required course for passing Methods and for approval to student teach. ILAS 401 is part of the state-mandated 100 pre-clinical observation hours required of all certification candidates. Judy P. will give you a folder describing details by the first week (if you didn't get one at the meeting Friday) and for the check-sheet of activities to observe /perform. The four texts you are required to read for ILAS 401 will be referred to and elements in them discussed during various times in this semester. I urge you do keep up with that reading schedule as well as the one for 480. 

8. I expect you to familiarize yourself with this year's back issues of the English Journal, Language Arts, College English, and CCC, as well as to subscribe to one or more N.C.T.E. journals. Those aiming for middle school teaching should, as well, look at Voices from the Middle. 

9. I am going to ask all of you to keep a daily journal (five days a week) in which I hope you will: record interesting thoughts and impressions of class, write down ideas that you will want to follow up on in the future, tell me some things that you'd find difficult to say to me personally, etc.. Since one of our primary goals is personality transformation, I am hoping this journal (keep it during student teaching as well) will give you a personal record of where you've been and where you're going. I will collect them once a week; you may claim them the next day in my office (or I'll bring them to the next class session. They will not be graded in any way!! One these entries (your choice) MUST be e-mailed to me -- each week. 

10. I strongly recommend (I would require this if I could) that NO ONE take more than 12 to 13 class hours this semester and that NO ONE work more than 10 - 12 hours per week. Methods is a time-consuming and demanding class and no special consideration will be given to anyone who takes on a load greater than the one mentioned above. 

11. All undergraduate students who have not taken the required undergraduate course, English 207T, Grammar, will be expected to have basic fluency in English grammar before beginning English 480. This requirement may be satisfied either by independent study (see book list below) followed by successful completion of the department's grammar examination, or by concurrently enrolling in this semester's English 207T. 

11. Required Texts:
P. Fussel, Poetic Form and Poetic Meter. Random
K. Koch, Rose, Where Did You Get That Red? .Vintage
N. Atwell, In the Middle. 2nd ed. Boynton/Cook
G. Orwell, Animal Farm. Signet
W. Shakespeare, Hamlet and Romeo & Juliet. Bedford
R. Noguchi, Grammar & the Teaching of Writing. NCTE
Beaty & Hunter, New Worlds of Literature. Norton
J. Phelan, Reading People, Reading Plots. . Chicago
T. Morrison. Song of Solomon. Dell
D. Bartholomae & A. Petrosky, Facts, Artifacts, & Counterfacts.. Heinemann 
Salomone & Davis, Teaching Shakespeare into the 21st Century. Ohio UP
VCB Packet (available by Tuesday, first week of classes). 

Recommended Texts: R. Scholes, Textual Power. Cornell
S. Rimmon-Kenan, Narrative Fiction. Yale
B. Neman, Teaching Students to Write, 2nd ed. Oxford
C. Weaver, Lessons to Share: On Teaching Grammar in Context. Heinemann 

12. Required Subscriptions:
Any two (2) N.C.T.E. Journals from the following:
English Journal (for Secondary English Teachers); 
Language Arts (for primary teachers); 
College English (for university teachers); 
CCC (for teachers of writing);
RTE Research in the Teaching of English (for empirical researchers). 

Or you may choose to subscribe to one of the state or regional journals: 
ITE (Illinois Teachers of English); or 
The English Record (New York State), etc. 

"All men [and women] by nature desire to know ... we think art more truly knowledge than experience is: for artists can teach, and men of mere experience cannot." Aristotle, METAPHYSICS 

Ground Rules for Teachers in Training. 

1. This course is aimed at post-graduate students who have had some previous teaching experience 

2. Two to three lesson plans are required for your final grade -- one each on drama, fiction, and poetry, with each plan having a writing component to it as well. Generally, one of the lesson plans must be made of a one-day class, and one for a unit of two to four weeks. 

3. All lesson plans (in final form) must be copied (xeroxed) for the whole class to share -- that is, a copy of each plan for each student in the class and one of each for me. 

4. You will be required to do one or more video-taped lessons in front of your colleagues as well as to participate in several teacher-training simulation games of "it;" I will explain "it" later. 

5. If you are taking this course for Illinois Certification (teaching license), you are required to observe a HS and/or Middle School classroom (at your assignment site) during the Methods semester for a total of 40 clock hours; these 40 hours are part of ILAS 401, a required course for passing Methods and for approval to student teach. 

6. I am going to ask all of you to keep a daily journal (five days a week). 

7. All graduate students who have not taken the required undergraduate course, English 207T, Grammar, will be expected to have basic fluency in English grammar before beginning English 504. 

8. Required Texts:
P. Fussel, Poetic Form and Poetic Meter. Random
K. Koch, Rose, Where Did You Get That Red?. Vintage
N. Atwell, In the Middle, 2nd ed. Boynton/Cook
G. Orwell, Animal Farm . Signet
W. Shakespeare, Hamlet and Romeo & Juliet. Bedford 
R. Noguchi, Grammar & the Teaching of Writing NCTE
Salomone & Davis, Teaching Shakespeare /21st Century. Ohio UP
D. Bartholomae & A. Petrosky, Facts, Artifacts, & Counterfacts. Heinemann
VCB Packet (available by Tuesday, first week of classes). 

Recommended Texts:
R. Scholes, Textual Power. Cornell
S. Rimmon-Kenan, Narrative Fiction Yale
C. Weaver, Lessons to Share: Teaching Grammar. Heinemann 

9. Required Subscriptions:
Any two (2) N.C.T.E. Journals from the following groups:
1) English Journal; Language Arts; College English; 
2) CCC; or RTE Research in the Teaching of English. 

English 565: English Literature Since 1900

For those of us who went to graduate school in the late 1960s believing that modernism -- as the topic of study in English literature courses -- was the equivalent of "what's happenin' now," it is curious and difficult to believe that modernism as it is commonly understood is as much an historical genre today as romantic or renaissance literature. Four short months from today, the whole of the 20th century will be wrapped up, classified, cataloged, and turned over to the bibliographers for interment with the other historical entities studied by that curious, dispassionately passionate breed that we have all come to recognize: ourselves. 

At least, we say to ourselves, we already know what MODERNISM is. The task ahead is to do what, say, Victorian scholars have done for almost 100 years: give over the process of mere catalogue, take advantage of the perspective gained, and rethink, revise, and strengthen what we have already established. For scholars in 2028 and beyond, however, one may ask: what do we call that period between the end of World War II and 2000? In our mania for catalogue, we really shouldn't call any part of the "old" 20th century "contemporary," should we? If not, what do we call it? 

More interesting than mere nomenclature, what are the attributes of that 55 year period? As important, what do we read to find such attributes? WHAT we read will be a problem. We've got to survey 1/2 of this century's (ie, contemporary) British literature while we're still living in the middle of it. Talk about shooting at moving targets from a moving platform! What you have in front of you is my rather half-baked attempt at beginning that reading process; please, in your later years, be kind when you think of this class because we will have to leave out pages of lists. 

We will read a selection of the following
1) Antonia Susan Byatt, The Game (1967).
2) David Lodge, Nice Work (1988).
3). David Storey, Mimesis & the Human Animal.
4). Salmon Rushdie, Midnight's Children (1980).
5). Graham Swift, Waterland (1983).
6). Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day (1989).
7). Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient (1992).
8). Tom Stoppard, Travesties (1975).
9). Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited (1945).
10. Steven Connor, The English Novel in History, 1950-1995 (1996). 

Requirements:
1. Regular attendance and active class participation.
2. One critical/research paper of approximately 20 - 25 pages;
3. Two or more brief in-class reports (10 min each) and several short papers (2 -3 pp.).
4. Final comprehensive examination in the form of an NIU Literary Convention, with all papers being read aloud to colleagues & thence critiqued. 

We could have as easily read something (or something else) by any or all of the following British writers: Kingsley Amis and/or his son, Martin Amis, Beryl Bainbridge, J.G. Ballard, Julian Barnes, William Boyd, Malcolm Bradbury, John Braine, Anthony Burgess, Angela Carter, William Cooper, Margaret Drabble, Maggie Gee, Russell Hoban, Michael Innes, P.D. James, John LeCarre, Doris Lessing, Colin MacInnes, Oliva Manning, Iris Murdock, Jean Rhys, Paul Scott, Tom Sharpe, Muriel Spark, Emma Tennant, Joanna Trollope, John Wain, Angus Wilson, and Jeanette Winterson. 

We could throw in a Canadian like Robertson Davies and we will do one by Michael Ondaatje, but too much of that could open the door to the vastness of commonwealth literature, and that's a whole course for another day. 

So what did you study in the old days? says your grandchild. Well dear, I did take Knapp's English 568 near the end of the century and it did me a world of good. Many mysteries were unfolded and searching for those that were not led me to the successful human being that I am and that you are today. So you see, Vyrginia, there really is a Father Santa Christmas! Now, go back to your VR The Hobbit and leave Grandpa to his cyberpoetics and his liter of Guinness.