Missouri Western State College College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Department of English, Foreign Languages, and Journalism English 300: Literature for Children Spring, 2000 Dr. Mike Cadden Class Time and Place: 4:00-6:50 p.m. in SS/C 219 Office Hours: 11 am - 12:30 T/Th; 2-4 pm W; and by appointment. Office Phone: 271-4576 E-mail: cadden@missouriwestern.edu URL: http://www.missouriwestern.edu/eflj/faculty/cadden.asp(A copy of this syllabus can be found on my website) Course Description: What makes a good teacher? Richard Ishler writes in "The Preparation of Elementary School Teachers: A University-Wide Responsibility": Persons who will spend their professional lives as elementary school teachers must be liberally and broadly educated, more so than individuals with other careers, because of their positions as role models for our children--positions that are crucial not only to the students whose lives are directly affected, but to the general society as well. Other than a student's parents, no other person has such an opportunity to influence, to motivate, and to inspire a child to value the intellectual life. In fact, acting as an intellectual role model may well be the single most significant aspect of the teaching profession. English 300 is our opportunity for you to learn about children’s literature as an art form, which will have implications for your teaching, ultimately; but the point of the course isn’t to teach you how to teach children; the point of the course is to teach you about children’s fiction. The two things aren’t at all mutually exclusive, but they also aren’t necessarily the same thing. The course is an introduction to the genre of literature for children. Through critical examinations of folk tales, novels, poems, and picture books, we will attempt to understand how children's literature distinguishes itself from "adult literature”--and when it doesn’t. Consider this course the content course companion to your methods courses: EED 320 (Language Arts Methods), EED 360 (Assessing and Individualizing Reading), EED 380-385 (Reading Approaches), EED 440 (Curriculum Methods and Materials in Early Childhood Education), and EED 483-4 (Practica in Reading). Let’s learn together as much as we can about what makes children’s literature tick. It is my goal that you’ll leave the course more thoughtful about what makes children’s literature the interesting and enjoyable genre that it is--for adults as well as for children. Prerequisite: Successful completion of ENG 108 or 112. ENG 300 is required in the Elementary Education program. This class does not count as an English literature elective for English majors. Required Texts: Jacobs and Tunnell. Children’s Literature, Briefly. McGraw, Eloise. The Moorchild. Paterson, Katherine. Bridge to Terabithia. ---. The Great Gilly Hopkins. White, E. B. Charlotte’s Web. Works by Missouri Author Cheryl Harness to be announced. Evaluation: In-class Exercises and Participation (including attendance): 10% Bibliographic Essay: 30% Reviews (1 book, 1 journal, 1 website, 1 picture book, 1 chapter book): 30% Short Essay: 15% Exam: 15% Attendance: I will take attendance. Please see the College’s Policy Guide governing student attendance. I will consider individual student cases of genuine and documented illness, emergency, or of acting as a representative of Missouri Western as a means to give you the opportunity to make up work. It will be your responsibility to notify me prior to the absence (if possible) and to find out what information was covered during your absence. You are responsible for knowing about date or assignment announcements made during your absence. An excused absence means that you will be given the opportunity to make up work; it is not a free pass. The work must be done even if your absence is excusable. An unexcused absence simply means that your absence and the work you miss cannot be made up. Academic Dishonesty: All cases in which students pass off others’ work as their own will be referred to the Dean of Student Affairs. Revision: All assignments may be revised. You may submit a revision at any time. You must submit with any revision the first version of the assignment that has my comments and the grade. All revisions are due by the last day of class. Late Work: I reserve the right to refuse any work turned in after our class begins on the date due. Calendar (Subject to Constant and Inexplicable Change): Jan. 19: Introduction to course, critical approaches, and an introduction to folktale types. Jan. 26: “Red Riding Hood”: tale types and intertexts; fable as children’s literature, children’s literature as fable; Review #1 due Feb. 2: McGraw’s The Moorchild--folktale meets the novel for children. Feb. 9: Paterson’s The Great Gilly Hopkins; considered with McGraw--distinctions between Realism and Fantasy; Review #2 due. Feb. 16: Paterson’s Bridge to Terabithia; Mode in Children’s Books; Short essay topic due. Feb. 23: Paterson--third book of choice and bibliography reports discussed; Review #3 due. March 1: White’s Charlotte’s Web; matters of anthropomorphism and its impact on subtext; Bibliography focus due. March 8: Censorship--learning about some fundamental assumptions about books, children, and reading: Short Essay Due. Spring Break (A fine time for reading and writing, I’ve heard.) March 22: Poetry: by, for, and about children--some textual, subtextual, and contextual distinctions; Review #4 due. March 29: Poetry: by, for, and about continued; Nonsense poetry; book lists for bibliographic essay due; Review #5 due. April 5: Picture Books: Introducing the third and fourth dimensions April 12: Picture Books. Words and pictures: respective placement and shared narrative meaning; Bibliographic Essay Due. April 19: Cheryl Harness--a Missouri author comes a callin’ April 26: Picture Books: Case Studies: Peter Rabbit and Good Night Moon; course evaluations; discussion of Final Exam; All Revisions Due by Friday of this week. Final Exam: Tuesday, May 9, 2:00 p.m. - 3:50 p.m. in our classroom ENG 300: Literature for Children Review Assignments Worth: 30% Length: About one single-spaced page each. I would like for you to review a web site, a scholarly journal, a book (handbook, theory, criticism, or collection of essays), a children’s chapter book, and a picture book this term. I want you to write a report for me, yourself, and for your peers about each of those five resources. When you are done revising any given review, we will discuss the possibility of putting them on reserve for your classmates to consult, copy, and take with them for future use in classes and for teaching. Format for reviewing a journal, book, and website: 1. Provide complete citation information for the video, research source, or web site in question in MLA style. Book or Journal Last Name, First Name. Title of Book: Including Subtitle. Edition. Place of Publication: Publisher, Year. Website 1. Name of author (if given) 2. Title of page accessed (in quotation marks) 3. Date when the material was posted (if given) 4. Title of the database (underlined) (e.g.. New York Times Online or ERIC) 5. Publication medium (Online) 6. Name of the computer service (e.g. Netscape Navigator or Lexis or Compuserv) 7. Date of your access of the material 8. URL (not in MLA handbook, but something useful for us): Vandergrift, Kay. "Author Biography and Autobiography Page." Created January 31, 1996, Last Updated February 8, 1997. Online. Netscape Navigator. July 9, 1997. http://www.scils.rutgers.edu/special/kay/authorbios.html For more specific detail on some of the subtleties of citation: Gibaldi, Joseph. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. 5th ed. New York: The Modern Language Association of America, 1999. This text is available in the library and in my office. 2. Summarize what the source offers the viewer/reader as thoroughly as you can in about a third of a page, single-spaced. What is provided? How is it arranged or organized? Remember, you are providing yourself (and possibly your classmates) a review that will enable the reader to visualize the source as well as possible in print. 3. Explain for whom this site/source might be of most use and why. If you think that more than one audience is implied, identify them and why you think so. Why might it be better for childcare workers or parents or teachers or siblings or the child him or herself? Please don’t simply assume that the source is for teachers just because most of you in the class are education majors. 4. Provide a critique of the site/source. Given the information you've provided in # 2 & 3 above, how do you rate this resource? Is it something you think you'd return to? Could you improve it somehow? Would you only use part of it? Give us a sense of the strengths and weaknesses of this resource so that when you look back on it later you can remember what you thought of it. Try to give a thoughtful response to this resource beyond "I liked it" or "I didn't like it." Start with those reactions as you review and ask yourself "why?" and move on to details. Format for reviewing a picture book and a chapter book: 1. Provide complete citation information in MLA style (see above). 2. Summarize the story. Remember: you are providing yourself a review that will enable you to have a complete sense of the story later when you refer to this. Don’t hold back on the ending; it’s not a TV Guide listing or something for the back of the book! 3. Focus on one textual feature that the book employs. This might be something to do with the use of character, plot, setting, narrative perspective, language, arrangement of chapters, pictures (be specific about some aspect of the pictures if you go this route) or anything structural. 4. Focus on subtextual issues in the book. What idea, message, issue, or concept does the book contain? Don’t feel the need to comment on the “moral” here; don’t reduce it to fable, in other words. 5. Focus on a context in which this book might prove useful or interesting (reader) or consider the implications for the context of the writing (something about the author, the place and era in which it was written, etc.) 6. Provide a critique of the site/source. Given the information you've provided in # 3-5 above, how do you rate this book? Is it something you think you'd return to? Could you improve it somehow? Would you only use part of it? Give us a sense of the strengths and weaknesses of this resource so that when you look back on it later you can remember what you thought of it. Try to give a thoughtful response to this resource beyond "I liked it" or "I didn't like it." Start with those reactions as you review and ask yourself "why?" and move on to details. All reviews should be about one side of one page, single-spaced. A bit more or less is not a problem. Please proof-read the page before submitting it. I will want it to be as professional-looking as it can be in case we should decide to distribute these to each other. A Note on Revision: You may revise each review one time. If you are submitting a revised copy of your review, please resubmit the original copy that has my written comments (staple or paper-clip the old to the new). The act of revision does not guarantee an improved grade. Editing isn’t the same thing as revision. If you would like feedback beyond that which I have written on the original, you may visit me to discuss revision strategies at any time prior to submitting a revision. English 300: Children’s Literature Short Paper Worth: 15% Length: 3-5 pages. Topics are completely open for these papers, though I provide you with a few good starts below. If at any point you would like to come by in order to talk about options, please do. I’ll expect that you’ll have some ideas from which we can work and find a focus. Don’t come by and say, “I have no idea what might be a good topic for discussion in an essay even though you’ve provided us with a mind-boggling assortment of swell choices.” Sure you do. Look through your notes and complete some initial brain-storming and we’ll work from there. Keep your ears open for possible writing topics as the course progresses. Some ideas: 1. Creatively intervene into a text. Consider how altering the text of some children’s tale or folk tale alters the nature of the tale. For instance, what happens when you make a folk tale a first-person narrative (which folk tale almost never is) or if you try to change something in a children’s poem that alters a subtext that it has. Try to make a change, explain the change, and comment on the significance of that change. I’ll be happy to help you narrow a task. 2. Put forth an argument about a children’s text we have read in class. Perhaps class discussion gets you thinking about how we were all wrong about something. Maybe you have an opinion about some structure, meaning, and/or context regarding, say, The Great Gilly Hopkins. This could be an extension of a review in which you can say what you didn’t have room to in the review . . . or maybe an extension of a class discussion. 3. Theorize. What do you think about the ways children’s literature works, using our texts and your own outside reading experiences? Have you any theories to offer about trends or features of children’s books? Consider theories about genre, mode, historical fiction and nonfiction, anything that, say, you could begin by disagreeing with or extending something said by me or us or Jacobs and Tunnel. 4. Discuss the implications of versions, revisions, rip-offs out there. Surely you’d be surprised to read Hans Christian Anderson’s original “The Little Mermaid,” for instance. I’ll bet there are a few film versions of The Secret Garden that you’d find strange in comparison. Anything to say about the results of dividing up Winnie-the-Pooh’s chapters into separate books? Are there web versions of old favorites of yours? Have you run across children’s versions of adult books you’ve read before (Gulliver’s Travels, the Bible, etc.) 5. Read a children’s book(store). Go to Barnes and Ignoble or Borders or Waldenbooks or a real children’s bookstore like The Reading Reptile (Westport in K.C.) and consider the way the books are arranged relative to other children’s books, other adult books. What categories are used that may differ from or parallel that which is found in the adult sections? How is the space used differently, if at all? Are there seats? What are the implications of all this? What does it tell you about children’s book culture, adult purchasing power, and what it is we tell kids about books in such places. You might even compare a bookstore’s children’s section with the public library’s children’s sections. 6. Read a children’s book curriculum . . . as seen in handbooks. Go to the library and compare Jacobs and Tunnel with other children’s literature handbooks and see if you can come to any conclusions about how they represent the field, what’s important, and why. You might come to your own conclusions about the way children’s literature might be arranged as a subject of study. Or roll your own. What do you want to argue, discuss, explain, narrate, compare, describe in a few pages that touches on the subject of books for and/or about children? I would find it very interesting to discuss topics with you. Really! Sometimes it’s through one-on-one conversation that ideas bubble up, especially if you’re a “social thinker” and generate better ideas through dialogue than when you’re cloistered away with chin in hand. With whatever project you carve out for yourself you’ll need to be mindful of ultimate point (a focused thesis), significance (“so what?”), and audience(s). What are you saying, why might it be important, and to whom? Good Luck! English 300: Children’s Literature Dr. Cadden Bibliographic Essay Worth: 15% Length: ~7-12 pages. The Task You will choose a particular author, theme, or genre in children’s literature in order to investigate it further. You will choose a number of representative works by that person, relevant to the idea/theme, or in the genre in question (the number will vary according to your project, but five to ten would be sufficient), and write a bibliographic essay about the works as a whole. The goal here is to become well acquainted with one small piece of the big picture of children’s literature. Who or What? Author: It would be wise of you to choose someone who is a good fit for the readers you’ll encounter in the grades you want to teach. I also encourage you to start early looking for a writer you think you’d like to learn more about. I would like for you to investigate as many different writers and illustrators as you can. If I think your choice is either inappropriate or if I just don’t know the name, I’ll likely talk to you about it. An alternative to picking one author is to choose another context of origin to examine. You might look at books written by people from a particular place (region, country), ethnicity, tradition, or belief system. Books by Japanese-American writers (as opposed to simply being about Japanese-Americans, which might be written by a non-member of that ethnic group). Theme/idea: You might decide that you want to look at older and recent books about orphans, poverty, AIDS, divorce, death, circuses, animal characters, environmentalism, Christianity, gay-lesbian issues, talented/challenged characters, immigration, dance, homelessness, birthdays, dragons, etc. Genre/mode: Adventure stories, folktale sub-genres (creation myths, Marchen tales, trickster tales, etc.), picture books (though this would have to be paired with another genre or theme or author/illustrator), comedy, tragedy, irony/satire, parody, coming-of-age stories, mysteries, travel, historical fiction, dream stories, poetry (of various sorts), science fiction, diaries/journal-forms, utopia/dystopia, etc. Where? Where to find names or ideas from which to choose? Other than your own or your child’s reading histories, I suggest that you pore over the bibliography information that I handed you, the websites listed on my links page (http://www.missouriwestern.edu/~cadden/), the list of resources on children’s and young adult literature at our library (link on my web page; see Jim Mulder or any other reference librarian at the MWSC library), the local library’s children’s section, local bookstores. I’ll be very glad and interested in talking about possible choices for you depending on interests you might have. Start looking at options right away so that you can begin reading and taking notes. I may have some ideas about books that fit your interests as well and may be able to steer you toward a more manageable focus within your chosen area, so please doen’t hesitate to employ me as a bibliographic resource! How? Let’s consider a sense of format that also deals with matters of focus. I won’t give you a page limit here, but you might consider that in terms of double-spaced pages, you could devote a page to introductory materials (see below), three-quarters of a page or a page for each book, and a page or more of conclusions. This might mean that you have seven, ten, twelve pages. I think that that you’ll find that the more texts you use, the easier this assignment will be, ironically. “How so, Oh Wacky Professor?” Well, more texts makes it easier for you to make more connections among the body of work and, therefore, enable you to come to more, better, and specific conclusions. The introductory material: briefly tell us a bit about the author/theme/genre that you’ve chosen. What interests you in the subject and what exactly will we be discussing? What have you ruled out in the course of defining this focus? Then tell us a bit about the main connections you’ll be covering across the books--the “thread(s)” that ties them together. If I’ve chosen Gary Paulsen, for instance, I’ll probably note that he tends to write about boys in adventurous outdoor circumstances. There are other links, too. Give us a sense of focus, then. The body of the essay is devoted to discussing each book in turn, focusing on the thread(s) that connect(s) each to the others, but also explaining other observations about the book that might not have anything to do with the other books. Somewhere in that book discussion you should summarize the book for us, as briefly as you can (brevity here is tough!) What makes a bibliographic essay distinctive from other essays is that the writer assumes that the reader isn’t familiar with the books. The summary needn’t be first, but it should be in there. Be style-conscious: if your transitions suffer from a formulaic approach for discussing each book, play around with each mini-discussion. Don’t feel the need to make each book one paragraph of discussion; it may take a couple of paragraphs to discuss each book. The conclusion of the essay is very important, and not simply a formality in which you sum up what you’ve said--not simply one paragraph that begins “in conclusion” (yuk). The conclusion should be where you share, in more detail, what you think makes this study interesting, significant, and useful, and where it might be taken from here. Dwell further on the threads that unite them. Feel free to point out shortcomings or problems. What, after having looked at these books in comparison, is your thoughts about trends, limitations, successes in the area of study? You should include a bibliography that cites the primary and any secondary materials used. You aren’t required to use a certain number of secondary materials, just what suits your task. You may have consulted a website, biography, journal article . . . cite those. Please use MLA style (available on line--http://www.mla.org or in the MLA Handbook available in my office or the library). There are several sources which will give bibliographies of books published by an author including: Something About the Author (Ref. PN 451 .S696), Contemporary Authors (Ready Ref. Z 1224 .C761 .A1), and the Dictionary of Literary Biography (Ref. PS 221 .D554). There also were several other biographical sources mentioned on the MWSC bibliography linked to my web page, but some of them are getting quite old. For additional sources of biographical information you may want to consult the following index: Biography and Genealogy Master Index (Available on the computers, and on Index Table 5). A word of caution. No published list of an author’s work is completely current. You need to check the date of publication of the volume which contains the bibliography they find. Often the bibliography will not include the author's works published during the previous year or two. For more recent information on new books published, you should consult the various periodicals mentioned on the bibliography and more general periodicals such as Publisher's Weekly. Many of these periodicals are indexed through the Reader's Guide Abstracts, Humanities Index, or Masterfile Elite on the library computers. Another source of more recent information is the Baker & Taylor CD-ROM, available on most of the computers in the Reference room. It lists books that are being published, as well as many which have gone out of print. You can search by author, therefore this would be a good place to look for updating most of the printed bibliographies. This is not a reviewing source as it gives only citations. You’ll find lots to comment on as you read. I suggest that you read each book with a pen and paper handy, and even plan on returning to books as you read the others (Reread?! Heavens!) I think that with the pieces of this assignment, the number of books, and the many links, you’ll be able to generate a lot of interesting material. I hope that you will share these final copies with each other when you’re done! Good luck!
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