Category: Literacy Learning

Graphic Novels – More than just for fun.

New part of the collection

 

My school library has recently acquired a variety of graphic novels, ranging from classics such as Harper Lee’s, “To Kill a Mockingbird” to swashbuckling tales of pirates, and fantastical stories of superheroes from the Avengers franchise.  There are multiple reasons behind the acquisition of these resources; tacking reluctant readers engagement with reading, boosting traditional and multimodal literacy and addressing the needs of the curriculum.  

BAM! Literacy and fun- TOGETHER!

 

Graphic novels have widespread appeal across generations.  From adolescent reluctant readers to highly literate adult geeks, graphic novels can inspire a cult following.  I can only chuckle when I reminisce about Sheldon Cooper and his obsession with comics in the popular TV series “Big Bang Theory”.  The popularity seems to stem from the presence of popular genres such as Manga, funny and superhero comics and their use of contemporary characters (Crowley, 2015; Hughes et al., 2011).  The Marvel and DC comic series in particular, have reached new zeniths in popularity due to the recent plethora of movies being released this decade.  

Literacy teachers common use graphic novels as a method of engaging students who are reluctant readers boosting literacy.   As mentioned in earlier blog posts, reluctant readers often struggle to engage with traditional texts for a multitude of reasons, most commonly, low literacy.  Aliteracy or illiteracy, can preclude students from comprehending large text paragraphs (Crowley, 2015). Graphic novels with their text juxtapositioned with pictures format allows students to use visual stimuli to assist with decoding text (Cook & Kirchoff, 2017).  The drawings create a tangible image for the reader allowing them to be captivated more easily by the narrative within. This engagement can often influence students with low literacy to become more prolific with their reading, which has a direct correlation to increased literacy and overall academic achievement.  Due to their popularity and narrative style, graphic novels epitomise the adage, ‘reading for pleasure’. For schools with wide reading programs, a strong graphic novel investment is highly advised.  

There are other benefits to adding graphic novels to a collection.  The advent of the information age has demanded a strong requirement for students to be literate across modalities.  Graphic novels with their images and text colligated together, confer visual, gestural and spatial elements simultaneously, causing the reader to engage with the material on multiple levels.   As mentioned previously, graphic adaptations of class texts and other classics are extremely beneficial in engaging students as it is unfortunate that prescribed texts often seem to lack appeal with the student cohort.  A graphic adaptation has the duality of both ENGAGING disinterested students and ASSISTING students with DIVERSE learning needs.  By adding graphic novel adaptations of class texts to the collection, a school library is acknowledging the diverse learning needs of their students whilst addressing curriculum requirements mandated by ACARA.     

References

Cook, M., & Kirchoff, J. (2017). Teaching multimodal literacy through reading and writing graphic novels. Language and Literacy.  Vol. 19 (4). Pp. 76-95

Crowley, J. (2015) Graphic novels in a the school library. The School Library. Vol 63 (3)  Pp140-142

Hughes, J., King, A., Perkins, P. & Fuke, V. (2011) Adolescents and the Autographics; Reading and writing coming of age graphic novels. Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy. Vol. (54(8). DOI: doi:10.1598/JAAL.54.8.

Choice matters.

I just read a fabulous article on Facebook that was shared by another TL about how much choice matters in recreational reading.  Korbey in her Edutopia article “The reading wars; choice vs canon” presents various perspectives to this scholastic issue.

qimono / Pixabay – which will you choose?

The problem lies in that if students are forced to read particular texts, then there can naturally be a resentment towards the task, the book and the activity of reading.  But if a student only ever reads what they want to read then their minds will never be broadened by wider concepts and or cognition stretched.  Korbey goes on to elaborate that leaving all texts to student choice poses challenges.  The obvious challenge is that students are less able to ascertain which reading material is best suited to their abilities.  They often return to old childhood favourites rather than allow their reading material to grow with them.

But what is the happy medium?  In this article Korbey talks about teacher lead explicit instruction and the impact it is having on students.  The answer seems elusive.

One idea is for teachers to select a general theme and or moral objective and then find books that address that theme in a variety of genres and text types.  This way student choice is addressed as well as the need to expand and challenge their growing minds.

This is a definite change in direction but I do think that George Orwell can work with Suzanne Collins; Mark Zusack with John Boyne and Jackie French.  But that also calls on English teachers to be brave and well supported by their colleagues.

Is your school brave?

Out of the Box!

How do you teach students about the context behind texts such as Jackie French’s Hitler’s daughter or William Golding’s Lord of the flies to very disinterested teens? 

I am not sure about you but I found both those books dull, dry and depressing as a teen; and I will say they have not improved with age!

Our graduate English teachers were struggling with the rampant disengagement with those two novels.  The indifference was causing the teachers great distress as they were concerned how the students were going to submit their essay assessment task if they would not engage with the book.    More experienced teachers were able to forge through the disengagement but our newest recruits were finding teaching the text challenging.

It then occurred to me that memorial boxes could be the answer!

WW2 Memorial Box set up

I had discovered that the Australian War Memorial had a whole host of educational resources available for loan to schools in the form of memorial boxes.  These boxes contain genuine artifacts from various military events in Australian history. I had requested a box for our 10 History classes earlier this semester as a ‘hook’ factor to engage and elicit interest at the commencement of their World War 2 unit.  

Artifacts from the memorial box

My cognitive connection between our great English dilemma and the memorial box was very much delayed!  It wasn’t until I was unpacking the resources in our library seminar room that it occurred to me that the same artifacts that were engaging our Year 10 history students could also stimulate our year 7 and 10 English students. 

I had an epiphany of sorts!

I was so happy my HOD agreed with my madcap proposal about using the memorial box as a stimulus for English.  The scheme was simple.  The students would come to our ‘library museum’ and view the various artifacts displayed within. Then in pairs, the students would interview each other to create a podcast with an accompanying transcript.  A very clever English teacher quickly whipped up a worksheet  and then, just like that… our immersive experience had begun.

Pictures and Memorabilia

Now I would love to tell you it was all a huge success, but I would be lying. 

The memorial boxes were a great triumph with our 10 History students but success was variable with our English classes.  This lackluster response could be attributed to the inadequate time for the students to complete the activity. The classes that visited the library twice had more success than ones that came just once. 

What we did discover was that students were stirred out of the apathetic stance towards the books because they began to understand the context  surrounding it. The memorial box activity connected the students to the mileu of the books and engaged them in the character’s turmoil.  As the worksheets were collected at the end of the session, the teachers were able to use those responses to formatively assess student literacy and other learning goals.  

The focus of a school library has changed in the past decade from archivist and curator of information to being an active facilitator of knowledge both physical and digital.  This means that teacher librarian may need to think out side the box for some more out of the box thinking!

The in class essays are all occurring this week for year 7 and next week for year 10.  I would be very intrigued to know if the memorial boxes assisted in increasing student engagement with the books and the outcome of the assessments.  I would also like to analyse the results of the English classes that declined to attend our library museum and compare them to the classes that did come.  If there is a significant difference, then I would have sufficient evidence to run this activity for more teachers and students.  

I await reporting time with great avidity.