HENA03925U English - Free topic 5: Teaching Literature to Adolescents (Exam form C)

This is a class for the students who are on the ‘gymnasierettede profil’ as well as for anyone interested in thinking about how to teach Anglophone literature to adolescents (‘gymnasie-elever’). In this class we will discuss both how to teach and what to teach. We will be reading and reflecting on didactic theories about teaching and learning, all the time maintaining a focus on the teaching of English literature in a Danish context. The class will be interactive and although we will be discussing theories about teaching literature it will also be pragmatic.  Thus we will develop hands-on approaches and concrete material that can be used in a teaching situation. In order to maintain a close connection with actual teaching out in the real world, in the form of high schools (‘gymnasier’), I have invited both experienced teachers and brand new teachers to come and share their experiences with us. All in all, this class will combine a ‘top-down’ theoretical approach to teaching literature with a very pragmatic hands-on approach, which I hope will help to equip those of you who might find yourselves in a classroom full of teenagers in a not so distant future. Our course book will be Atherton, Green and Snapper, Teaching English Literature 16-19: An Essential Guide (2013): we will also be reading selected chapters from Beach, Appleman, Hynds and Wilhelm, Teaching Literature to Adolescents, 2^nd ed. (2011). In addition we will be reading a selection of literary texts suitable for our practical tasks that we will agree upon in class.