Part 1 - Risko, et al.

Risko, V., Roller, C., Cummins, C., Bean, R., Block, C., Anders, P., Flood, J. (2008). A Critical Analysis of Research on Reading Teacher Education

Risko, et al., is a lit review of reading teacher education studies. I'm reading this primarily to study it as a model of how to conduct a lit review. Starting from a pool of 298 studies, they selected 82 to include.

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• Began by reading lit reviews for "learning to teach" and reading teacher preparation. This helped them understand the characteristics of the field and set broad goals.
  
• Set the following objectives: 
  

1. identify criteria and quality indicators for evaluating research
2. conduct comprehensive search and analysis of empirical research meeting those criteria
3. analyze theoretical arguments and practical issues in the studies.
4. identify future research objectives

The researchers sought to include a variety of theoretical perspectives. They grouped studies into five theoretical categories:

1. positivist/behavioral - This represents a transmission model of teaching, an additive process. The theory was dominant in the 1970s. Characterized by lists of discrete, observable skills and behaviors to be mastered.
2. cognitive - Importance placed on connecting learning with prior knowledge and beliefs. Piaget and Bartlett's schemata.
3. constructivism - Focus on conditions for learning, problem-solving, inquiry, and collaboration. Shift away from transmission model.
4. socio-cultural - Focuses on individuals relationship to social context, "multiple forms of interaction with others".
5. critical theories - Focus on how literacy educators can address social justice issues, and on equitable learning conditions.

Researchers attempted to maintain "objectivity" by meeting and developing "shared and negotiated understandings of the papers"... "collaborative interpretive analysis and critique". They acknowledge that their personal histories influenced the meaning that they constructed.

More Rosenblatt

More Rosenblatt:

"Recognition that there can be no absolute, single 'correct' version of a text has sometimes been seen as accepting any reading of a text. Without positing a single, absolutely correct reading, we can still agree on criteria by which to evaluate the validity of alternative interpretations of a text." p. xix

This relates strongly to the discussions we've had in our research group when viewing the movies from camp. We use communitarian grounded theory, a process by which we generate alternative interpretations and interrogate each other. We eventually express a multiplicity of possible meanings. The ones that gain no traction in the group are discarded.

Still, in many discussions, it has felt like we are trying to identify the 'right' answer. I'm very interested in how Rosenblatt defines evaluation criteria for alternative interpretations.

Rosenblatt 1995

Rosenblatt, L. (1995). Literature as Exploration (5th Edition). New York, NY: Modern Language Association of America.

Barry, P. (2002). Beginning Theory: An Introduction to Literary and Cultural Theory. Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press.

In the foreword to the fifth edition, Wayne Booth hopes that someone will apply Rosenblatt's work to TV and video.

"In other words, the students we meet in classrooms today need something more than education in conducting transactions with books. To survive as the kind of people Rosenblatt would have us become, they need what seems to be the much more difficult art (though new technologies are making it possible): slowing down the image, recognizing that living with the flow of images and talking back to them is, as Rosenblatt says of reading literature, a "mode of living" (264), a training for the life that occurs after the images are turned off."

When he wrote this in 1995, the kind of response he was talking about was less possible than it is now. With desktop video and online video publishing, it becomes possible for a wide range of people to "slow down" the moving image, dissect it, and respond in the same mode. The moving images that both reflect and help to shape our culture are now infinitely re-viewable - through DVD, online video, and particularly through online video sharing sites like YouTube. If I want to more closely examine a political speech, or a popular movie, or a video composed by an anonymous person (commonplace since online video sharing, almost unheard of before that), I can access the original (video) text, slow it down, pause it, segment it, re-present it in new contexts, and juxtapose it with other (video) texts to produce my response in the same mode as the original. Online video sharing means that the potential audience for my response may be as great as that of the original text, depending in large part on the quality of my work.

I just began reading Barry's Beginning Theory, which interestingly omits any reference to Louise Rosenblatt and reader response theory. Barry says he's providing a survey of all major developments in literary theory, at least over the past 100 years. According to Wayne Booth, "she has probably influenced more teachers in their ways of dealing with literature than any other critic". Literature as Exploration, originally published in 1938 and revised constantly since then, includes responses to all of the major literary theories that Barry lists. Why isn't Rosenblatt included, even as a footnote, in Barry's book? Why not even a word to say why he doesn't value her work?

In Barry's book, I've just finished the section on liberal humanism. This describes the state of English studies before critical theory. Liberal humanism argues against bringing preconceived notions into the analysis of literature. It says that a book should be evaluated based solely on a close reading of the text on the page, not through any lens of theory. It presupposes the existence of an essential human nature, absolute truth, and timeless great works of literature. It is criticized for unexamined Eurocentric and androcentric underlying assumptions that marginalize others by elevating European male perspectives to the status of essential truths. It also ignores the context that produces and influences a work of literature. From this perspective, the teacher (or critic) must help the student discover the essential truths in the text. There is only one correct answer and one correct response to a given piece of literature.

Putting it together

A's class yesterday was incredible - as I remembered. I first took that class in 2002 and I knew so little when I took it, but I remember how it made me feel. To her new students, she is scary and funny and challenging and empowering. Going back now, after having taught elementary school, after having taught college students, her teaching is still incredible to me. Now, I see other levels to what she does, I see more of the how and why. Still, all of that only deepens my appreciation for what she does with her students. Just as it was then, I don't want to miss a single class. There's too much to learn and it's too exciting.

I've attended all three of the classes I'm taking this semester and I have some idea now of how much work each will be. I need to continue working on refining my patterns and habits so that I can complete what I need to this semester. There's a heck of a lot of reading to do and I've got to have the time and the places to do it. There's also a lot of writing to do, not the least of which I want to be online.

I got the old/current version of Semantica installed on my new computer, but I'm intrigued by the description of the new Pro version and its add-ons. Still, I don't know that it's worth the effort of recording information in it. I think, for my purposes, a wiki might make more sense. PBwiki supports tagging of pages now, and that makes a big difference. I feel like I need to be able to create articles, inter-relate the information, and tag them. It's worth investigating other sites, though. The ideal wiki would be created in MediaWiki so that the resulting code would be compatible with other MediaWiki-created pieces. That way, I could move appropriate pieces directly to Wikipedia, for instance.

UPDATE: I like what I see at Wikidot so far. I think I'll try that out.

Personal Learning Tools

I'm interested in developing some kind of a personal wiki to use as a learning log in my program. The same concepts and authors recur in different contexts, in different courses. Also, it's important to be able to inter-relate concepts. I can imagine doing this on Wikipedia, but of course that's not the venue for most of that work. I'd also love to create graphical representations, of the sort that can be created with Inspiration.

I've used Semantica in the past. It's a terrific product, but it has some serious limitations - or it did. I see now on the Semantica site that there is a new version that may do everything I've ever wanted it to do. I'll have to check out its features and see how much it costs. It might be something that I need to buy.