Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Poetry Professor Concern...Sort Of

Okay, my poetry professor presentations are going fairly well. It is having many intended and many unintended positive consequences. Today we fared into end-stopped lines and stanzas vs. enjambment and the consequence of each. It's that kind of teachable moment that this project routinely creates.

One possible concern. My students seem to be doing considerable research to help along their analysis. I mean, this is great because it adds such depth to our discussions, but I worry that in some cases this research is replacing close reading.

So, what are your thoughts? How do you balance? Do you balance? Does the positive outweigh the negative?

2 comments:

jchris145 said...

It is great that they are doing research; maybe they need that step to "scaffold" until they build their confidence. Maybe later on you could have all of them do a poetry pop "clinic" and give them short pieces and have them prepare an "extemporaneous" professorial presentation.

You could probably get much information from asking them what they think about it. Someimes they have better answers to our "problems". Let me know how it turns out.

fdileo said...

I agree with jchris145....they need to think on their own and work out different ways to approach the poetry.

Teachable moments are great...that is another reason for PP.