Republic of the Philippines

Iloilo Science and Technology University

Miagao Campus
Miagao, Iloilo

TEACHING ENGLISH IN THE ELEMENTRAY GRADES THROUGH LITERATURE (EEd 111)

First Semester 2025

MODULE 2: READER-BASED APPROACH IN TEACHING LITERATURE

INTRODUCTION TO LANGUAGE LITERARY TEXT
FACILITATING CRITICAL THINKING THROUGH LITERATURE

Lesson Outcomes: At the end of the lesson, the students must have:
1. discussed the reader-based approach in teaching literature;
2. analyzed language literary text as an introduction in teaching literature in the elementary grades; and
3. facilitated critical thinking analysis through literature.

ACTIVATE: ________________________________________________

Before we start this unit, answer honestly the following questions. Just be ready to
discuss your answer soon.

Question 1: Should we teach children how to read literature?

a. Think about your own experiences of reading literature. Have educational

experiences increased your enjoyment of specific texts? If so, how? If not, why
not?
b. Read the following statements and see if you agree or not.
1. Children are naturally capable of taking pleasure in what they read.
2. Readers are made, not born.
3. Literature is more experienced than taught
4. Critical analysis of literature somehow destroys pleasure in it.
5. Many people don’t focus their teaching of literature on the enhancement of pleasure because they
believe that pleasure is private, too dependent on individual tastes and feelings to be taught.
6. Literature must be discussed. It is only by discussing with others who have experienced a book that
new meaning can be effectively constructed.
7. Children need teachers to demonstrate how to enter into and explore the world of literature, just as
children learning language need adults who show them how the language functions in the everyday
world.

Question 2: What should teachers do to help children read literature?

a. Think about your own experiences of reading literature. Did any of your
teachers teach you how to read literature when you were a child? If so, how?
b. Read the following statements and see if you agree or not.
 Ask children to understand every word written in a text.
 Ask children to derive meaning from context as they read,
 Ask children to always read closely and analytically.
 Allow children to feel free to read against a text.
 Encourage children to see their reading of literature as a source of
questions to think about rather than answers to accept.
 Ask children to parrot the responses or interpretations of other people,
particularly those with authority over them, to prove that they understood
the “right” things about a book they read.
 Encourage children to have their own ideas about what they read.
 Encourage children to exchange their viewpoints with others and respect the differences.
 Provide children with diverse experiences of literature.
 Help children to read with an awareness of ideological implications, that is, of the ways in which texts
represent or misrepresent reality and work to manipulate readers.
 ACQUIRE: ________________________________________________
THE READER-CENTERED APPROACH TO LITERATURE
“Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and
digested.” ~ Francis Bacon
"Readers return to books because of the way they feel about the reading, their response to the
text." ~ Martha Combs

DEFINITION: WHAT IS THE READER-CENTERED APPROACH TO LITERATURE?

 The reader-centered approach, based on reader-response criticism, emphasizes the individual as a reader-
responder. It argues that reading a literary text is part of a complex process that includes collaboration
between the writer, the text, and the reader.
 A text is re-created every time someone new reads it, and it becomes, in the process, increasingly richer. The
text is a stimulus that elicits responses from us based on our past experiences, our previous reading, our
thoughts, and our feelings.
 In this reader-response approach, the text acts on the reader and the reader interacts with the text;
therefore, this analytical method is often referred to as transactional analysis.
 The reader-response critical theory teaches us that there are no absolutes. It enables us to examine
the complexity of human behavior and motivation, the difficulty in ascertaining right and wrong, and
the interdependencies involved in any social construct.

Objectives of the reader-centered approach (Purves, Rogers, & Soter,1990):

1. To encourage individual readers to feel comfortable with their own responses to a literary work.
2. To encourage the readers to seek out the reasons for their responses and thereby come to understand
themselves better.
3. To encourage the readers to recognize, in the responses of others, the differences among people and to
respect those differences.
4. To encourage readers to recognize, in the response of others, the similarities among people.

The Role of the teacher:

 The teacher's responsibilities in effecting a successful reading experience in young people:
1. Bring children and books together.
2. Give them as many different types of literature as possible.
3. Encourage honest and open responses
4. Challenge them to explore those responses and learn something about themselves
5. Provide them with the critical language that they might clearly express their responses
6. Encourage toleration.
7. Encourage mutual understanding.

Suggested activities:

1. Reading Aloud

Effective reading aloud can be modeled by observing the following guidelines.

1) Read stories you enjoy.
2) Choose stories that are suitable to the children's emotional and social developmental levels. Don't be
afraid if the text includes a few challenging words.
3) Be sure the illustrations in a picture book can be seen easily by everyone.
4) Keep the reading experience an interactive one.
5) Be sure to pronounce the words correctly. Rehearse your reading and be sure to use the proper tone
and assume different voices if there is a dialogue.

2. Storytelling

Successful storytelling can be achieved by observing the following guidelines.

1) Tell the stories you love and be sure your story is appropriate for your audience.
2) Tell the story in your own words. Make the language easy to understand.
3) Make sure your story has an attractive beginning and a strong, definitive ending.
4) Pay attention to the rhythm and intonation. Change your tone as the story requires.
 5) Project your voice so that the people in the back can hear you.
6) Make eye contact with all sections of your audience.
7) Use gestures and body language that feel natural and support your story.
8) Use props or visual aids to create the interestingness of your story.
9) It is a must to practice telling your story in advance.
10) Be yourself. Develop your own storytelling style.

3. Book Discussions

Integral to most book discussions are the questions posed by the leader, and questions can be posed to
elicit varying levels of response. There are four levels of questions:
1) factual or memory questions: to ask the readers to recall facts from the story or poem: plot incidents,
character identifications, details of the setting, and so on.
2) interpretation questions: to ask the readers to make inferences and draw conclusions from the facts
of the story or poem. These questions may require analysis or synthesis.
3) application questions: to ask the readers to consider the story or poem in a larger context and to
focus on further extensions of the theme, style, imagery, symbolism, etc. Application questions ask us
to draw on our own experiences and help us to see the relationships between literature and life.
Here is where the personal response to literature comes into play.
4) evaluation questions: to ask the readers to critically evaluate what they have read and to articulate
their reasons. This is the beginning of the acquisition of critical taste and judgment. Remember that
with most application and evaluation questions, there is no clear right or wrong answers,
only answers that are more convincingly supported than others.

WEBBING AND MAPPING (GRAPHIC ORGANIZERS):

 Webbing and mapping help children develop their ability to see patterns, identify relationships, and make
categories (see examples in Russell, p. 62).
 Webbing is a visual means of demonstrating relationships between story elements or concepts. Virtually any
aspect of literature can be applied to a web - character development, plot events, symbols, imagery, and
themes.
 Similar to a web, a story map charts the progress of the plot in a visual manner. It helps children work out and
organize their thinking about the story. The power of a story map is in the process, not necessarily in the
product.
ANALYSING LITERATURE: INTRODUCTION TO THE LANGUAGE OF LITERARY TEXTS

Kindly click the link and study the given ample and significant information on how to analyze literature as an
introduction to the language of literary texts.
http://orelt.col.org/module/unit/1-analysing-literature-introduction-language-literary-texts

1. Activity 1: Using poetry to develop vocabulary in context

2. Activity 2: Developing creativity in language use: Converting a prose text to a play
3. Activity 3: Creativity in collaboration: Using students’ language resources for story development

FACILITATING CRITICAL THINKING THROUGH LITERATURE

Kindly click the link and study the given ample and significant information on how to analyze literature as an
introduction to the language of literary texts.
http://orelt.col.org/module/unit/5-facilitating-critical-thinking-through-literature

1. Activity 1: Using literature to develop critical thinking: Drawing inferences from a text
2. Activity 2: Evaluating a literary text
3. Activity 3: From critical to creative skills: Participating in creative writing workshops
4. Activity 4: Collaborative creative writing: Creating a big book

APPLY: ___________________________________________________
Take time to study the given cases and examples as these might all be helpful for your individual
recorded teaching demonstration.

ASSESS: ___________________________________________________
This will be part of your one-time-big-time final requirement which is the recorded teaching
demonstration.

References:
http://www2.nkfust.edu.tw/~emchen/CLit/teach_reader-centered.htm
http://orelt.col.org/module/unit/1-analysing-literature-introduction-language-literary-texts
http://orelt.col.org/module/unit/5-facilitating-critical-thinking-through-literature

Prepared:

MA. MAJA JADE N. PEREZ, PhD

Associate Professor V

Enhanced by: Ms. Janice Irene T. Noble, EdD