Young Adult Literature- Why we need it in the classroom.

Is Young Adult Literature more useful in the secondary classrooms than the classics?

While teachers feel stressed about sticking to their curriculum as designated by the state, they may lose sight of the need to bring more intriguing literature into the classroom. In a study done by a man named Arthur Applebee, printed in "Young Adult Literature in the Classroom-Or Is It?" by John Bushman, Applebee followed the choices teachers made in terms of broadening the curriculum. As described by Bushman, "After completing this study, he found the most successful classrooms for students were led by teachers willing to look beyond the classics. In these classrooms, comic books, rap songs, and young adult literature were as acceptable for study as Shakespeare’s King Lear.  As Applebee noted, these teachers let content determine the material, rather than a list of time-worn literary works." 

It appears that many teachers have made the discovery that by pushing older, classic novels onto their students, they are turning them off of reading altogether. Instead of making them read something that they will never read again after school, teachers need to introduce to them books and authors they will also choose to pick up on their own time. Through research, Bushman has also discovered that teachers need to seek out Young Adult Literature that touches issues students are faced with. For example, for middle and high school students, a big issue they face is figuring out their personal value system or ideology. Students can not figure out their own beliefs when faced with unrelatable classic novels they cannot connect to. However, Bushman lists some Young Adult literature that may be more useful in the classroom, and help students find their identity. Some of his examples include Crazy Lady, by Jane Leslie Conly, for the middle school set and Chris Crutcher’s Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes for high school students, which discusses issues students may actually face in their own lives. Another recommendation Bushman makes is David Klass’ Danger Zone, which helps students understand how they feel about prejudice, racism, and politics. Bushman lists a number of other useful books for young adults, that are more useful in the classroom, which I have listed below. However, what seems to be most important is that students are able to make a connection with the literature and the characters. By giving them a book with a lot and character they can relate to, students are more likely to pick up the books and read, rather than choosing Cliff Notes and skimming through the classics enough to get by. For the purpose of my content area, art, I think this idea of encouraging reading could be something as easy as an occasional "Drop Everything and Read" class period. I think in any classroom, students should be encouraged and offered the opportunity to pick up and read something they are interested in, as long as they are reading and reacting.

Suggested books that students' can identify with:

• Adam and Miriam in Miriam’s Well (Lois Ruby) All That Glitters (Jean Ferris)
• Between a Rock and a Hard Place (Alden Carter)
• Somewhere in the Darkness (Walter Dean Myers)
• The Original Freddie Ackerman (Hadley Irwin)
• If Rock and Roll Were a Machine (Terry Davis) 
• The Drowning of Stephan Jones (Bette Greene). 
• I Hadn’t Meant to Tell You This (Jacqueline Woodson) 

Bushman, J. Young Adult Literature in  the Classroom--Or Is It?. English Journal. (1997): 45-40. Print.

Applebee, A. 1994. Shaping Conversations: A Study of Continuity and Coherence on High School Literacy 

Curricula. Albany, NY: National Research Center on Literature Teaching and Learning. 

Art in the Picture, The National Gallery & Restoration Online

http://www.artinthepicture.com/

Art in the Picture is a very useful website for all things Art History. I like it because it has a search function that offers every artist, movement, country and century by which children could search. The main site also features a constantly changing art inspired quote, many of which are thought provoking and interesting. I know not every student has an interest in Art History, but I think quotes and features like these may spark an interest in certain students or help them connect to an artist.

This site also features a “Video of the Week.” This week, it is a 15 minute feature on Van Gogh. Again, not every student will find every video interesting, but there may be one or two over the course of the year that draws their attention or highlights an era, movement or artist they are somewhat interested in. This site could be a useful weekly tool in the classroom. We could finish every Friday class off with the video of the week and use it as an opportunity to learn something new about Art History and discuss what was watched as a class.

For purposes of a specific lesson, this site also features each major artist of a movement, offers some of their famous quotes, most well known paintings and biographies.

http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/

The National Gallery is a website for the museum which is located in London. Since that is not very accessible for us, at least their website still offers a great look into the museum itself, along with a bunch of other great features! This is another useful website for generating interest in Art History. This site is just about the next best thing to visiting The National Gallery itself. They even offer a Virtual Tour of inside their museum! It allows you to go throughout parts of the gallery, zoom in on a specific piece as if you are standing right in front of it, click on the art, and read more about it. I think this is a pretty incredible feature of the website and something students would enjoy as well. Using it, the students could go on a “Virtual Museum Visit.”

Here is a view from the Central Hall. Next, I can chose hover over the painting I want to find out more about, click, and get all the information I need!

Next I moved into a room that featured works from Venice. This feature allows you to feel like you are present in the museum. I think if students are in a classroom with access to computers, allowing them to “tour the museum” and writing about a few pieces they “viewed” would be a fun activity.

Aside from this feature, there are other great parts of this site, such as a Featured Artist of the Month, and ability to Explore Artists A-Z, information on Featured Exhibitions and much more. 

http://www.artsmia.org/restoration-online/

Restoration Online is a very interesting site that leads you through the process of the restoration of a classic work of art, and goes into depths to explain more about the process, the art, artist, etc. 

This would be a fun site to introduce to students that allows them to view the Restoration process from start to finish, along with more information about the painting itself. This site even breaks down the Restoration process from start to finish, including a daily log and a step by step explanation of how everything was completed. Since teachers are constantly searching for ways to bring reading and writing into every classroom, I think this site could provide for a useful assignment. An interesting way to incorporate this into the art classroom would be to allow each student to pick one piece of work they want to explore. Students will have to read about the Restoration process and the work, and then write up a small essay that briefly explains the process and the work. To also bring a creative aspect into this, I think I would then assign each student to try to recreate the artwork they chose in some way. Students could be offered the option to emulate the artists’ style of painting, subject matter, emotion or design, so they are not too limited in their creativity. I think this website and accompanying assignment could be a great lesson for students to really see the effort that is put into some of the great masters’ works of art in order to conserve them so we can enjoy them today.

The Art Gallery & Surf Net Kids

http://www.theartgallery.com.au/kidsart.html

The Art Gallery website is an incredible resource for students. One of my favorite features on this site is shown on the home page. It features a number of students work from across the world, which I think really helps a child to feel connected to their peers. They can browse through other students’ artwork, see what people their own age are doing and maybe even get ideas by browsing the work. This is useful as an Art Instructor, to help generate ideas for future lesson plans, but it also may motivate students and inspire them if they see something they like. The website featuring students in their Art Gallery could also be an incentive to the students; submit your own work and let’s see if they choose anything to show on the site. I think this could be very encouraging and make the students want to really put their all into their work because it would give them the opportunity to show their work off on more than just the school hallway. 

Beyond this home page, this website allots students to learn about art interactively. For the purpose of teaching about Impressionism, this site offers a drop down menu enabling a student to choose “What is Impressionism?” Here they can pick different art eras to learn about and the site will take them to a quick, easy-read summary. Then, they offer the ability to explore Artists of the era further by offering a drop down menu to pick from, “Who was…..?”  This site is very easy to navigate and user friendly.

http://www.surfnetkids.com/directory/Art_Music/

Surfnetkids is a great website I discovered which essentially serves as a portal into dozens of other websites that contain activities, readings, pictures, parent and children activities and much more. While this site covers a number of topics, the link specifically takes you to the Art Content website, which is a great tool for students and their parents to use beyond the classroom. The Art portion of this site is broken down into sections, and each section contains several links. These links then take you to a new page, with more links that fall under the category. It is basically a never ending supply of information and ideas to help encourage students to feel inspired by art.

Since this site is so packed full of information and links, I have tried to come up with several ideas as to how I could use this in the classroom. Of course, the opportunities are endless, so this is a great resource for the future. However, one specific idea I came up with was to create an out of the classroom project for the students to complete. I would give the students a fair amount of time, and maybe make this assignment only once a quarter. I want this assignment to be fun for the students, something they look forward to. They would be required to choose and complete one activity from this website. There are so many options that I feel every student, regardless of their background of socio-economic status, could do something from this page. For example, there are hundreds of craft ideas, recipes, museums in the area to visit, activities to do at a museum or gallery, artists to read, think and discuss, etc. Instead of restricting students, I think I would make this a project that would be pretty open ended. Allow them to learn about what they choose so they are really passionate about it. It would also create for a great sharing in class activity. Each student would get to discuss what they did and what they learned. I think this would be a great activity for the students, and also help guide me as a teacher to see what the children really love to learn more about.

Young Adult Literature in the Art Classroom

A Further Look: 

How can we use Young Adult Literature in the Art classroom to increase reading?

As I research how Young Adult Literature can be used in an Art curriculum, it appears that there is a major push to bring reading into every aspect of a students education. As explained in 'Young Adult Literature: Exploration, Evaluation, and Appreciation,' Bucher and Manning discuss how "there is an increasing trend to incorporate young adult books and other forms of literature across the middle and high school curriculum." As I mentioned in my previous post, I strongly believe that if students are offered more freedom and better choices when choosing literature to read, they are more likely to become independent readers and enjoy the act. In order to increase students independent reading, I think teachers must collaborate to encourage reading in each and every classroom. Obviously not every teacher will be in agreement as to how they will go about this. However, I believe if there is a general consensus and a stronger push from the teachers, students will feel the encouragement.

As an avid reader, I feel that some of the novels and literature I have read have encouraged my creativity and helped me to grow as an artist. Reading has given me new ideas, settings, characters, and scenes that I have attempted to depict in some sense in my work. I think one of the greatest and most exciting aspects of reading is how it allows you to create a vision of what you are reading. While the author lays out the basics, the mind instantly creates a world all by itself and reading becomes such a visual act. As an art teacher, I believe that if I could convey this excitement to my students, they may be encouraged to read on their own and use it as a form of inspiration. The question then becomes, how do we translate this into art?


While other subjects such as English or Social Studies can push for reading and test it simply by assigning writing based on the work, art teachers don't necessarily have this luxury. They have to dig deeper and get creative as to how students' can be assessed. While difficult, I believe it is possible to encourage students to read by showing the connection between art and literature. Since the "assignments" won't be in the form of writing or tests, maybe students will be more excited to create art work from their reading of choice.  If students in my classroom view assignments stemming from literature to be more enjoyable than an essay, they will be more inclined to read. If students are asked to create based on what they read, they may view this as a fun outlet to display their interpretation of a book. More importantly, maybe art and reading together can help the students connect with one another. Perhaps two students read the same book or read books by the same author. They are likely to enjoy seeing how someone else has interpreted what they read. The idea of combining literature and art opens up a discussion and gives students a place to freely discuss and express their feelings for literature. I think students' creativity will pleasantly surprise themselves and the teachers involved.

Bucher, Katherine and Manning, M. Lee., Young Adult Literature: Exploration, Evaluation, and Appreciation. Prentice Hall. 2005