The Response-Centered Approach

The teaching of literature has evolved along with society. Different world events, social media, and technological innovations now influence students. A couple years ago, most teachers would have been standing in front of the class lecturing over literature. The approaches of literature have progressed based on the student’s needs. Mary Lou Brandvik and Katherine S. McKnight discussed the recent response-centered approach in their book, The English Teacher’s Survival Guide. This approach “emphasizes the reader as a key element in the creation of a literary work.” The response-centered approach, based on reader-response criticism, the reader is actively engaging with the text as they read it. The most respectable approach by far would be …show more content…
Often times, it is better for the student to determine their own writing prompt, although the teachers would approve it first. Similar to projects, it is a better practice to have students select their own prompts and their own mediums for the projects. For example, a teacher could have a list of projects such as a news broadcast, a painting, a children’s book, or an essay. The students can hand-pick what book or short story they would like to do the project over. That way, your students, who have different preferences regarding projects, will feel more comfortable with the overall project. Again, one needs to have guidelines for the students to follow, but one does need to give the students some room for creativity. This would be a great practice to incorporate into the classroom because most classrooms are quite diverse regarding cultures, race, and learning differences. It would be better to guide students through small group and projects rather than direct teach the entire time. Direct teach is completely okay to do at times, but for students who are not college-aged, it is often better to not direct teach the entire class period. Students need to engage themselves in the classroom, and the best way to teach is to minimize distractions and add interesting aspects to one’s lessons while still incorporating the required curriculum and content. As a final point, the best approach a teacher can make is to hand the teaching over to the students. Of course, direct teaching and other approaches are always going to be necessary, but overall, students are becoming more responsible for their learning. Brandvik and McKnight say that there are approaches that still should be used. However, “our concept of the reader has changed, we’ve learned to place a greater