Getting students to do their reading, think about it and share their ideas and responses

In his little book Unriddling the World, Terry Johnson (1988) points out one of the major problems of institutionalised learning; a problem so large and pervasive that it can be as invisible as the air around us:

It was decided long ago that the appropriate way to educate the young was to relieve them of most responsibilities required for subsistence and place them in buildings called "schools" and boxes called "classrooms". ... Isolation from the rest of the community engenders a sense of irrelevance. A lack of responsibility causes the participants to focus too heavily on learning. In many other aspects of society learning is not the central purpose for any given activity, but a by-product of attempts to solve problems that arise when trying to conduct that activity.

It is very difficult to move out of a powerful, controlling role like this and I certainly don't claim to have relinquished it completely. I still feel that it is my job to locate at least some of the appropriate literature and to do my best to encourage students to engage with it. There are obvious reasons why students need to read: to access a wider range of information than is available in lectures, for example, and to hear other views and other voices than those of their teachers. In professional courses it is also important to establish habits of professional literacy, including the following:

• habits of reflection - reading and writing are fundamental reflective processes which I believe are essential to informing and reforming our work;

• habits of risk-taking - speaking their ideas and opinions builds students' confidence and the acquisition of public voice;

• habits of sharing - including collaboration, joint enquiry and challenge. [1]

Students as teachers

When the students meet for a tutorial, they are paired with someone who has prepared different readings and are given a certain period of time to "teach" one another about their material. The "learners" are encouraged to ask questions and both students can spend some time connecting and comparing their readings (which have, of course, been chosen accordingly). I usually then suggest that they exchange readings so that they can later confirm or challenge their partner's interpretation. I sometimes then combine the pairs into groups of four to extend the discussion, or open out into a class discussion of, for example, the implications that the readings might have for classroom practice.

Several important beliefs and understandings underpin this very simple strategy, among them:

• the use of different texts gives the students an authentic reason for explaining, clarifying, analysing and discussing their reading;

• placing a reader in a teaching role promotes active reading at discourse level, and necessarily involves metacognitive processes;

• reading undertaken in this way is more likely to activate schemata for the reader, and thus to be understood at a deeper level and integrated with other knowledge (Anderson, 1977);

• translating text into a visual representation necessitates a different mode of thinking, and is a powerful tool for both teaching and learning (Morris & Stewart-Dore, 1985, p 134). It is also a useful basis for evaluating degrees of understanding;

• students who have had an opportunity to "talk their way towards understanding" in a small group are more confident in expressing their ideas to a larger group.(Reid, Forrestal & Cook, 1987, p 32)

• teacher education students are gaining experience in seeing a text from the learner's point of view and developing their instructional skills.

When I was helping the students to organise their groups I noticed M. had no notes or diagrams and he admitted he hadn't read the articles. In the past I think I probably pretended not to notice when a number of students hadn't done the work - I'd just feel really pissed off but continue - probably try to tell them all the information they hadn't bothered to find out for themselves! Sometimes I used to do the "Talk" about how important it was to read blah blah blah - to no effect of course. What happened this time was interesting. I made quite a big deal of it - "You must feel pretty bad that you've let your partner down like that. Perhaps she could join this group while you go to the library and see if you can get some sense of what this is about." Another girl admitted she'd better do the same. I felt much better in the role of reminding them of their responsibilities than I had as "wimp" or "authority figure" - and hardly anyone failed to do their reading after that!

• students come to class prepared to argue from the point of view of a particular author. They are grouped with students who have prepared a contrasting position or positions;

• each group of students becomes an "expert panel" on a particular issue and has to field questions from the floor;

• each group has to research and demonstrate a particular teaching strategy to the class;

• in pairs, students generate a set of discussion questions for their article. Article and questions are then passed to another pair to read and respond to. Both pairs form a group for final discussion.

Notes

1. Nias (1987) notes that the culture of teaching tends to be one of agreement, where challenge is perceived as uncomfortable. Pleasant as this may be it can serve to preserve poor practices, inequity and entrenched attitudes.

References

Johnson, T. (1988). Unriddling the World. Perth: Wesley Foundation.

Morris, A. & Stewart-Dore (1985). Learning to Learn From Text: Effective reading in the content areas. North Ryde: Addison-Wesley.

Nias, J. (1987). Seeing Anew: Teachers' Theories of Action. Geelong: Deakin University Press.

Reid, J., Forrestal, P. & Cook, J. (1987). Small Group Work in the Classroom. Perth: Education Dept of WA.