Ari's Rationale
At the beginning of the Fahrenheit 451 unit it is important to not simply start reading the book, but begin with an introduction to the unit that allows students to begin thinking about its themes and activating prior knowledge in which to contextualize the book. As it is said in How to Read English Like a Literature Professor, "So engage that other creative intelligence. Listen to your instincts. Pay attention to what you feel about the text" (Foster 107). By beginning the unit with contextualizing activities and readings, student will begin to engage in their prior knowledge to allow for creativity to come when beginning to read the text. In fact, determining what to feel about a certain text is almost always based on our past experiences, our values, and our stance on certain issues -- this is precisely what the day one worksheet is supposed to gauge in each student and the class as a whole. This type of open discussion also permits for the classroom culture to be established and for a variety of opinions to be heard. In Jim Burke's The English Teacher's Companion Burke discusses the importance of establishing a comfortable and safe learning environment that builds off of the students' own honest desire to learn, engage, and share with others (482). After students begin to think about their own values and then begin reading the supplementary material by Jean Rhys, an article on book burning during Germany's Nazi regime in the 1930's, and an article on Google censorship from 2010, students will begin to reflect on how issues of surveillance, censorship, and government control have been issues throughout the course of history. The journals and class discussions during the first three days will bring students to be comfortable with introspection so that self-reflection and reflection on society can continue throughout the remainder of the unit. As students engage in this type of learning, then the work that is turned will also be reflected upon and students will learn how to self-evaluate not just their opinions, but their presentation of their opinions through reading and writing. This pedagogical strategy aligns itself with Burke when he states that, "Students were also taught to become more reflective about their own reading and writing performance" (26). As students begin to read the novel with help from their own backgrounds and the contexts that were discussed in the first three days, then Bradbury's story will begin to better resonate with them as they find meaning and application to their daily lives: "[...] the story resonates with the richness of distance antecedents, with the power of accumulated myth. The story ceases to be locked in the middle of the [...] century, and becomes timeless and archetypal" (Foster 56). By introducing the story with outside sources and allowing student reflection to be the focus of the first week of the unit, they will find relevance with the novel and become engrossed in an engaging story that does not seem to distant of a possibility from our own lives and technological/government progression.
Adina's Rationale
Essentially in each pedagogy class at the University of Illinois' education department, teaching diversity in classrooms has been among the most important topics. When teaching a book like Fahrenheit 451, some critics may allude that this book does not have the ability to teach students about diversity, when, in fact, this book provides so many wonderful opportunities to teach diversity in the classroom. By emphasizing the major themes in the book, uniformity in thinking and lifestyle, it provides the opportunity for a dialogue on whether that is the road to equality, or whether people deserve freedom. By exploring the lack of diversity in this novel, it opens up the classroom to a dialogue on what diversity means, what is the role of diversity in the book (the lack thereof), and get students to truly and critically think about the role of diversity in their lives. In the novel, Montag and other characters like Granger start the intellectual revolution. The whole concept of the book is that books cause people to think, and when people think they are not happy and controllable. Thus, by taking away books - people lead "meaningful, fun" lives when the reality is that people are truly miserable and leading half lives. In terms of teaching for social change, the book How to Read Literature like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster shows that bringing politics into the classroom can be a good thing. Political works can have a negative connotation in the classroom with teaching that is “programmatic, pushing a single cause or concern or party position, or it’s tied into a highly topical situation that doesn’t transfer well out of its own specific time or place” (110). However, good use of political writing “engages the realities of its world - that thinks about human problems, including those in the social and political realm, that addresses the rights of persons and the wrongs of those in power - can be not only interesting but hugely compelling (110). Similarly, the book Privilege, Power, and Difference by Allan G. Johnson explains that when teaching diversity, “the real illusion connected to difference is the popular assumptions that people are naturally afraid of what they don’t know or understand” (13). This is a related theme in the novel, and many dystopian novels, where people are controlled and do not question what they don’t know. This “supposedly makes it inevitable that you’ll fear and distrust people who aren’t like you and, in spite of your good intentions, you’ll find it all but impossible to get along with them” (13). These themes relate perfectly to the novel, especially regarding Clarisse and how she was killed because she was different. Thus, Fahrenheit 451 is a great novel to teach about diversity.
Jeanne's Rationale
The rationale for my unit has multiple layers; indeed, as Jim Burke explains about composing curricula in The English Teacher’s Companion, “If I were to translate this image into the language of music, I would compare it to the improvisational pianist Keith Jarrett, who, with one hand, would establish a sound, regular melody while with the other hand he began to introduce layers of complexity over that melody” (Burke 278). I started with one essential question for my section of the book: Why do we need to read? (more broadly connected to the essential question for the entire Unit: How is literature a vehicle for social change?) Each day I found new ways to examine this question: either by examining specific characters within the book, challenging students to relate the text to their own lives, and then finally, at the end of the week, taking an article about the importance of solitude and personal thought for leadership to connect the concepts of the importance of reading and thinking in order to be an effective leader for change—that right there is the answer to how literature can be the vehicle for social change.
Another reason for introducing the article, Solitude and Leadership during this time, besides the fact it is the time where characters, for the first time in the novel, begin to take on unfamiliar leadership roles, is that I want students to understand not only the importance of reading to explore other people’s perspectives, but to understand, as Thomas C. Foster puts it in How to Read Literature Like a Professor, that “there’s no such thing as a wholly original work of literature” (Foster 29). It’s important to read in order to think, certainly, but it is important to read a lot in order to understand the conversation that goes on in all writing—which is especially relevant when teaching such an iconic and decades-old novel. Through the week, between the “What do books do?” chart, examining references within the text, and the discussions on “Solitude and Leadership,” I hope for students to understand that “the dialogue between old texts and new is always going on in one way or another” (Foster 34).
Finally, the diversity unit at the end of the unit actually continues the ideas nicely of participating in the conversation of literature, by realizing what voices are silenced during different points of this conversation. By reading articles about different instances of book banning, censorship, and ignoring of voices, students will be provided with concrete examples to talk about diversity and power dynamics. Indeed, as Allan G. Johnson explains in Privilege, Power, and Difference, “You can’t deal with a problem if you don’t name it. Once you name it, you can think, talk, and write about it, make sense of it by seeing how it’s connected to other things that explain it and point toward solutions.” (Johnson 9) By using case studies to examine diversity, students will be provided with language to name the problem and start thinking about it, and then, with the extension activity, begin thinking about solutions.
Another reason for introducing the article, Solitude and Leadership during this time, besides the fact it is the time where characters, for the first time in the novel, begin to take on unfamiliar leadership roles, is that I want students to understand not only the importance of reading to explore other people’s perspectives, but to understand, as Thomas C. Foster puts it in How to Read Literature Like a Professor, that “there’s no such thing as a wholly original work of literature” (Foster 29). It’s important to read in order to think, certainly, but it is important to read a lot in order to understand the conversation that goes on in all writing—which is especially relevant when teaching such an iconic and decades-old novel. Through the week, between the “What do books do?” chart, examining references within the text, and the discussions on “Solitude and Leadership,” I hope for students to understand that “the dialogue between old texts and new is always going on in one way or another” (Foster 34).
Finally, the diversity unit at the end of the unit actually continues the ideas nicely of participating in the conversation of literature, by realizing what voices are silenced during different points of this conversation. By reading articles about different instances of book banning, censorship, and ignoring of voices, students will be provided with concrete examples to talk about diversity and power dynamics. Indeed, as Allan G. Johnson explains in Privilege, Power, and Difference, “You can’t deal with a problem if you don’t name it. Once you name it, you can think, talk, and write about it, make sense of it by seeing how it’s connected to other things that explain it and point toward solutions.” (Johnson 9) By using case studies to examine diversity, students will be provided with language to name the problem and start thinking about it, and then, with the extension activity, begin thinking about solutions.
Alex's Rationale
Many aspects of our CI 403 course play into the necessity of teaching the issues that Fahrenheit 451 addresses. Inclusivity is a major tenet of great pedagogy, and this book allows teachers to bring in multiple lessons on diversity. We have discussed in class how important learning about diversity is, and how important it is to learn about problems within societies of discrimination; while the following quote is focused on genocide, the following quote applies to issues of individual rights, discrimination against minorities, and global actions of war and peace as well; Stanford Professor of Education Elliot Eisner states, “‘ignorance is not simply a void; it has important effects on the kinds of options one is able to consider; the alternatives one can examine, and the perspectives with which one can view a situation or problem’” (262). The issues in Fahrenheit 451 are complex ones that will open students' eyes to important philosophical, historical, and social problems, although it is a fictional, futuristic novel.
Students should understand the importance of learning about new perspectives. The importance of teaching students about social issues and diversity is brought up again when Teaching About Genocide states, “we need an education that teaches the common humanness of ‘the other,’ an education that stresses the values of caring and that emphasizes personal responsibility and compassion, an education that prepares the individual for doing acts of good” (3). Students should feel connected to the world outside of their own town and country, and feel a sense of empowerment to educate others and make a difference. The book goes on to elaborate, “we also have to confront the tough questions, the questions about ethics, resistance, and responsibility, the questions about personal and political choices, about religious teachings and civil society” (4). This book provides many instances of reflection for students on exactly such tough questions - resistance and responsibility, personal and political choices, are the backbone of the novel.
Another book from class that touches on the importance of social responsibility and the role of literature in developing that in students is How to Read Literature Like a Professor: I am usually reading to understand different perspectives, looking for a fuller array of “stories…that constitute a way of seeing by which we read the world and, ultimately, ourselves” (65). Foster also instructs the reader to “try to find a reading perspective that allows for sympathy with the historical moment of the story, that understands the text as having been written against its own social, historical, cultural, and personal background” (228). It emphasizes the magnitude and scope behind and within every story, illustrating the power of literature. Removing students from their own perspective, finding new social, cultural, and historical significance, and multiple layers of meaning through symbolism are all part of learning from literature like a pro.
To address these subjects in my section of the unit, I included probing questions for students to reflect on at the beginning of each class. I brought in secondary sources to prompt critical thinking of the deeper meanings within the text, and gave them both academic and creative opportunities to work both individually and collaboratively on exploring these issues in more depth. I connected the issues to their own lives as often as possible, asking them to make connections and think about how they feel about these problems. Many of the themes were something they had to explore visually or verbally, and we focused on close reading of the sections of the text that really discuss diversity, knowledge, and power. Writing assignments also had an analytical component that asked students to pick out the quotes they thought were most insightful into a social problem or philosophical perspective. The final lesson in my section of the unit focused on diversity in its entirety, but it flows with the rest of the week's lessons because looking at what is valued in society and whether diversity is seen as a positive complexity or negative social problem is the essential question behind the unit. Students should have a much larger idea of historical, social, and philosophical dilemmas and perspectives on diversity, and connect and compare these concepts from the novel into their own lives and society as a whole within America. They should also have an idea how powerful the sharing of ideas is in changing viewpoints and creating social change- whether through books or electronic media, mass culture is propagated and manipulated by everyone with a voice to contribute. Books and other information that values and highlights minority voices are necessary to have a fair, inclusive understanding of life.
Students should understand the importance of learning about new perspectives. The importance of teaching students about social issues and diversity is brought up again when Teaching About Genocide states, “we need an education that teaches the common humanness of ‘the other,’ an education that stresses the values of caring and that emphasizes personal responsibility and compassion, an education that prepares the individual for doing acts of good” (3). Students should feel connected to the world outside of their own town and country, and feel a sense of empowerment to educate others and make a difference. The book goes on to elaborate, “we also have to confront the tough questions, the questions about ethics, resistance, and responsibility, the questions about personal and political choices, about religious teachings and civil society” (4). This book provides many instances of reflection for students on exactly such tough questions - resistance and responsibility, personal and political choices, are the backbone of the novel.
Another book from class that touches on the importance of social responsibility and the role of literature in developing that in students is How to Read Literature Like a Professor: I am usually reading to understand different perspectives, looking for a fuller array of “stories…that constitute a way of seeing by which we read the world and, ultimately, ourselves” (65). Foster also instructs the reader to “try to find a reading perspective that allows for sympathy with the historical moment of the story, that understands the text as having been written against its own social, historical, cultural, and personal background” (228). It emphasizes the magnitude and scope behind and within every story, illustrating the power of literature. Removing students from their own perspective, finding new social, cultural, and historical significance, and multiple layers of meaning through symbolism are all part of learning from literature like a pro.
To address these subjects in my section of the unit, I included probing questions for students to reflect on at the beginning of each class. I brought in secondary sources to prompt critical thinking of the deeper meanings within the text, and gave them both academic and creative opportunities to work both individually and collaboratively on exploring these issues in more depth. I connected the issues to their own lives as often as possible, asking them to make connections and think about how they feel about these problems. Many of the themes were something they had to explore visually or verbally, and we focused on close reading of the sections of the text that really discuss diversity, knowledge, and power. Writing assignments also had an analytical component that asked students to pick out the quotes they thought were most insightful into a social problem or philosophical perspective. The final lesson in my section of the unit focused on diversity in its entirety, but it flows with the rest of the week's lessons because looking at what is valued in society and whether diversity is seen as a positive complexity or negative social problem is the essential question behind the unit. Students should have a much larger idea of historical, social, and philosophical dilemmas and perspectives on diversity, and connect and compare these concepts from the novel into their own lives and society as a whole within America. They should also have an idea how powerful the sharing of ideas is in changing viewpoints and creating social change- whether through books or electronic media, mass culture is propagated and manipulated by everyone with a voice to contribute. Books and other information that values and highlights minority voices are necessary to have a fair, inclusive understanding of life.