b)
The TP has taught me a
very important lesson on the term “Time constraint”. While teaching Merchant of
Venice to many of my Lower Secondary students, I find myself in a constant race
with my arch nemesis, the minute hand on the classroom clock. This minute hand
is out to get me. It disallows me from giving students some amount of
experiential learning of the text. It also disallows me from pressing students
into forming their own opinions of the characters. It’s partner in crime is
someone I would like to label as “Sir Syllabus of Litville,” commonly known as
the Literature Syllabus. As this text is being taught to a Lower Secondary
class, I am tasked with the following:
1.
Completing the text in
the stipulated timeframe to a class of students who are pretty clueless of this
Alien Early Modern English.
2. Allowing the students to know
enough to effectively seat for their Examinations.
As such, as I teach the students
about this piece of Drama, something has got to give. My arch nemesis and his
partner in crime have just too much power over me. The “best decision” would be
to frame my lessons to lead up to the main things they will be tested on in
their examinations. This would mean letting go of some crucial lessons and
possible readings of the Merchant of Venice. With minute hand constantly
robbing them of time, (seriously, I have never come across any other villain
who works non-stop like this) the teacher cannot possible cover all the facets
of the text. As such, I have to cut down on teaching students some Dramatic
devices employed by William Shakespeare. This is something that makes me feel
extremely guilty. I have sleepless nights thinking about how students will
never know the significance of the use of contrasting images/ juxtapositions in
Gratiano’s conversation with Antonio. I have thee sleepless nights not because
my bed is uncomfortable, neither is it because the students are not able to
learn/process this at this current juncture. The sleepless nights come from the
fact that I am choosing what is important for them to learn. I am not providing
them with the rich vocabulary of devices that they can use to identify the
beauty of the writer’s craft.
Depending on the teacher, students
may never know how Shakespeare wrote with such care in beautifying a play by
painting vivid pictures with words. Students may also never know that there are
usages of Puns, Foreshadowing and Dramatic tension in one Scene alone. It really
depends on the teacher. We choose what
is important for the students and that in turn guides our lesson. The question
is, “Who are we to guide them?”; Are we the absolute and final possible reading
of the text? In sooth, no. Then, who are we to provide them with what is
important in a piece of Drama and what is not? Have we conducted a worldwide
poll on “Why Foreshadowing is more prominent/important a technique vs
Imagery(Metaphors)?” We have not. However, we cannot keep concentrating and
explaining along the way why this is a metaphor or that is an instance of
foreshadowing. The repetition may help the students better identify such
techniques but we do not have time to pick out all that there is to allow them
this. We pick and choose what is important and hope it sinks in. The smarter
students will get it after a few examples. The slower students may not and will
struggle to identify the techniques still. Do we ensure all students can
successfully identify the constant use of a dramatic literary technique or do
we expose them to as much of it as possible? Quality vs Quantity.
As such, the problem that I am
facing and which will always be there till the end of time is ensuring the
students can indeed learn all that they need to in their one year of studying
Literature, without losing out on too much. Teaching Shakespeare in Lower
Secondary, for example can take up to 3 terms or even a whole year. We still have
to cover things like Poetry and Prose/short stories. Students need to be
exposed to a variety of prose and poetry. It is up to us to effectively frame
up a year’s work to ensure students get the most of their experience in
Literature. Unfortunately, something we have to live with is condensing some
areas of study and leaving out some less crucial bits (even though it may give
us sleepless nights).The phrase “less
crucial bits,” after all, is always subject to debate. At the end of the day,
to sum up in a terrible metaphorical example, Batman may think Robin due to his
acrobatic fighting skills is important but Robin may not be so crucial when the
only enemy in question is the Joker, who frankly is all brains. That is the sad
price to pay in teaching Lower Secondary students Shakespeare.
Hi Harvinder, your post got me thinking about whether Shakespeare should be even taught at lower secondary? Given the time constraints, is it better to have student cover a less difficult text so that we can cover it more thoroughly and in more depth. But then, what if they never study it at upper secondary? So there are lots of difficult questions when it comes to text choice. Given that your practicum is in a school where literature and drama is valued, and yet all these issues are faced, it makes me wonder how we can even achieve the kind of learning we want in other less supportive environments.
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