Appleman ch 7

We are finally invited into the semi-personal lif eof the teacher who has allowed her classroom to be the laboratory as we intently observe studnet interactions and responses to the previous theories. Martha Cosgrove is asked questions in throughout this chapter and gives some insightful answers especially for future educators. She talked about her beginnings as an English tecaher. Her approach to literature was traditional and her style was didactic; not a good combination. She followed New Criticism methodolgy, defining terms, literary devices and vocabulary. It wasn't until she was placed in a totally different setting about 10 years later that her style and purpose transformed. Her focus was now the students and their abilities. Her approach had no choice but to morph to fit the students ability.
Cosgrove gave alot of great advice and said some really thought-provoking things. She said that one thing she has learned over the years is 'sensing' or temporing her class to see what will work, how to push them or to fall back. I think this takes a teacher to be tuned to his/her students. You must have a passion to get to know them indivually and collectively. I know that at the beginning of the book, Appleman gave many suggestions for why we should teach theory. Cosgrove gives her profound reasoning for her instruction of theory '...teaching literary theory is about teaching kids metacognition and encouraging flexibility in thinking. It's about giving them power as learners, because literary theory enables them to know what they are doing while they are doing it' (123). It's not only about offering different lenses to se ethe world but it involves the process by which they do this. This is where problems with deconstruction may dissolve; we help students acknowledge their advanced thinking skills, therefore they are appreciative of how much they've grown as a thinker rather than their focus being the relevance of existence. Because after all we are not philosophers but teachers. Martha shared her story in this chapter and it gives proof that if you start off wrong you don't hav eto end up on that same track. I also like that she incorporated the 'lenses' in her own life as she moved and started a different journey in her career and family. Over all the chapter was helpful for future teachers like myself.