Cirrus@Austlit

Literature created and/or marketed for readers aged 12 to 20 is a valuable resource for teachers and their students. This unit explores the range of such materials available while addressing questions about literariness, appeal, and the changing role and format of books in learning environments dominated by electronic media. The strategies for using imaginative literature across the curriculum are also given key consideration.

Aims

This unit aims to assist you in your on-going development as:

* An effective communicator with an enhanced knowledge of the diverse field of adolescent literature;

* A learner who is aware of issues of inclusiveness, difference and intercultural understandings as they are articulated through literature written for young people;

* A reflective practitioner who is open to the challenges that literature offers in viewing the world from different perspectives, and who is committed to developing creative and challenging learning experiences using adolescent literature.

Objectives

On completion of this unit, you should be learner-focused and inclusive curriculum developers who are able to:

1. Manage learning environments that are educationally productive for diverse sets of students and their learning needs [EPA 2.1]

2. Help learners to develop, monitor and evaluate their own thinking and learning skills within the social and cultural context of education [EPA 2.3]

3. Design learning experience programs that draw upon pedagogical, curriculum and assessment knowledge and skills, to respond to the diverse abilities and interests of all learners [EPA3.1]

4. Model and promote inquiring, cooperative and independent approaches to learning [EPA 3.2]

Content

An outline of the development of imaginative literature written and marketed for young adults; exploration of issues involved in the selection, evaluation and promotion of books in school contexts; close study of select texts; and wide reading of representative authors and genre.