Personal knowledge versus Powerful knowledge? literary response, affect and understanding in secondary classrooms in England.
Submitted by:
Andy Goodwyn
Abstract:
Recent research in England has demonstrated that high stakes terminal examinations, and their associate pedagogy, severely damage the literary experience of young people. They are formulated around students being taught the received significance of certain texts from the English Literary heritage. To achieve high grades students must memorise key facts about the texts, their authors and their contexts and produce knowledge ‘rich’ essays with literary meanings reduced to received notions that their teachers have inculcated. One, ongoing research project ‘The Lead Practitioner of English study’ reveals the emergence of leaders in English who considers this approach is much more equitable as students can ‘learn’ the correct responses and so achieve high grades; they argue this is also in the interest of ‘disadvantaged students’ who are being given access to ‘powerful knowledge’ (Young, 2013). Yet these leaders also acknowledge the importance of the Personal Growth theme in the history of the subject.
However, it is no coincidence that this ideological move is accompanied by a significant decline in the numbers continuing to Advanced Literature study and to University English departments. Simultaneously, other leaders of English, remain determined to offer a version of English that encourages personal response, where knowledge of literature is seen as much more fluid than factual. The factual is not irrelevant but it is subordinate to the personal and to the concept of literary knowledge being essentially the realm of the affective as well as the intellectual. These English teachers see their purpose as to engage students with texts and to encourage them to care sufficiently so that they feel the value of developing an authentic literary response – not a correct answer. We have reached a point in the history of English in England where these conflicting ideologies dominate the post Covid environment. If English is to flourish and support students’ recovery, then the reestablishment of English as the domain of authentic literary response must be championed.