You Call That Reading? Putting Graphic Novels in Their Place Louann Reid Colorado State University

Goals of Today’s Presentation Notes toward a rationale Teaching strategies for the beginning of term and beyond And an invitation... Please feel free to raise questions and offer suggestions from your experience throughout the presentation. I am here to learn as well as to teach, and I would like to know what you do in your classrooms regarding the teaching of visual texts. But first, a word from your presenter... Note: I modified some slides after the conference so this presentation and the handouts would make sense together. New material has a pink background.

Colorado State—The Green University Teach preservice teachers and inservice courses for practicing teachers Co-author of textbooks for secondary school students Previously taught secondary school English, public speaking, and drama for 19 years Recently taught a graduate course on Visual Texts and Textuality, from which arose a question from a teacher, “I want to teach a graphic novel, but I don’t know how.” Working on a book for teachers on teaching visual texts.

Louann Reid, Colorado State University, 2008 View from Our House in Winter

The Rocky Mountains in early summer

Notes Toward a Rationale Graphic novels are popular. Many of them are serious as well as entertaining. For some topics and perspectives, graphic narratives are the most effective way of conveying powerful messages and having an emotional impact on readers. Graphic narratives can connect students to the world.

Graphic Novels are Popular  In the Philippines, according to professor and researcher John Lent, “komiks are the most read of all media and a source for many movie plots” (1989).  Booksellers in America, Britain, Germany, Italy and South Korea cite graphic literature as one of their fastest-growing categories (Newsweek 2005)  In Borders, one of America's largest bookstore chains, graphic-novel sales have risen more than 100 percent a year for the past three years. Children in Langley, UK read the new Simpsons graphic novel at Borders.

Comics Aren’t Just for Fun In order to graduate from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, cadets from the class of 2006 must study Marjane Satrapi's graphic novel Persepolis (Newsweek 2005) Around the world, comics have been used to change people’s attitudes and practices (Lent). UNICEF campaigns in South Asia and Africa to uplift role models for girls—television series, video animation, radio broadcasts, comics, storybooks, posters, etc. Organizations and governments in India, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, Latin America, Tanzania and others have mounted campaigns using printed comics to educate people on everything from safe sex to safe driving. Storyteller Group of Johannesburg—largest and most productive: create books around major social issues such as AIDS, environments, and peer pressure. The books are based on extensive research, consultation, and genuine participation.” According to Lent, they have “huge circulations”—more than 3 million copies of one book were distributed.

Comics Aren’t Just For Kids From Hicksville by Dylan Horrocks

Graphic Narratives Allow Expressive Freedom "Comics aren't supposed to be 'serious,' so we can say anything," notes Marjane Satrapi. "Also, the use of a drawing, rather than a photograph, can create the distance necessary to handle a sensitive topic without being cynical." [As for In the Shadow of No Towers] The subversive power of comics allowed Spiegelman to depict falling towers and satirize the Bush government while most other writers were staying clear of the disaster zone. (quotations from Newsweek 2005)

Comics Can Connect Students to the World Additional Perspectives on World Events  Persepolis (Iran) by Marjane Satrapi  Maus (Holocaust) by Art Spiegelman  Palestine (Middle East conflict) by Joe Sacco  Fax from Sarajevo by Joe Kuber Social and Political Education  South Africa (the Storyteller Group)  Germany (200 page bio of Hitler to combat racism in the early 1990s)

Comics Can Connect Students to Shared Pasts Maui: Legends of the Outcast

But Do They Belong in School?

Yes, but... Comic books have NO place in schools. That should be a 'duh'. I love graphic novels and believe anything that encourages kids to read is a good thing. If this class gets students to read outside of school instead of playing games on an Xbox, watching the junk on TV, or mindlessly surfing the Internet, then I'm all for it. Does every different medium have to justify itself based on the opinion of people who either don't really know anything about it or don't care for it. Talk about the dumbing down of America. St. Paul Pioneer Press, 24 March, Complete story and comments on Reporters used graphic novel form to write about a middle school class reading graphic novels (left). Comments from readers about the class are below.

Taught Well, Graphic Narratives Have Value in the Classroom They are motivating to some less- motivated readers. They provide opportunities to develop critical thinking skills about images and representations. They offer a way to capitalize on students’ out-of-school literacies to strengthen academic literacy. They can enlarge our view of the world.

Teaching Comics Well Practice close reading Support for reading difficult texts Teach style and craft Advance social justice Develop a more powerful literacy that allows students to produce as well as consume text

Activities To Consider Close reading Sort and Sequence Supporting Readers Deepening Understanding Examining Narrative Craft Developing Multimodal Literacy

Activities in the Workshop Sort and Sequence  Read the next slide and answer the questions.  Form small groups of no more than 5.  Click to the slide that says “Sort and Sequence”

Close Reading My faith was not unshakable. The year of the revolution I had to take action. So I put my prophetic destiny aside for a while. “Today my name is Che Guevara.” “I am Fidel.” “And I want to be Trotsky.” We demonstrated in the garden of our house. “Down with the king!” “Down with the king!” The revolution is like a bicylce. When the wheels don’t turn, it falls. “Well spoken!” And so went the revolution in my country. What is the subject? Who are the speakers?

Sort and sequence  Open your envelope and take out the panels for three different excerpts. Keep the piles separate from each other.  Put the panels in sequence. Be ready to explain why you chose the sequence you did.  Decide among your group members what the subject is and what the story is.

Added notes about the activity  Envelopes contain the panels for three comics pages. The words have all been blocked out.  Assemble each, using the pictures as clues to sequence. “The Bicycle” uses the words read on the close reading slide.  Look at the complete pages on the second handout for this session.  As a group, discuss what was easy and what was difficult about this activity.

Is This Reading? What skills or strategies would a reader have to use (or could a reader learn) to make sense of the excerpts?

Valuing Visual Texts [some conclusions from the activity] Words and images offer different affordances. There’s value in both ways of telling. Value in versions  Support readers  Enlarge interpretive abilities/deepen understanding Value in finding the most effective form to tell your story.

Supporting Readers Use a graphic narrative to acquaint students with the story basics. Graphic adaptations can demonstrate to today’s students the timelessness of stories.

From Manga Romeo and Juliet

Deepening Understanding Seeing a Metamorphosis in Reading  Visualize from text  Analyze narrative in images  Compare artists’ styles

Where This Comes From Daybooks of Critical Reading & Writing, 6-12 Claggett, Reid, and Vinz. Houghton Mifflin Supplemental Publishers,

Seeing a Metamorphosis in Reading (handout) Pages 2 and 3 offer three versions of Kafka’s “Metamorphosis.” Discuss the effects and effectiveness of each version. What’s told? What’s omitted? Whose story is told (from whose eyes do we see the story and, consequently, from whose value system or world view)?

Multimodal Literacy Students need to be able to construct and comprehend messages that are, increasingly, presented in multiple modes. Using comics helps them to identify the interplay of modes and understand how they can employ multimodality in their own creation (what we might have called “writing”). Students become producers as well as consumers.

Maus Page 4 of the handout offers definitions of the modes in multiple literacies—the ways we make meaning from the text. We didn’t have time in the workshop, but I’ve asked readers to divide into 5 groups, each taking one of the modes and preparing to comment on how that mode contributes to the meaning they make from the two pages of Maus provided here.

Examining Narrative Craft Word balloons  Characters’ speech Thought balloons  Characters’ thoughts Captions  Narrate story, provide background, indicate shifts in time Onomatopoeic sound effects  Words and images that denote sound simultaneously Proportion  Size of text and images to denote dominant characters or important information Composition  Artist’s manner of organizing images and using size and shape to create an overall effect

Invitations to Literacy Habits “In an era when literary texts and age-old literary themes enter new forms every year—from films to adventure games in arcades to hypertext—the visual and verbal powers of comics may be one of the most powerful and productive forms of preparation and motivation available to invite new readers into literacy habits.” Shirley Brice Heath and Vikram Bhagat, “Reading Comics, the Invisible Art,”Handbook of Research on Teaching Literacy through the Communicative and Visual Arts, (1997, 2005)

Invitation to Contribute to My Learning If you would be willing to tell me...  What graphic novels do you teach, if any?  What questions do you have?  What objections do you have to graphic novels?  How could I contact you if I would like to know more? ( ?)

What graphic novels will find a place in your classrooms?