Keira Chapter 5

This chapter focused on the boys' responses to four short stories. The big surprise, to the researchers, was that the boys not only overwhelmingly engaged with the stories, but did so in a notably story-centered way. They did not generally do merely "efferent" (to use a key word from a previous chapter) readings. They seemed to relate to characters as if they were real people, or at least relevant depictions of real people. They took the characters' moral and emotional experiences seriously. Smith and Wilhelm claim to be particularly surprised to learn that 19-20 of the boys were able to respond in this way even to the story ("My Sister's Marriage") that featured a female narrator and arguably a "girly" situation. For Smith and Wilhelm, the fact that the boys responded in this way has to do with the importance in their lives of the social. They form relationships pretty readily with characters because the social dimension of their lives is very important to them.

I have a few thoughts I want to share. The first is the least connected to the rest...but I have to bring this up. Did you notice that the researchers discovered that Mick could not read the stories? I did note earlier in the book that they described this boy as "functionally illiterate." Was it during this part of the study that they came to this conclusion about Mick? I suppose it's fortunate that we/ they don't encounter functional illiteracy *more* often...but still, I'm so troubled when I encounter it. I hope they offered to find some special help for this boy.

But, well...So my next thought is along these lines: Maybe these boys' English classes are not really as bad as they make them out to be. Maybe they're pretty decent, and that's why the majority of the boys really don't have any trouble doing story-centered reading. Maybe the boys have some sort of adolescent oppositional reason for making English class out to be some kind of enemy, when in fact it may be working for them much better than they will admit to the researchers. What do the rest of you think?

My next thought is: I do genuinely feel impressed by the subtlety with which Smith and Wilhelm have managed so far to handle their topic. It would be so much easier to say something simpler about catering to students' already established interests (You know: teach boys action-packed stories with masculine heroes). What they are actually saying is much more complex. It's more along the lines of: Boys can respond to characters and situations different from their own, but it would be a good idea to put more thought into sincere acknowledgement of their interests and literacies, to deal with fewer topics and texts but in more depth, and to make explicit reading strategies--and, also, make more explicit connections between topics.

But, as they note: The fact remains that the boys did pretty well with stories they read "cold"--with NO front loading, no instruction on strategies, and no explicit connections made to previous instruction. Do Smith and Wilhelm think they just did an awesome job of selecting very good/ relevant stories? What do you others think? I have not read the stories in question, but they sound not terribly unlike material I read in high school.