Eureka!
Summer 2001 Workshop
Gulliver's Travels: Text And Context
Leader: Dr. Lila Miranda Graves
Date: Monday, June 25, 2001
Presentation Overview
My presentation will follow the three-part format that I use
when I teach UAB's sophomore survey in British and Irish Literature.
The format, which is simple but transferable, should work as students
move from text to text within a high school class, from one high
school class to a higher one, and from high school to college.
For my presentation I will use Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels
as a demonstration text. Each workshop participant will need to
bring a personal copy of Holt, Rinehart, and Winston's Elements
of Literature: Literature of Britain and The Longman Anthology
of British Literature, Vol. I. I will also use material
from my own library and files such as two film versions
of Gulliver's Travels, slides of illustrations taken
from various editions of Swift's text, overhead transparencies,
and handouts.
Main Points of Presentation
I will begin my presentation by explaining to the workshop
participants that my students are responsible for reading
each assignment three times. They do a "homework pre-read"
before the lecture, a "lecture read" during class, and a
homework "re-read" after class. Each of these readings
requires different techniques on my part and different
skills on the students' part. Using Jonathan Swift's
Gulliver's Travels as my demonstration text, I will
explain to the workshop participants (1) how I handle
the three stages, (2) how workshop participants can utilize
and/or modify my approach for their own classroom use,
and (3) how my technique is conducive to successful
literary analysis at both the high school and university level.
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