C9077 - APPROCCI PLURALI NELLA DIDATTICA DELLE LETTERATURE (LM)

Learning outcomes

At the end of the course, students will be familiar with the main past and present institutional, theoretical and pedagogical motivations for teaching literature in schools, as discussed in an ongoing international debate. In particular, they will be acquainted with contemporary views on the reading of literary works in lower and upper secondary education, including in today’s multilingual classrooms. They will be able to identify the variety of pedagogical approaches that enhance interactive literary discourse in the classroom, will learn about international empirical studies describing the participatory, interactional and linguistic characteristics of these approaches and their potential effects on reading habits, and will be able to examine the connections between literature, multimodality and media culture. On a practical level, students will know how to adapt innovative teaching proposals to specific teaching contexts.

Course contents

The course focuses on ‘reading at school’, which underpins a literary pedagogy characterised by a plurality of teaching approaches. To explore current thinking on reading at school in this context, students will, first and foremost, acquire (or deepen) their knowledge of the theoretical perspectives that inform this plurality of approaches. Starting with an essential diachronic overview of the long-standing international debate on the teaching of literature, we shall, in fact, consider the proposals that today redefine, at various levels, the literary reading education, focusing, in particular, on the insights offered by sociological studies of reading practices (which clarify the multifaceted nature of reading as an everyday practice, a process of knowledge, a social resource, etc.) and on the contributions of ‘literature education’, viewed as an autonomous field of theoretical and applied research.

Within this framework, we will focus on ‘reading as an experience’, as the starting point for a pathway towards expert reading; on the sujet lecteur-scripteur (student-reader and writer), a concept that places the real reader at the heart of a new and comprehensive teaching paradigm, which has been extensively tested in the French context from which it originates; on ‘discursive approaches’ to literary reading, that is, the ways in which books that have been read are talked about in the classroom, and thus the micro-dynamics of interaction and social interaction, such as those that arise during a reading circle (or book talk) organised in class, for example, or which take place autonomously, in a creative and participatory manner, even where silent, individual reading was originally planned; on ‘shared reading’ of a novel within the class group, and the teacher’s role in facilitating this practice.

In exploring all these aspects, we will draw on concrete examples – i.e., transcripts taken from interactions in real classrooms – drawn from empirical studies that reflect a methodological interest in naturalistic data. The analysis of this data provides a deeper understanding of literary reading in schools and offers insights upon which innovative teaching approaches can be fruitfully based within specific educational contexts.

Readings/Bibliography

• S. Giusti, 2026, La lettura a scuola. Le teorie, l’insegnamento, la scelta delle opere, Carocci.
• L. Sterponi, 2007, “Clandestine interactional reading: Intertextuality and double-voicing under the desk” in Linguistics and Education 18, 2007, pp. 1-23.
• J.Gordon, 2022 [2020], “The subtle art of shared reading: Pedagogic Literary Narration”, in B. Marshall et al. (Eds.) The Bloomsbury handbook of reading perspectives and practices, pp.167-181.
• J-F. Massol (2022), “Le sujet lecteur-scripteur: breve histoire française d’un paradigme didactique contemporain” in Effetti di Lettura / Effects of Reading, 1(1), pp.17–29.
• R. Pugliese, 2026, “Talking about books in the classroom: when literary reading education becomes a shared, social and interactively lived experience”, in L. Caronia (Ed.), Special Issue, “Forms of talk and shared worlds of meaning: language, culture and social interaction at home, school, and in healthcare settings”, in Civitas Educationis. Education, politics, and culture, vol. 15/1.

Teaching methods

Lectures will be combined with seminar discussions and practical activities based on examples of natural conversational interaction in the classroom (transcribed audio or video clips) to examine certain specific phenomena related to the experience of reading literature. Students attending the course will be invited, before each individual lecture, to read the study material, as set out in a detailed course outline (‘dates, content and readings’) which will be provided on the first day of the course.

Assessment methods

The assessment of learning involves an oral examination consisting of questions, both general and specific, relating to the topics covered. The criteria for assessing the answers will primarily be as follows: accuracy and depth of understanding of the content; a good ability to establish links between topics; clarity and precision in presentation; appropriate use of vocabulary; and independent analysis.

 

Students with SLDs or temporary or permanent disabilities:

we suggest that you contact the relevant university office (https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en ) and your teacher immediately to work together to find the most effective strategies for attending classes and/or preparing for exams.

Any requests for exam accommodations must be made at least 15 days before the date of the exam, by sending an email to the teacher and copying (Cc) the email address disabilita@unibo.it [mailto:disabilita@unibo.it] (in case of disability) or dsa@unibo.it [mailto:dsa@unibo.it] (for students with Specific Learning Difficulties).

Teaching tools

PowerPoint presentations, video, handouts

Office hours

See the website of Rosa Pugliese