1. Better Reading through Shakespeare
National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE)
November 19, 2010
2. Shakespeare – Who Cares?
Traditionally, we introduce Shakespeare into the curriculum
as an end- product to which students must be exposed
although most won’t be able to read or understand it outside
of class.
Given that Shakespearean language will only become more
challenging to future English classes as fluency and literacy
levels shift, I believe our only option is to consider changing
using Shakespeare as a product and instead using his writing
as part of a process.
In other words, instead of teaching students to read
Shakespeare, I believe we should use Shakespeare to teach
students how to read.
3. But Wait! Shakespeare’s Hard!
When reading Shakespeare is carefully introduced, properly
scaffolded, and painstakingly modeled, not only does the text
become more meaningful, but the class creates a pathway
into academic discourse which empowers students well
beyond the last quatrain.
4. Why Bother?
The skills required to parse Shakespeare’s language are
immediately transferable and applicable to decoding any
academic text across the curriculum as well as unfamiliar
texts outside the university.
5. Who’s Boring Now?
And no one would argue that spending time parsing
Shakespeare’s writings on love, jealously, hatred, fantasy,
sex and murder is time wasted, especially when compared
with the usual texts of the reading and composition
classroom, which tend to focus on social issues like
immigration, euthanasia or global warming.
6. Pre-Reading
Using your work email, you were trying to forward an email
with an attachment from LOL Cats when a horrible error
occurred and student records were lost.
Compose an email to the parents of student Liam Stephens
explaining that his records are now irretrievable, although
your friend did receive the email and is ROTFL.
8. Hamlet, Act 1, Scene ii
KING CLAUDIUS
Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's death
The memory be green, and that it us befitted
To bear our hearts in grief and our whole kingdom
To be contracted in one brow of woe,
Yet so far hath discretion fought with nature
That we with wisest sorrow think on him,
Together with remembrance of ourselves.
Therefore our sometime sister, now our queen,
The imperial jointress to this warlike state,
Have we, as 'twere with a defeated joy,--
With an auspicious and a dropping eye,
With mirth in funeral and with dirge in marriage,
In equal scale weighing delight and dole,--
Taken to wife: nor have we herein barr'd
Your better wisdoms, which have freely gone
With this affair along. For all, our thanks.
9. Now follows, that you know, young Fortinbras,
Holding a weak supposal of our worth,
Or thinking by our late dear brother's death
Our state to be disjoint and out of frame,
Colleagued with the dream of his advantage,
He hath not fail'd to pester us with message,
Importing the surrender of those lands
Lost by his father, with all bonds of law,
To our most valiant brother. So much for him.
Now for ourself and for this time of meeting:
Thus much the business is: we have here writ
To Norway, uncle of young Fortinbras,--
Who, impotent and bed-rid, scarcely hears
Of this his nephew's purpose,--to suppress
His further gait herein; in that the levies,
The lists and full proportions, are all made
Out of his subject: and we here dispatch
You, good Cornelius, and you, Voltimand,
For bearers of this greeting to old Norway;
Giving to you no further personal power
To business with the king, more than the scope
Of these delated articles allow.
Farewell, and let your haste commend your duty.
10. Close Reading
Group 1 – How many times does Claudius use the pronouns
we, our or us
Group 2 – How many times does Claudius use the pronouns
he, him, or his?
Group 3 – How many times does Claudius use the pronouns
you and I?
11. Discussion
How is Claudius’ language similar to your freewrite? What
strategies did you share?
Why does Shakespeare have Claudius use this language?
What does Shakespeare want the audience to know, think
and/or feel about Claudius?
What do you think is going to happen to Claudius? Why?
12. What the heck just happened?
pre-reading exercise
an active and engaged reading activity
discussion of grammar, rhetorical choice, and character
low-stakes reflective writing
13. Daily Lesson Plan
Activity: “Throwing ‘To Be or Not to Be”
T hands out Hamlet’s famous soliloquy: Class reads
Class reads soliloquy again, but this time, class stands up when they hit
a punctuation mark. Class continues to read and when they see
another punctuation mark, they sit. Repeat until soliloquy is finished.
T divides class into two lines
Each line faces the other
One side reads the first line and then other side reads the second line.
Repeat until end.
T divides class into groups
Groups mark speech every time Hamlet’s thoughts change.
14. Hamlet, Act 3, Scene i
HAMLET
To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
15. For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.--Soft you now!
The fair Ophelia! Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember'd.
16. Lesson Plan - continued
Class Discussion: When did the groups in the last
activity stand/sit together? When did they stand/sit
separately? When do the thoughts change?
T asks “How do we know when thoughts change?”
T reviews punctuation: commas and colons
Class reads “To Be or Not to Be” Again
Class discussion: What changed from the first reading to
the last? Why? What do we know now that we didn’t
know at the beginning of class?
Homework:
Finish reading Act 3
Character Journal
17. Character Journal
Directions: On the second day of this unit, you will be assigned a character you will pay special
attention to and follow throughout the course of the play. Each week, you will find your character
in the acts and scenes assigned for reading, and identify and discuss a personality trait that this
character displays in the scenes. Use the dialogue spoken by that character or by other characters in
the same scene to support your findings. Your response should follow the form of the example
below.
Student Example:
Act and Scene: Act 1, Scene 1
Character: Horatio
Character Trait: Loyalty and Bravery
Illustrating Evidence: In this scene, Horatio sees the ghost of Hamlet’s Father. Although he is
afraid of ghosts, Horatio tries to get it to speak to him so he can find out how the King really died so
he can tell Hamlet.
Quote: “Let us impart what we have seen tonight/Unto young Hamlet, for upon my life/This
spirit, dumb to us, will speak to him.”
Summary of Quote: Horatio tells Marcellus they must let Hamlet know the ghost of his father
is haunting the castle and that the ghost will speak to Hamlet.
Requirements: You will be required to turn in your character journals every Thursday. If your
character is not in the scenes we read, please hand in a journal with your name, the numbers of the
scenes we read, and the reason WHY your character is not in those scenes. For instance, your
character may have been sent on a mission by the king, returned to the spirit world, or have been
killed. You are responsible for excusing your character from the journal, and must provide a true
and compelling reason for your character’s absence drawn from the play.
18. The Point
Ultimately, we as English teachers have to follow Darwin’s dictum and
“adapt or die,” especially when using 400-year-old texts in a classroom
where students communicate more quickly and copiously and with less
thought, reflection, grammar and complete sentences than ever before.
Changing the product, or text, has been our approach in the past, which
frustrates teachers, and bores students (at best) and disrespects them (at
worst). A new adaptation is required, one which gives students the tools
to attack the text we feel they should examine in the first place. We
complain they can’t read, so let’s teach them to. Let’s accept them for
who they are and meet them at their texting, IM-ing, tweeting levels.
Let’s show them that “though this be madness, yet there is method in it.”
And let’s explain that these methods lead not only to an understanding
of Shakespeare but of all substantial texts themselves. Then we will
really have taught them something.
19. Handouts and Contact Info
All my documents, plus this presentation, will be online at
NCTE’s connected community under the posting “Better
Reading Through Shakespeare.”
Email me whenever with questions or request for more info
Anne Trumbore
trumbore@epgy.stanford.edu
