It is perhaps apposite to remember that authors do not usually write in order for students and teachers to unpack their words. The wonderful writer Claire Keegan articulated this in a recent interview: “I can’t explain my work. I just write stories. I’ve never thought about a theme. I never once have. I just think about the text.” As all English teachers are asked time and time again “but how do we know that’s what the author meant? How do we know that word was chosen on purpose?” Of course these questions are valid but nevertheless our job remains: to deliver lessons that help students to “think about the text” in a clear and focused manner through engaging active reading strategies. We need to take time to encourage the skills needed across the curriculum and for future assessments. This workshop will concentrate on how to enable students to understand explicit and implicit meaning and attitudes, select and evaluate what is relevant to specific purposes and how effects are created through authorial choice (whether intentional or not!).
