In their book Understanding by Design, Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe argue that curriculum designers should employ a “backwards” design to initially define learning goals and objectives — what you want your students to be able to do. You can define the specific strategies or critical approaches students will employ by first unpacking your own interpretation of a media text and noting the particular thought processes you employed in constructing your responses to a text. In doing so, you should consider the differences in how you respond and how your students respond. While you may be able to interpret the symbolic meaning of sign given your knowledge of the cultural codes, your students may have more difficulty doing so.

An alternative perspective on curriculum design frames the curriculum around the use and application of various interpretive strategies or critical approaches that are involved in understanding and producing all different types of texts.

Interpretive Strategies

• Comparing differences in experiences of different reading and viewing modes

• Defining narrative development

• Interpreting characters’ actions, beliefs, agendas, goals

• Contextualizing texts in terms of cultural and historical worlds

• Defining intertextual/hypertextual links between texts

• Adopting alternative voices and discourses

• Judging quality of literature and media texts

By framing the curriculum in terms of these underlying interpretive strategies you can consider using both print and media/digital texts to helps students acquire these strategies and approaches.

Module 12: Word document

Drawing on Existing Media Studies Curriculum

Studying Film Adaptations of Literature and Theater

Different Modes of Adaptation

Interpretive Strategies for Organizing Curriculum

Comparing Differences in Experience of Different Reading and Viewing Modes

Defining Narrative Development

Interpreting Characters’ Actions, Beliefs, Agendas, Goals

Contextualizing Texts in Terms of Cultural and Historical Worlds

Defining Intertextual / Hypertextual Connections Between Texts

Adopting Alternative Voices and Discourses

Judging Quality of Literary and Media Texts

Designing Units

Techniques for Developing Units

Evaluation and Assessment of Learning

References

Ideas for Integrating Media into English/Literature Instruction