Teahing Shakespeare

I love Shakespeare. By no means am I an expert, but I simply enjoy his work. Teaching Romeo and Juliet is my favorite thing to do all year. Nevertheless, every year I start out the planning for this unit by asking myself why I teach this. It's a good discussion to have with myself- it certainly helps me prepare to provide quality instruction.

I start by reflecting on my own experience as a freshman reading R&J for the first time. I was so excited. Finally, after many long years of being aware of Shakespeare, I was finally "able" to read his work myself. In many ways, it was my Holy Grail of English education. I was fortunate to have passionate teachers (both about students and subject) throughout my education who kept me engaged with The Bard for the next four years.

Now I find myself in their shoes. The past two years my students have done activities that I have found to be engaging, fun, and meaningful as well as activities that were trivial for all involved. Every year I try to explore new aspects of the text with myself and my students. My history teacher hat certainly shows throughout whatever I teach, but the question remains-- why are we teaching Romeo and Juliet, or Shakespeare at all?

The obvious, although bureaucratic, answer for me is that my curriculum binder says I'm supposed to. Of the entire 9th grade binder, only two texts are specifically mention- Romeo and Juliet and The Odyssey. I take this as a sign of the academic freedom entrusted upon me rather than loose standards. I have spent many inservice and summer hours collaborating with colleagues from all of our districts high schools on texts, lesson plans, standards, and assessments.

The more personal answer for me is my own passion for the text. Even if it were not required, I'd probably slip it into my 9th grade class anyways. I strongly believe teachers teach better when they too are engaged in the subject. I proved this to myself this year by changing the tone of my Great Expectations unit. In the past, I told the students that it would be hard, but it would be a journey we would get through together. Generally, I would lose 70% of those students along the way. This year, I kept myself enthusiastic about a novel (which I generally dislike) and at least half of my students "didn't hate" the book by the end. This, to me, seems like a major victory.

The people are important too. That is, my students, of course, are my audience. Romeo and Juliet really seems to speak to freshmen, when they understand it. When is it best to get a student to connect with a text about non-understanding parents, peer conflict, and unrequited, poetic, tragic love? In the middle of puberty-- that's when. Not only that, but as freshmen are getting their feet solidly planted in the world of higher order thinking (or formal operational, for you Piaget-philes out there) it provides us the perfect oppertunity to explore symbolic poetics. We can explore the possibility of language being moving, powerful, and even life changing. We can realize, together, that literature is about more than enjoyment. It's about understanding ourselves, connecting to each other, and sharing that experience.

So I guess that's why I teach Romeo and Juliet. This year more than ever it seems I've had students ask why we read it. A few of them are antagonistic (either they've read it before, they don't like poetry, and generally aren't the "typical" English student.) Most are genuinely curious. I've given terse answsers like "it's culturally important" or "it will help us understand language and poetry." I think I have a better answer now.

I best be off to bed. There are thumbs to bite, swords to unsheath, and maidenheads to be taken tomorrow.

(Did I mention how fun it is to explain the puns to the kiddos?)