"One Town's War on Gay Teens" Lesson

My students read "One Town's War on Gay Teens" for class today. I had a pit in my stomach all day; I was worried about the things they would say or worse- that they might not have anything to say. To help my anxiety, I carefully crafted a lesson plan based on our discussion last week and Shor’s chapter “Three Roads to Critical Thought.” Shor says: “the process of individual writing followed by small-group discussion leading to whole-class dialogue insures that everyone spends time on the tasks—writing, reading to peers, debating the issue, and preparing to report” (p. 71). He talks about how starting the class with student participation via writing and/or group work allows students to co-develop the lesson. This is particularly important, Shor tells us, when the teacher introduces a topic theme. With this in mind, I planned the following:

Building on our discussion of thesis writing and organizational schemas, I had students spend the first 10 minutes of class composing a brief outline for the following prompt: Do you think the author’s argument was persuasive? I decided on this question because I wanted to focus our discussion around the use of narrative in constructing a persuasive argument instead of a moral or political discussion around GLBT rights. In retrospect, I think this was not the best choice for a prompt. Next, per Robin’s suggestion, I planned for students to go to one side of the room if the thought she was persuasive, and the other if they though she was not persuasive. I planned to pair them up with someone with an opposing perspective so they could discuss their opinions. Finally, I prepared a list of discussion questions and passages I wanted to discuss as a group.

Good thing this was a lesson plan. This is what really happened:

As they wrote their outlines, I got excited. They were looking through their articles for examples and writing vigorously. Then I asked them to stand up and move according to their opinion of the article. Everyone walked to the same side of the room. They all thought the article was persuasive. And I panicked. As I thought through my next move (I was thinking they could still get in groups and discuss), a student said: “What was she persuading us to believe?” At that moment, I realized that there was not a clear call to action or conclusion, and so my students all found something different in the article. I told that student he had asked an excellent question, and then posed the question to the class. This led us in a discussion that took up the entire class period. I didn’t get to any of my pre-planned questions, and instead I followed their lead. They were really interested in the author’s motivation, the relationship between politics and culture, audience and venue, and the overall impact of the article. What I found most interesting about the discussion was that they felt empowered to do their own critique of the article. They talked about aspects of the article that they liked and disliked. My students especially took issue with the lack of a clear call for action to suspend the Neutrality Policy. They were concerned that there weren’t resources for readers that may be considering suicide or who were triggered by the article. And they wanted to know how they could get involved. I told them repeatedly how impressed I was with their commentary and their ability to critique. It was an exciting moment where I felt that they were learning from each other and constructing a complex and varied critique. Generally I just prodded them along by asking questions about what they had said, although I find it hard to get away from the student-teacher-student model where I affirm their comment before someone else volunteers to speak. Overall, it was a good day, and the most excited I've been about teaching in a while.