Moving Beyond Personal Loss to Societal Grieving

Moving Beyond Personal Loss to Societal Grieving considers how secondary English language arts teachers and teacher educators can sensitively and thoughtfully teach pieces of literature in their classrooms in which large-scale deaths are a significant, if not central, aspect of the texts. As mass shootings and violence against black and brown bodies increase, and issues such as AIDS, war, and genocide remain important to discuss as part of a shared, critical, and social consciousness, this book provides resources for educators to directly tackle and discuss these topics through the texts they read in their ELA classrooms. Whether it is canonical or contemporary literature, middle grades or young adult literature, fiction, nonfiction, or graphic novels, literature provides a vehicle to have these difficult but needed conversations about not only the personal but social effects of death and grief in our society. Each chapter in this book focuses on 1-2 texts and provides practical activities that ask students to engage with death, dying, and loss through writing assignments, projects, activities, and discussion prompts in order to build empathy, understanding, and develop critically-minded and engaged students. Moving Beyond Personal Loss to Societal Grieving will be of interest to English language arts teachers, teacher educators, librarians, and scholars who wish to explore with their students the complex emotions that revolve around discussing deaths that occur in literature.

An essential exploration of why books that tackle grief and violence can help students process the reality of these experiences in their lives. This book is a courageous and thoughtful compass for all teachers navigating those difficult but ultimately life-affirming waters., When confronted by death and tragedy, I have never known a group of students who returned to school without the desire to express themselves in some way. Some yearn to speak and be heard, others prefer to listen and reflect; finding a balance between the two can be a difficult task for teachers in the classroom setting. Hence, this important book invites teachers to consider how they explore death’s social impact through literature and provides meaningful pedagogical practices that scaffold personal, emotional, and intellectual conversations about how students respond, as Dr. Maya Angelou once wrote, “when great trees fall…and when great souls die.”, Falter and Bickmore’s book urges teachers to face the topic of death and loss with students through the reading of well-selected young adult literature both fresh and familiar. In doing so, they dignify the kinds of losses young people already face, but which are usually deemed off-limits for classroom study and discussion. Chapters focus on a surprising range of topics, including a focus on the veracity of non-fictional representations of deaths like that of Emmett Till; a consideration of “spirit-murder” via systemic racism; and rethinking views of child soldiers. Each chapter pauses to ensure sensitivity and care when broaching these issues. Much gratitude for a book that honors youth enough to see their strengths and vulnerabilities as central in the curriculum.

Michelle M. Falter is an assistant professor of English education at North Carolina State University. Michelle’s scholarship focuses on dialogic, critical, and feminist pedagogies, emotion in the teaching of literature and writing in secondary classrooms, English teacher education, and adolescent literature. She has previously co-edited the book Teaching Outside the Box but Inside the Standards: Making Room for Dialogue with Teachers College Press.Steven T. Bickmore is an associate professor of English education at the University of Nevada and a past editor of The ALAN Review (2009-2014). He maintains a weekly academic blog on YA Literature—Dr. Bickmore's YA Wednesday (http://www.yawednesday.com/) and his research includes how English teachers negotiate the teaching of literature using young adult literature, especially around the issues of race, class, and gender.