Why you should read literature

• Nederlands
• Middelbare school
• havo
• Leerjaar 4

LITERATURE

Objective lesson

By the end of this class:

• you know why you need to read literature
• you know the aims of literature.
• you have shared experiences with another about books.

Literatuur is een verzamelnaam voor fictieve teksten (verzonnen) die een 'diepere' laag hebben. De kenmerken van literatuur zijn o.a.: originaliteit, complexiteit, onvoorspelbaarheid, een bijzondere stijl en de mogelijkheid om meerdere betekenissen aan de tekst toe te kennen.

What is literature?

What would be a reason for
you to read literature?

Wanneer levert literatuur jou iets op?

Why would you read?

• Reading broadens your horizon.
• Reading improves your well-being.
• Reading teaches you to understand yourself and other     better.
• Reading enhances your language skills.

Reading broadens your horizon

• Your world becomes larger because you encounter new people, ideas, experiences and situations through reading literature. 
• Your own ideas and opinions can change or your ideas and opinions can be put into perspective.
• It can help you to show more understanding for different ways of life, cultures and religions.

Reading broadens your horizon

Dutch people were asked:

What made you start thinking the most?

                        Reading a book                                42%

                        Watching a film/series                 25%

             

                        Gaming                                                20%

Which genre made you start thinking the most?

                         literure                                           71%

                        fantasy/ sciencefiction           37%

                        thrillers                                            31%

Readers are less biased

Books lessen fear for the unknown. They provide a safe place where you can get into contact indirectly with other groups.

Readers are less biased

Harry Potter-readers show more understanding for minorities, when they identify themselves with Harry and not with Voldemort.

The Midnight Library

Between life and death there is a library, and within that library, the shelves go on forever. 

Every book provides a chance to try another life you could have lived. To see how things would be if you had made other choices . . . 

Would you have done anything different, if you had the chance to undo your regrets?

The Power

In The Power the world is a recognisable place: there's a rich Nigerian kid who lounges around the family pool; a foster girl whose religious parents hide their true nature; a local American politician; a tough London girl from a tricky family. But something vital has changed, causing their lives to converge with devastating effect. Teenage girls now have immense physical power - they can cause agonising pain and even death. And, with this small twist of nature, the world changes utterly.

Following a scalding row with her mother, fifteen-year-old Holly Sykes slams the door on her old life. But Holly is no typical teenage runaway: a sensitive child once contacted by voices she knew only as “the radio people,” Holly is a lightning rod for psychic phenomena. Now, as she wanders deeper into the English countryside, visions and coincidences reorder her reality until they assume the aura of a nightmare brought to life.

For Holly has caught the attention of a cabal of dangerous mystics—and their enemies. But her lost weekend is merely the prelude to a shocking disappearance that leaves her family irrevocably scarred. This unsolved mystery will echo through every decade of Holly’s life, affecting all the people Holly loves—even the ones who are not yet born.

Heb jij ook een voorbeeld van een boek dat jou aan het denken heeft gezet?

Reading improves your well-being

• When reading you can lose yourself completely in another world and forget about your problems and concerns for a while.
• While reading you discover that you are not the only one with problems and concerns.
• The books you need to read for school may give you pleasure and entertainment. 
• Reading enhances your creativity and feeling/understanding of language.

The Kite runner

1970s Afghanistan: Twelve-year-old Amir is desperate to win the local kite-fighting tournament and his loyal friend Hassan promises to help him. But neither of the boys can foresee what would happen to Hassan that afternoon, an event that is to shatter their lives. After the Russians invade and the family is forced to flee to America, Amir realises that one day he must return to an Afghanistan under Taliban rule to find the one thing that his new world cannot grant him: redemption.

In pairs

What book has impoved your well-being? (gave you consolation, relaxation, pleasure)?

Reading teaches you to understand yourself and other better.

• Literature classes help you to develop your problem-solving skills. Many stories are about how people (from different eras, contexts, situations, continents) solve very relatable, human problems and deal with moral dilemmas (for example, honesty, tolerance and freedom). 

• Literature classes make you ponder about the reasons why characters make certain decisions and about the moral values behind it.

• Literature can offer you more insight and understanding of the consequences of certain acts for other people. It can make you  reflect on justice and unjustice, power and powerlessness, right and wrong, universal human values, the equality of men and women......

Reading teaches you to understand yourself and other better.

Children who are being read to, show a better understanding of what happens in other people's minds.

For example  Little Red Riding Hood

'I know that the wolf knows that  Little Red Riding Hood doesn't know that grandmother is the wolf who wants to eat her alive.'

Reading teaches you to understand yourself and other better.

• Readers are better at recognizing someone else's emotions.  e
• Reading can make you more empathtic and helpful (which is really nice for your parents ;))

• When you retire later in your life, 3.5 hours of reading per week will lower the chances that you will die within 12 years with 23%.

In groups of 3 or 4

What book has given you more insight and understanding of yourself and/or others?

Reading enhances your language skills.

• Reading enlarges your vocabulary. 
• Reading stimulates reading comprehension --> understanding difficult and complex sentences, recognizing text structures, summarizing.
• You will get better at every subject.
• Reading improves your skills of expressing yourself in a civilized and rational way.

Why now in the fourth form?

You are an adolescent (14-25 yr) and right then your brain absorbs  information like a sponge.

Your brain is looking for identity:

Who are you? What do you like? What is important?

You need to determine what your life will look like. Apart

from your parents. 

Literature can help you well with that.

Denk nog even terug aan Emma Morano (117). Weet jij nu waarom je langer leeft als je leest?