Teaching With Comics & Graphic Novels

•Comics are an ideal form of authentic creative works. The purpose of introducing students to literature is to promote language development while providing students with an enjoyable aesthetic experience. Comic books meet these requirements perfectly. They are written for an adolescent audience and they provide an aesthetic experience. If students are required to discuss and respond to literature, then it is imperative that they gain a concrete understanding of what they are reading.
•Wendy Carr’s Classroom Links

 

Steven Krashen in his book, Every Person a Reader, says that “middle school boys who did more comic book reading also read more in general, read more books, and reported that they liked reading better than those who did less comic book reading.”

http://www.wcer.wisc.edu/step/ep301/Spr2000/multimedia/comics.htm#conventions

 

Poster & Student Handouts What is a Graphic Novel? 
A downloadable Colour Poster and a Black & White 2 page handout for use with students illustrated what a graphic novel is. Permission is given to print for classroom use.

Comics Terminology PDF 
 Matt Madden & Jessica Abel label an example with the basic comics terms.

Step by Step Behind the Scenes PDF
 Stan Sakai shows the process from beginning to end in comic from.

Spidey

http://www.ed.gov/inits/americareads/spidey/spidey9.html

 

Comics with Class

Graphic Novels A Novel Approach: Using Graphic Novels to Attract Reluctant Readers and Promote Literacy
(Please be patient. The article is in PDF form. It will take a few moments to open.)

Comics in the Classroom

http://www.learnnc.org/index.nsf/doc/comics0703

http://www.schoollibraries.ca/articles/31.aspx

 

Back to the Drawing board Once-Banned Comic books Now a Teaching Tool

National Association of Comics Art Educators

Getting Graphic at the School Library

ALA's Booklinks
Graphic Novels for Younger Readers by Michelle Gorman author of Getting Graphic! Using Graphic Novels to Promote Literacy with Preteens and Teens (Linworth, 2003).
Suggested grade level with short annotations.

Research

Annotated Bibliographies 
Maintained by
Gene Kannenberg, Jr. 
University of Houston-Downtown

Comics Research Bibliography

ComicsResearch.org's

Comics Scholars' Discussion List

Form, Function, Fiction:
Text and Image in the Comics Narratives of
Winsor McCay, Art Spiegelman, and Chris Ware
A Dissertation Proposal
© 1996, 2003 Gene Kannenberg, Jr.

Mass Media & Popular Culture
 Yale university Library

 

Another access point would be a response like Fagin the Jew. Eisner used it to teach history of the AskenaziJewish group's move to England AND an alternate point of view for the story of Oliver Twist. If you could convince your grade 10 history (here in Sk. that's to the end of WW1) to work with ELA and art, you could do an amazing product. That is pretty high level thinking for students.

Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game is on our grade 10 ELA curriculum and Card has certainly written his other books from other points of view, Ender's Shadow, Shadow of the Hegemon, are excellent examples of writing from other points of view. I see on Amazon that Card also has a book out now called Characters and Viewpoint. written by Shelia Soulier