Most basically, literacy refers to the ability to read and write, and thus logically has a place in all language pedagogy. In terms of critical pedagogy, however, this definition is expanded to include an essential effect of literacy, namely empowerment. Being literate gives agency and informs social identity, and is, of course, dependent on social (and linguistic) norms, values, and hierarchies. Accordingly, literacy-based pedagogy uses authentic texts, both literary and non-literary, with the primary goal not of learning the language itself, but rather “[engaging] [students] in the thoughtful and creative act of making connections between grammar, discourse, meaning, between language and content, between language and culture, between another culture and their own — in short, making them aware of the webs, rather than strands, of meaning in human communication.”^[1] In other words, the skills of analysis and critical thinking are emphasized from the earliest days of instruction, against the backdrop of “equality and human rights.”^[2] Literacy-based pedagogy thus helps to ease the transition between lower-level courses, in which the emphasis is traditionally on acquiring language skills, and upper ones, in which students are expected to analyze texts.

What challenges might you expect if you want to incorporate aspects of this approach into your teaching? First of all, it can be hard to find appropriate authentic texts for the lower levels of instructions. For this reason, instructors often turn to children’s literature to provide them. But even children’s literature can prove challenging to lower-level students, often due to the vocabulary, which means that lessons using it must be carefully scaffolded if the students are to succeed. And sometimes the students simply don’t have the language to discuss weighty topics, meaning that English is necessary to do them any justice. If you don’t like to use any English in your classroom, this approach might not be for you. If you are willing to scaffold with a small amount of English, you would be amazed how much engagement with literature is possible even at the lowest levels. For example, one of us has introduced a “Gedicht am Freitag” (poem on Friday) element in her German 1 course. Every Friday she presents a short poem. After reading the poem out loud with the students, she walks them through which words they already know (or look similar to words they already know). Then she provides a few key missing vocabulary items. Afterwards she asks the students what they think about the poem and what the topic is. This is all conducted in German, though the students’ replies are admittedly brief. The final step occurs in English, when she asks them what their interpretation of the poem is. The whole exercise takes five minutes and focuses not just on the language of the poem but on the act of reading and interpreting poetry, while encouraging students to realize how much they actually can understand.

Resources

Menke, Mandy. “Literacy-based Curricula in University Foreign Language Instruction: Perceptions form Non-Tenure-Track Faculty.” L2 Journal: An Open Access Refereed Journal for World Language Educators 10, no. 2 (2018): 111 – 133. https://escholarship.org/uc/item/7c2497rh

Paesani, Kate. “Researching Literacies and Textual Thinking in Collegiate Foreign Language Programs: Reflections and Recommendations.” Foreign Language Annals 51 (2018): 129 – 139.

Sederberg, Kathryn and Magda Tarnawska Senel. “Teaching Politically Relevant Authentic Texts: Integrating Social Justice Pedagogies and Literacy-Based Approaches in the Beginning Language Classroom.” In Social Justice Pedagogies: Multidisciplinary Practices and Approaches, edited by Katrina Sark. University of Toronto Press, 2023, 166 – 178.