Reconstruction 10.2 (2010)


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Literary Quests in Sacher's HOLES: A Middle & High School Game for Literary Learning / John V. Knapp

Abstract: Gaming isa heuristically useful alternative in the literature classroom to such pedagogies as whole-group class discussion, worksheets, and small group arguments. By asking students to play the game titled, Literary Quests, after finishing Louis Sachar's novel, Holes, the teacher employs his/her students' ready-made interest in the computer and board games to the tasks of learning how to read literature. Based on student pairs questioning one another in competitive fashion, quiz-show style, this game includes sets of increasingly difficult literary questions about the novel, and a writing component aimed at student expressiveness concerned both with their understanding of the text in question and with the ethical procedures used by the two-person teams in winning or in losing Literary Quests.

I

<1> The whole idea of "gaming" generally is to provide heuristically useful alternatives to some standard teaching strategies: whole-group class discussion, worksheets (bah humbug!), and small group arguments. Sacher's novel, Holes, is commonly taught in the middle and early high school years in many American secondary schools -- grades 7 to 10 -- and is, in 2010, arguably Sacher's best work from an author very popular among children in this age group, children who encompass the very demographic most likely to be somewhat more interested in electronic games and somewhat less interested in reading fiction. Hence, this game becomes a stimulating way of using what students employ anyway to develop further the literary skills they will need for academic success in later years. Much of the teacher's preparation for such games is the same as for whole-group Q & A: writing out questions, the direction of which will give students a better understanding of a) the Progression of the text, b) character analysis; c) plot points; d) metaphoric and imagistic patterns, e) thematic generalizations, and, most importantly, comprehending at a deeper level why this book of fiction is worth reading. Since this game is "open-book," students find that marking passages (with slips of paper if a school book; by underlining, or making cross-referenced page numbers if their own) makes for a more successful gamer.[1] However, before getting to the game itself, it might be worth taking a few minutes to look at gaming itself, whether a face-to-face game played with a literary text or a game between a human being and a computer. Programming science has made possible the later game in a way unimaginable just twenty-five years ago, and, in the eyes of some, threatens the very existence of the humanistic domain known as literary study. I will argue to the contrary ahead that both types of game share several common cognitive modalities.

<2>In his recent book, Literature, Science, and a New Humanities, Jonathan Gottschall connects two undeniable patterns in our literary intellectual life: the slow decline into seeming irrelevancy of much of the humanities and the inexorable growing into cognitive dominance of the sciences, physical, biological, and social. Gottschall asks a simple question: "What exactly are the sciences doing so right that we [in the humanities] are doing so wrong?" Gottschall's aim is not to make pseudo-scientists of all of us in the humanities but rather, he is merely pointing out that "the sciences are doing many things better than we are, and that we can gain from studying their successes without degrading any of the things that make literature special" (xii).

<3>One of the places we might look to -- where the sciences and the humanities could share some common interests in teaching novice readers the skills that all expert literature readers acquire -- is the tool known as "gaming." One variation of gaming, among the most popular, is what one discussion (Annetta, et al) called "multi-player educational gaming application (MEGA)" -- an "immersive, 3D virtual learning environment." While almost all gaming in recent years has required electronic (video) equipment, and while that necessity reflects the game-creators' desired goals of "meaningful collaboration and interactivity" in order to bridge the gap between "experiential learning and information representation," computer-centered gaming is not the only game in town (so to speak). Gaming could also involve little more technology than the old-fashioned board game, Monopoly. As Janet Murray pointed out over a decade ago, in "games . . . we have a chance to enact our most basic relationship to the world -- our desire to prevail over adversity, to survive our inevitable defeats, to shape our environment, to master complexity, and to make our lives fit together like a jigsaw puzzle" (143). Indeed, Murray specifically mentions the (relatively) ancient board game Monopoly as one of several kinds of "texts that offer interpretations of experience," texts that could be experienced in either the real or virtual world (144).

<4>What all gaming involves, whether based upon electronic means individually, or palpable objects in a classroom are, to extrapolate from Murray, the feelings of the student players' immersion into the activity; if the classroom game environment really captures the students, they really do want to compete. As Murray suggests, "when the things that [students] do bring tangible results, we experience the second characteristic delight .  .  .[of gaming] -- the sense of agency" (126). In a classroom setting, the student is active, challenging one another, and basing their challenges on a common object, a literary text. Far from the teacher imposing a single interpretation upon the class, the game below encourages what is called, in the adult world, acts of literary criticism. In that world (of Lit. Crit.), no self-respecting critic would ever maintain seriously that his/her reading of a given literary text is the final and exhaustive analysis (although such thinking might sneak out after two rounds of beer or so); nonetheless, trying to do so -- in the journals and in book publishing -- is half the fun. Hence the competition in the Lit. Crit. world differs little in one respect from that of the game world. To extend Murray's point a bit, in all such "games," the activities are both "goal-directed and structured around turn-taking and keeping score" (140).

II

<5>Since any good game is most heuristically interesting when it requires students' written responses to important features of playing the game, students are told immediately about the writing component attached to it. Each student may write one of the following writing prompts, or may create an appropriate question and then answer it.Each student will write at least two pages (or whatever is suitable for that class) concerning a) A retrospective of how he/she played the game, and if that student is not on the winning team, why he/she thinks the game was lost, and b) A discussion of the way in which the winners played and won. Did they win fair and square? c) A discussion of any insight about the novel (Holes) the student came to while playing the game; d) Any argument about the novel that arose during the game; this controversy may then be amplified and extended during the writing about the game. Especially valuable are responses of those students who fall into one of two camps: a) this was a very good if not great novel and it taught me (the student) some valuable things about myself; or b) this was a dumb book and it was a waste of my time reading it.

<6>The teacher may then use these pieces of writing to review sentence types, word choice, and usage (i.e., grammar). However, the most important reasons for writing have to do with: a) the student's growing awareness of HOW to read a reasonably complex novel; and/or b) the student's developing sense of what constitutes good literature -- as opposed to the literatures of mere distraction, and c) using the memory of recent immersion to add some spark to the student's arguments.

<7>Although each game MUST be tied directly to a specific genre and a specific text, one important objective is generalizing knowledge of the text(s) from this particular game to other texts like it. Games are specifically "matched" in their activities to the reading requirements of any given text. Hence, a game played with Louis Sachar's Holes may focus on a) its quest elements; b) its mystery elements; c) its coming-of-age (Bildungsroman) qualities. Among the teacher's major objectives are: a) to help motivate students in a relatively painless way to find interesting the reading of a particular text and text type; b) to socialize students into looking to the specifics of the text for answers -- at the word/image level, sentence, paragraph and page, or moving up and down what I have elsewhere called the "snakes and ladders of abstraction" (Learning); c) to familiarize students with genres and genre expectations, and specifically the genre(s) of the texts under study; d) to get students out of their seats, up, and moving, but in an intellectually productive way; e) to help students to begin the process of ownership of the work, a process every good reader learns that makes reading a joy rather than a chore, a game rather than work.

III
A) Methodology:

<8>The teacher begins by first selecting three students (two if the class is evenly divided) as "the Warden's staff" [Judges] who will vote, along with the teacher, to adjudicate any disputed claims (this practice also prevents any one child not selected from feeling bad). One of the staff may take a turn at being "The Warden." The class (of 24 to 30 students, even numbered) is then to be divided up into dyads (or pairs), with each pair given an ordering number (one to fourteen in a thirty-one person class) and the first two pairs are to face each other with their books open.

<9>The teacher has, before class, created a number of questions about the text, the genre, and possibly the author, written on 3 x 5 cards for students to answer during the game; [variation: if the teacher knows the text well, the teacher may ask the questions from memory]. Each card also has directions about what to do if the answer is judged 1) correct; or 2) incorrect; or 3) partially correct. Cards only have questions written on one side; the answers remain with the teacher and the judges. After any question is asked, pairs have 20 seconds to consult one another and/or the text before answering. One of the student judges will also act as time-keeper.

<10>Each pair begins the game with six tokens; judges control the remaining 25 tokens and only distribute them according to rules stated on the cards (Wreck Room or Warden's Office). The object of the game is to "win" in one of two ways: by either being the last group standing at the top of "God's Thumb," or by acquiring the most tokens at the end of one, two, or three "rounds" of questions. Questions are arranged in ascending order of difficulty, and in the order of the text's Progression, as noted above. A "Warden" may interrupt the game at any time by saying: "excuse me!" Having said, "excuse me," the Warden may then ask the pair asking the question of the other dyad, by requiring them to answer any question about the relationship(s) between the text under discussion and any text read earlier in the semester. Only the Warden may try to connect the current text with an earlier one.

<11>All students form a serpentine line of pairs, situated so each pair may clearly see the two pairs asking/answering questions. Pair # 1 asks Pair # 2 a question from the card; if Pair # 2 gets the answer correctly (as adjudicated by the teacher/judges), that dyad is awarded X tokens and then, in turn, asks Pair # 1 a question. Once any pair of students correctly answers three questions in a row, they remove themselves to the end of the line to give Pairs 3, 4, 5, etc., a chance to play. If Pair # 2's (first) answer is incorrect, they must "dig a hole" [sit down], to be replaced by Pair # 3 who are then asked the same question by Pair # 1. Pairs answering with partially correct answers will be given partial tokens but may remain in the game to ask the other Pair a question. Two partially-answered questions in a row will require that Pair to "dig" [take their seats]. As any given pair digs, they are replaced by the next number in order (Pair # 4, then Pair # 5, etc.). Ideally, all class members will get to answer at least two rounds of questions in the 30 to 40 minutes allotted for the game in a given class period.

<12>Pairs in the audience previously required to "dig a hole" ["sit down"] may rehabilitate themselves by answering correctly any question unable to be answered by the two pairs up front. When they do so (by raising hands and being "recognized" by the judges), they take the place of the pair sitting down, although the ordering sequence in the audience remains the same. However, guessing is like getting bitten by a lizard with 11 yellow spots. Once bitten, you're out of this particular game for good.

III
B) Special Features:

Cards similar to "Chance" in Monopoly: " 1) Wreck Room"; 2) Warden's Office

<13>The Warden may, at times of his/her choosing, say: "excuse me, you "no-good, dirty-rotten, pig-stealing couple"! At that point, the dyad being so accused must select, from alternative piles, one card from the pile labeled Wreck Room, or Warden's Office, beginning always with the former first. The dyad selecting the card must do as it says, and if instructed to "dig a hole," must sit down and let the next dyad in line take its place. Teacher and/or judges make and add to the cards

Wreck Room Cards (sample):

  1. Sit down; no drink of Water for you today; give up one token.
  2. You finish your hole early in the afternoon; replace the team opposite you and they must sit down and give you each one token.
  3. You "borrow" Mr. Sir's Sunflower seeds. Give yourself a pass when answering on the next round, but if you do, you must surrender one token each.
  4. The sun is hot, but you can buy a rest; give to the team opposite 2 of your tokens.
  5. Sploosh makes you sick to your stomach, so you must sit down, but take 4 tokens from the judges.
Warden's Office Cards (sample):
  1. Sit down; the Warden gives you a sip of her bottle but takes 2 tokens from the team.
  2. You finish your hole early, but the Warden thinks you are not building character: lose one token each.
  3. Mr. Sir is furious and about ready to start smoking again; humor him with one token each.
  4. Madam Zeroni offers you a baby pig to carry up the hill each day and three tokens.
  5. Sam offers to fix your token account and gives each of you two tokens.
Sample questions in order of three levels of difficulty: 1) water; 2) Sploosh; 3) Onion. Water questions are preceded by a "W." Sploosh-type questions by an "S," and Onion-level questions by an "O."

III
C) Questions:

<14>Student pairs are permitted to prepare question cards ahead of time; if there are disputes over the type(s) of questions being asked, the teacher is the "judge" whose authority must be argued, if it is, in writing (only).

Water-Level Questions:
  1. Which campers are forbidden to lie in the hammock?
  2. What happens if you get bitten by yellow-spotted lizard?
  3. What's the one "rule" at Camp Green Lakes?
  4. What does Madam Zeroni want from Elya?
  5. What will happen to him if he fails to do this?
  6. What did Clyde Livingston's shoes have on the back?
  7. When Stanley finds the gold tube with a heart on it, which engraved initials does he find inside the heart?
  8. What does Zero want Stanley to teach him?
  9. What does the Warden have in her nail polish that causes Mr. Sir to scream?
  10. Who did Trout Walker want to marry?
Sploosh-Level Questions:
  1. Why does the Warden own the shade at Camp Green lakes?
  2. When Mr. Pendanski tells Stanley that digging builds character, why does Stanley think that it's not his shovel that is defective; rather, he is defective?
  3. How does Zero know what Cyde Livingston's shoes look like?
  4. In Chapter 24, why does Mr. Sir pour Stanley's water on the ground instead of in his canteen?
  5. Why does Hattie Parker say that "God will punish you" when she sees Sam and Katherine kissing?
  6. Why did Trout Walker ram his motorboat into Sam's rowboat?
  7. Why does Kate Barlow die laughing?
  8. When, in Chapter 30, Mr. Pendanski hands Zero a shovel, why does he smash it "across his face"?
  9. What does Stanley keep hoping there might be on Big Thumb after Zero runs away?
  10. In Chapter 32, why does Stanley decide to steal the water truck?
Onion-Level Questions:
  1. Why doesn't Elya pick a number to help Myra decide who she will marry? What does his refusal tell us about him?
  2. Following his fainting episode, why does Stanley refuse to ride with Mr. Pendanski ? What emotion does Stanley feel that appears so odd at this point in the novel?
  3. At the end of Chapter 12, why does Zero tell Mr. Pendanski that he "likes to dig holes"?
  4. Why does Elya's son, the one robbed by Kissing Kate, say that he found refuge on God's thumb? Does the word refuge have anything important to say about the novel?
  5. Why does Zigzag keep insisting that Stanley "eat his cookie"? What's bothering Zigzag?
  6. At the beginning of Chapter 21, why does the narrative voice emphasize the Rattlesnake's warning and Stanley's thanking it for the warning?
  7. Why does the author place the upturned boat, Mary Lou, exactly in the middle of nowhere? Does your answer have anything to do with an important idea or theme in the novel?
  8. When Stanley hands Zero the raw onion, why does he call it "hot fudge Sundae"? What might that Sundae be metaphoric for?
  9. Zero tells Stanley the story of when his mother disappeared, he waited for a month. When he got chased out of Laney Park, he lost his stuffed animal, the giraffe. Why didn't he go back to look for it? Relate your answer to Zero's relationship with Stanley.
  10. Why don't the spotted lizards bite Stanley and Zero? Has Stanley's family's luck changed and if so, why?

IV
In-class Experience:

<15>Although I have now played this game in classes several times, one must always keep in mind that MS and early HS students must debate the "rules" of any game they play, endlessly, to make sure that everything is "fair." Any teacher thinking that the first run or two of any game will go off smoothly probably should stick to worksheets as a pedagogy. My experience has been that typically it takes two or three tries of any game before students settle down and actually play. Indeed, it is developmentally important that students learn how to debate the rules of the game in a way that neither alienates the other players nor intimidates those with questions or concerns into silence.

<16>Secondly, it must be emphasized each class period that a piece of writing is always part of the completion of each day's game. Writing does not then become a surprise sprung on kids having just fun, nor is it the coin-of-the-realm drudgery paying for the pleasures of gaming. Rather, writing becomes a combined source of self-expression, a way of letting off steam from the heat generated by the game's competition, and a method of analysis both of the text and of the act of playing. Many of the questions hotly debated (see those above) during the game's verbal ferocity can easily be transformed into writing prompts, prompts that have the advantage of having already generated students' motivation to answer them with reasoning power.

<17>Finally, learning to read this novel should always be seen in the context of students learning to read novels generally. That is, the skills most valuably taught in this unit are ultimately transferable to students' reading of other works of fiction. Understanding local effects, particular metaphors, and specific character traits and trajectories of change should always be seen also as potentially applicable to the next work of fiction (poetry, drama) the students read.

<18>Inventing "games" for one's lesson plans. Much of the fun of teaching is exercising one's creativity. Literary Quests is a "game" directly related to students' learning how to read Louis Sachar's Holes, but it could easily be modified depending on the narrative and "characterological" demands of the text being taught. The only sure way to know is get up and actually try to play the game, and then critique the class's efforts as you try to find a stimulating way to teach the novel (play, poem, short story) in question. As you adapt this game for your own text(s) in your own class, or, better still, invent and then trial-run a game of your own invention, you will find that the closer the "fit" between the text being taught and the requirements of the game, the more heuristically useful the game is, and the better the writing that comes from student engagement with both game and text.

 

 

Works Cited

Annetta, Leonard A, Marshall R. Murray, Shelby Gull Laird, Stephanie C. Bohr, and John C. Park. "Serious Games: Incorporating Video Games in the Classroom." Educause Quarterly 29.3 (2006): 16-22.

Arsenault, Dominic and Bernard Perron, "In the Frame of the Magic Cycle: The Circle(s) of Gamersplay." The Video Game Theory Reader 2nd ed. Eds. Bernard Perron and Mark J. R. Wolf. New York: Routledge, 2009: 109-31.

Gottschall, Jonathan. Literature, Science, and a New Humanities. New York: Palgrave-Macmillian, 2008.

Knapp, John V. "Creative Reasoning in the Interactive Classroom: Experiential Exercises for Teaching Orwell's Animal Farm." College Literature 23.2 (June 1996): 143-56.

---. Learning From Scant Beginnings: English Professor Expertise. Newark, DE: University of Delaware P, 2008.

---. "Situated Learning; Red-Eye Milton and the Loom of Learning: English Professor Expertise." tomorrows-professor@lists.stanford.edu # 236 (July 2000).

Murray, Janet H. Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace. New York: The Free Press, 1997.

Phelan, James. Reading People, Reading Plots. Chicago: U Chicago P, 1989.

 

Notes

[1] The Progression is a heuristically useful idea of James Phelan's, whose sense of a fictional "progression" refers to narrative as a "dynamic event, one that must move, in both its telling and its reception, through time. Such movement is given shape and direction by the way in which an author introduces, complicates and resolves . . . certain instabilities which are the developing focus of the [implied reader's] interest in the narrative" (15). [^]



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