Teaching Literature at Key Stage 3 and 4

Prose

Teaching examples of non-fiction
Ways of Seeing

Ways of Seeing, John Berger's series of pertinently illustrated essays on the nature of our perceptions of the world we inhabit, is a rather different type of text. It is perhaps more suitable for older pupils conceivably following media studies, communications or even art courses as well as those centring on English literature or language, and as such its potential strength may well lie in its multi-faceted possibilities. The book's fundamental thesis is of particular and controversial interest to English teachers: 'Seeing comes before words. The child looks and recognizes before it can speak. ... It is seeing which establishes our place in the surrounding world; we explain that world with words, but words can never undo the fact that we are surrounded by it' (Berger, 1972). The essays go on to elaborate on this idea, using examples from traditional and modern art, and from the mass media. In the sense that this text echoes Blake's words 'As a man is, so he sees' (Letter to Rev Trusler, 1799), it is part of a continuing debate concerning the relations between subjective and objective, and that debate often centres on the place of language – even if dismissive of its pre-eminence. In this general context, student teachers could be asked to try out and then reflect on a range of creative tasks, such as:

• seeking and presenting materials to illustrate the arguments of specific sections of the book, particularly drawing on knowledge and understanding of the media
• creating collages of pictorial images to surround and exemplify carefully chosen quotations from the text
• writing a reasoned reply – illustrated if possible – to one or more of the more contentious arguments featured
• writing the parallel script – either expository or for the three purely pictorial essays in the book which are 'intended to raise as many questions as the verbal essays'
• creating the storyboard and script of a television version of the book, bearing in mind that it was originally conceived as the accompaniment to a BBC TV series of the same name.