{"id":589,"date":"2013-02-18T12:43:54","date_gmt":"2013-02-18T10:43:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/?p=589"},"modified":"2013-02-18T12:43:54","modified_gmt":"2013-02-18T10:43:54","slug":"group-portrait-a-survey-of-first-year-students-preferences","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/2013\/02\/18\/group-portrait-a-survey-of-first-year-students-preferences\/","title":{"rendered":"GROUP PORTRAIT: A SURVEY OF FIRST YEAR STUDENTS\u2019 PREFERENCES <\/strong>"},"content":{"rendered":"

In order to break the ice and to get to know my new first year students I ask them to answer on the first day a brief questionnaire, which I\u2019ll also answer here as if this were 1984, my first year at university:<\/p>\n

1. Have you read a complete volume in English yet? (If so, which one?): Wuthering Heights<\/em> and The Go Between<\/em> (chosen by my English language teacher… I had already read Wuthering Heights at least twice in translation)
\n2. How many books do you read every year?: 50 (I swear, I still keep the notebook where I wrote them down; now it\u2019s 100 on average, which I believe is a minimum for university teachers)
\n3. Which is your favourite book (in any language)?: Wuthering Heights<\/em> (still… can\u2019t get rid of Heathcliff)
\n4. What book(s) you would like to read in English? Why?: Ulysses<\/em> (I have read it!!)
\n5. Do you have a favourite fiction genre?: No, but I like fantasy very much, particularly gothic and science fiction (I still do…)
\n6. Which is your favourite film and TV series? Film: Blade Runner<\/em> (still); series: Brideshead Revisited<\/em> (well, no, now it\u2019s The X-Files<\/em>)<\/p>\n

Now I\u2019d like to comment on my students\u2019 answers, which you can find complete in the .pdf document attached here. There is not a particular novelty I want to highlight, I just want to make them public for anyone interested to consider. <\/p>\n

My first concern are numbers: 82 students registered, yes, but only 57\/60 attended the first week sessions, of which just 42 bothered to answer my survey. So, message for the remaining 15\/18: why didn\u2019t you bother?? Second concern: 6 students claim to have never read a book in English… and this is the SECOND, not the first semester they spend with us. It\u2019s true that mine is the first English Literature class they take but, why wait for the teacher to tell you when to begin? Third concern: As regards how many books they read per year, 5 confess they simply don\u2019t read at all… 6 read five books at the most. Most students (16) read eleven\/fifteen books a year \u2013 not enough, clearly. I\u2019m sorry to say that only the 7 students who claim to read more than sixteen books a year are well equipped to face the degree\u2019s demands with a certain ease. The rest need to make a serious effort, in some cases a very serious one. A baffling aspect is how often students claim not to have time to read… Too many classes, perhaps?<\/p>\n

About the favourite fiction genre, this turns out to be romance (12 students), followed by fantasy (9) and detective fiction (7), though 10 students claim to read omnivorously. Their reading tastes are, obviously, much closer to those of average or common readers than to university teachers of Literature… which is why it is difficult for me to comment on them without sounding prejudiced (arghhh… Fifty Shades of Grey?). At any rate, I must say that mainstream fiction and not the classics dominate students\u2019 readings, whereas for the next three years this should be the other way round, complemented by a good selection of contemporary literary fiction. No more Nicholas Sparks… <\/p>\n

The list of books read in English, of favourite books, TV and films are quite eclectic, with no clear generational favourites (well, curiosuly, The Big Bang Theory<\/em> is named by 5 students). Predictably, Jane Austen, Oscar Wilde and William Shakespeare are the most often mentioned classics. Yet, as I\u2019m thinking these days of the Harry Potter<\/em> elective I\u2019ll teach next year \u2013yes, it\u2019s official\u2013 I can\u2019t help noticing that Rowling\u2019s name crops up quite often in all categories; also The Lord of the Rings<\/em>, which turns out to be book most students would like to read (it\u2019s only 5 nonetheless). Something you might notice is that even though students claim to have read in English great novels like The Grapes of Wrath<\/em> or The Great Gatsby<\/em>, these are not among their favourites, a list which, as usual, is a strange mixture of the popular among younger readers and what teachers order to read in secondary school (still Gald\u00f3s\u2019s Tormento<\/em>?)<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll close with a list of safe recommendations, thinking in particular of those who have never tried reading in English, and those who read too little \u2013all the books are mentioned in the survey:<\/p>\n

1984
\nAlice\u2019s Adventures in Wonderland
\nAnimal Farm
\nBrave New World
\nCatcher in the Rye, The
\nChristmas Carol, A
\nDracula
\nFrankenstein
\nGame of Thrones, A
\nGone with the Wind
\nGrapes of Wrath, The
\nGreat Gatsby, The
\nHarry Potter Saga, The
\nHomage to Catalonia
\nLess than Zero
\nLife of Pi, The
\nLine of Beauty, The
\nLolita
\nLord of the Flies, The
\nPicture of Dorian Gray, The
\nPride and Prejudice
\nRebecca
\nRomeo and Juliet
\nStrange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, The
\nTalented Mr. Ripley, The
\nWuthering Heights
\n<\/em> <\/p>\n

Enjoy!!
\nHere are the full results:<\/p>\n

SURVEY RESULTS<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In order to break the ice and to get to know my new first year students I ask them to answer on the first day a brief questionnaire, which I\u2019ll also answer here as if this were 1984, my first year at university: 1. Have you read a complete volume in English yet? (If so, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":98,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-teaching-tools-and-rules"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/98"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=589"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}