Jim’s Blog: A Place for Conversations about English Education


Some Key Questions for Reader Response

Posted in Reader Response by Jim on the October 5, 2006

On September 27, our class explored Reader Response theory.  These are some of the key questions that Reader Response asks of a text:

  1. What is your first reaction to the poem/text?  What feelings or emotions did you feel as you read?
  2. What memory–of people, places, events, sights, smells, even feelings, attitudes–does the poem/text call to mind?
  3. Does this poem/text call to mind any other literary work?  If so, what is the connection you see between the two?
  4. What would you do if you were in the situation of a certain character in the poem/text?

The source of these key questions was the small group that presented Reader Response Theory to our class–you know who you are.

How about other key questions . . . 

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