To think that Shakespeare is a little intense for Yr 7 English?

[mids2019]

My daughter is studying Romeo and Juliet for Yr 7 English. Am I being unreasonable that this play may have more impact at A level when pupils have greater critical analysis techniques and possibly a greater appreciation for English literature?

I think Shakepeare is a genius of English literature but the language is so dense and tied to contemporary Elizabethian society that I think a Yr 7 pupil could struggle and in some cases actually put pupils off a more gradual approach to literature appreciation.

I also find it difficult explaining to a 12 year old daughter how Juliet (13) is capable of making so such life changing choices such as marriage and ultimately suicide and with the perspective of 21st century society the play does seem remote in experience.

Is the bard best taught at a slightly older age?

My kids did R+J in primary school. It's all about how it's presented to them.

So did we

Seems perfectly normal to me

It's interesting. My kids both read C.S. Lewis and enjoyed the books and would read for 'fun'. Shakespeare on the other hand was less easily accepted. I suppose there is a lack of suspense and excitement in the narrative as well as the Bard being purely dialogue while other classic authors wrote novels.

I do take the point about Shakespeare writing plays rather than novels. Are we getting our children to read the equivalent of a film script? If we do get children to see a performance does the performance have to be sacred to a certain quality to be meaningful?

@CornishGem1975

I guess it's all about presentation but can primary school children appreciate the intense emotion between the two main characters?

Shakespeare is definitely much more accessible if you see/hear it rather than read it at first, but that's one of the huge advantages - there are loads of recordings, productions, adaptations, retellings, films.

Loads of ways to access the story and then study the text.

I, like most people of my age who did English through secondary school, did at least one play a year and it got easier to read over time.

Our reading order (if I remember correctly!) was:

Midsummer Night's Dream
Merchant of Venice
Much Ado About Nothing
Macbeth
Hamlet
The Tempest

@ditalini

We don't take the same attitude to Dickens or the Bronte sisters in that we would expect to see a play before reading the book. I agree Shakespeare can only be fully appreciated through performance but do many children still go to the theatre with school? Do we need more film productions of Shakespeare's plays?

I live near Stratford and there are a reasonable number of performances there but not in neighbouring Coventry.

I'd happily have it taken from the curriculum entirely, but definitely for 12 year olds. They don't care about the words that make no sense. I remember buying the Spark notes translation to figure out what was going on. Pointless in my inner city deprived school especially.

Actually we definitely did Romeo and Juliet because I remember watching the Fellini film in class. (Lots of sniggering) So we must have had a year where we covered 2.

@RoomOfRequirement

I have heard similar. Is Shakepeare more relevant in grmmar/private schools as part of a 'traditional' English education. I can't help but think there is an unfortunate (and incorrct) element of classicism with the bard. It seems perfectly acceptable for the likes of Boris Johnson and the King to quote the bard but working class 14 year old boys round here....hmmmmm....not so much

But they're novels not plays.

There are oodles of verbatim recordings of Shakespeare performance so definitely no need for live, although we were lucky enough to be taken to the Edinburgh Fringe for a performance of Hamlet in 6th year as it was accessible to our home town and it was absolutely transformative for me.

@mids2019 I think I see where you are coming from. However a good teacher should talk them through the issues of early love, tribal hatred, mistaken suicide and death. They'll get more than that on their phones.

@crosstalk

I agree but I think many would agree we would ideally wish to limit exposure on phones (impossible though). The strange thing is that a pupil may go to a lesson about mental health and being told suicidal feelings are a symptom of depression and then study Hamlet or R and J where suicide is natural part of a dramatic narrative. Shakespeare looked at depression as part of the human condition rather than a treatable disease as obviously society moves on.

I agree a good teacher should be able to talk about such subjects but it begs the question what age? Love, violence and death are all perennial themes of human life but we decide on how to gradually introduce our children to these concepts. As I said earlier if someone else other than the bard had written stories with these themes it may well be that teachers would introduce them later in students school careers.

I just can't see what a primary school child would get out of R and J as they have no real concept of instantaneous visceral attraction or enmity between households never mind suicide. These are quite adult themes that are integral to the play.

My 11 year old (yr 7) thinks that Romeo was on the rebound and fell for Juliet after one kiss and both of them were pretty stupid to get so involved without actually dating for some time. She also thinks Juliet should have simply married Paris. She is not unintelligent and is actually from her SAT scores good at English but an early introduction to the bard has confused her as basic core of the play makes no sense.

to her

Your daughter’s assessment is a pretty valid response.

Romeo on the rebound? Friar Lawrence agrees with your daughter! ‘Young men’s love lies, not truly in their hearts, but in their eyes.’

Romeo is impetuous throughout the play. That’s why Tybalt ends up dead. It’s how he and Juliet end up dead, too. He’s on a hair trigger - of course he is. He’s 15 and full of hormones.

And the Nurse agrees with your daughter, in the end. But the idea of having no say in whom you must marry, and when, is surely something your daughter can be engaged in a conversation about - especially when just this week child marriage has been put an end to in Malawi.

Reading Shakespeare (or any literature) shouldn’t be about having a right or wrong response. It’s about having a personal response, learning how to back it up with the text, and taking it from there.

My response to R & J changes as I move through each stage of life. I saw it very differently when I was a starry-eyed teen to when I was a parent of teens. That’s the genius of the writing.

My year 6 class performed R&J and Hamlet 20 years ago. R&J we accompanied with singing Rock the Casbah (Clash), Never Ever (All Saints), My Girl (Temptations) and Kids ( Bye Bye Birdie). Hamlet we did in the setting of an Australian soap, complete with whiny Aussie teenager voices. They come across similar themes in soaps, films, comics and pop songs.

@DuncanBiscuits
@Duncan
Very true.

To a 11 year old girl in a typical British comp is it important to talk about patriarchal society when discussing R and J. The freedom Romeo has when choosing a new suitor compared to Juliet's effectively arranged marriage surely needs context and as you say for the vast majority of this country now society is very much (thankfully) different. It's the precipitous decent into absolute and doomed love that is hard to explain and from one perspective the idea of sharing one kiss before committing to undying and sacrificial love is a challenge to relate to for going children.

I think personally it is the beauty of the verse which makes Shakespeare unique and the beauty is possibly more appreciated by older children. For as modern child not grounded in classics Shakepseare is dificult. The plays would be better appreciated with some passing knowledge of Roman and Greek literature for instance and for the average comprehensive classics is non existent.

It's certainly not fair to paint all 14 year old boys from working class families with the same brush.

My 14yo DS enjoys Shakespeare. Not in the same way that I do, as a woman with different life experiences, approaching middle age. He'll throw out a casual "Self-love, my liege, is not so vile a sin, as self-neglecting" when I ask him to stop preening his hair in front of the mirror when we're running late.

He's very well read. The vast majority of the Christmas presents he's asked for this year are clothbound editions of classics. He finds such pleasure in reading and I really do worry the societal messages of "no, this isn't for you, you're not fancy enough to appreciate it properly" will get to him eventually.

@Hobbi

year 6 and Hamlet? At year 6 age many children are grappling with David Walliams.

I understand using music and soap opera to deliver Hamlet but at its core the existential angst of Hamlet, the descent into madness of Ophelia, the murderous ambition of Claudius etc. are all a.little too much for year 6. Are we in danger of sugar coating some of Shakepseare 'a plays and making it confusing for primary school chikdren?

is it that we teach Shakepearr going as to make children aware of this cultural icon from a relatively early age but possibly can't in reality give children a truly important relationship with the verse (at that age)

@traveller

Fair comment. There may be 14 year old working class boys that fall in love with the bard but it may be in reality a smaller proportion than amongst middle classes. Possibly middle class children are more likely to be from families where a visit to the theatre is more common place and parents make their children aware of the cultural capital of classic literature at an earlier age. I have said before a knowledge of classics assists to some extent in interpreting some verse and this subject is not widely taught in a lot of schools.

I don't think this is right of course and Shakepeare should be made as accessible as possible. However if you do have schools where literacy rates are low is there a debate to be had about where the focus of English teaching should lie given limited resources on teachers time? A case of less art and more matter when we are preparing children with life skills to allow good quality emplo yment?

@@mids2019
year 6 and Hamlet? At year 6 age many children are grappling with David Walliams.
Only because they keep getting them as presents for birthdays and Christmas! No-one 'grapples' with Walliams (children with reading difficulties aside, obviously) - I've nothing against the guy - good luck to him but the amount of times I've advised parents of students reading to a decent standard in school that after Year 4, he really is bedtime comfort reading at best. There's a whole world out there, kids! If your average reader kids are still reading Walliams at Year 6, there's going to be one helluva shock in September and don't say your year 6 teacher didn't warn you!

I’ve read all of OP’s posts and they seem to be an awful lot of words which essentially boil down to very low expectations of children and young people.

I’m particularly cross about the comments about 14 year old working class boys. OP obviously don’t know many if she can’t see that a text with a cracking plot and a quite few knob gags is likely to appeal to them, along with their empathy for the characters. We still do Shakespeare with students who struggle with literacy. We might not spend much time on trochaic substitutions but we do use the fantastic plots and short sections of poetry to teach literacy skills, which are otherwise incredibly dry when taught in a vacuum. In my experience lower-ability children are much more likely to meet the play where they are and enjoy it on an appropriate level. More able students get much more anxious about the fact that they don’t understand every word and constantly feeling that they are missing something. There is a lovely quotation in Matilda where the librarian tells the child not to worry about the words she doesn’t understand, and to ‘let the words wash around you like music.’

Well, I know bugger all about Greek and Roman Classics, and I appreciate the fuck out of Shakespeare.

I think this is the point where I bow out of the discussion.

exit, pursued by a bear

You don't think it's right but you seem to sit very comfortably on one side of the debate.

"Less art more matter" doesn't mean no art at all. I detest the idea that you have to fit a specific set of criteria to earn the right to learn about and enjoy art.

@YippieKayakOtherBuckets

looking at my last post it does seem unfair. Possibly this is a case of opportunities that should be granted to everyone but there is discussion about the exact timing. I didn't want to suggest low expectations amongst young people was prevalent in any part of society.

I agree the words do wash over you so observing a performance is probably a great idea.