Argumentalizing the Novel: How to Engage Students Anew in Long-Form Fiction Reading Through Evidence-Based Argument & Criticality

Argument-centered instruction (ACI) has been receiving heightened attention from education leaders in recent years, as the Brookings Institution study Resolved and the 2024 PBS documentary Beyond Debate indicate. Traditional classrooms are becoming communities of genuine intellectual inquiry, as students engage with challenging texts and content within a framework formed by salient, exigent, rich, and open questions. ACI has been refreshing and in some places redeeming the study of long-form fiction – i.e., the novel. This workshop will use these four great novels to show participants exactly how to argumentalize the teaching of the novels in their curricula: Caramelo, The Great Gatsby, Maus I & II, and Things Fall Apart. This session requires participants to bring a device to the session.