Looking at Reader Response Through a Gendered Lens

5**F("2#&)#@.&9./#@.3<*"3.#>4/*=24#&# D."9./.9#5."3

by Jessica L. Edwards

Dr. Jessica L. Edwards is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Literacy, Elementary, and Early Childhood Education at Central Connecticut State University. Her research interests are housed within multicultural and international children’s literature, specifically how these books can be used to encourage Critical Pedagogy in the elementary classroom.

Recently, I became intrigued by the story of a young man named Chavo. In a chapter of

Rebecca Rogers’ An Introduction to Critical Discourse Analysis in Education (Josephine Marsh and Jayne C.

Lammers, 2011) an adolescent boy named Chavo describes his reasoning behind a significant drop in his academic career. Using the concept of James

Gee’s figured worlds (Gee, 2011), Chavo understands his lack of literacy performance to be a result of the assumption that “athletes don’t read books,” and

“guys participate differently than girls” (Marsh &

Lammers, 2011, pp. 106-107). Considering that

Chavo excelled in literacy during his elementary years, it was unfortunate to discover that these new assumptions became prevalent in his life after he gained popularity among his friends, joined athletic teams at his school, and acquired the need to reflect masculinity. Chavo’s story inspired me to look deeper into the realm of reader responses through a gendered lens. My mission was to find studies on reader responses to literature, and locate trends within those studies that related to gender. I expected to find the use of Reader Response Theory within all of my studies. What I thought would be a simple literature review turned out to be a realization of the complexity within this topic, and the various sociocultural theories that are used

for this type of research.

Theoretical Framework

One of the leading theories within the research I found was a branch of reader response theory by Louise Rosenblatt called transactional theory. Rosenblatt (1994) discusses her transactional theory as a relationship between the reader and the text in which they read. This relationship with the text affects the reader according to their personal “interests, expectations, anxieties and other factors based on past experience” (Rosenblatt, 1994, p. 19). In the case of this particular topic, Louise Rosenblatt’s transactional theory has assisted educators in understanding more about why boys and girls react differently to the same text. Considering the use of

transactional theory, one must consider both the efferent and aesthetic factors that create a different

relationship for each student and their text. As an extension of reader response theory, Mikhail Bakhtin (1986) was another sociocultural theorist that was used in these studies to discuss

the discourse that occurred when boys and girls responded to literature through discussion groups. According to Bakhtin and his use of critical discourse analysis, our identities and the positions we choose to take on a subject are altered based on the verbal interaction with another person (LopezBonilla, 2011). We can also alter the identity and positions of another person through the discussion of a text. “For Bakhtin, new links of meaning are forged only when we engage in dialogue in which two perspectives intermingle to generate new points of view, new positions, and new understandings” (Rice, 2002, p. 2). Evidence of this became clear while reviewing some of the studies that involved verbal interaction between boys and girls. Kohlberg’s theory was mentioned several times in regard to children’s rigid understanding of what it means to be male and female. In his theory of cognitive and moral development, Lawrence Kohlberg (1966) explains the developmental factor of information processing. When children internalize new information, they are at an age where they begin to classify human behaviors as right or wrong. This influences them to assume that the traditional behaviors they have been taught are correct, and nontraditional behaviors are morally wrong. Kohlberg’s theory helps educators understand why nontraditional gender behaviors are difficult to change in children who are raised in a strong traditional household or taught in a traditional school. Another leading theory within the research I found was gender schema theory. Martin and Halverson (1981) used Kohlberg’s theory of cognitive and moral development as a foundation for a schema theory that was influenced by gender. Gender schema theory involves the understanding that children have a knowledge about the clothes, behaviors, traits, roles, and activities that belong to each gender. This knowledge is interpretive and constructive based on each child’s existing schema. Adding to this notion, “gender schema theory incorporates both social learning theory and cognitive theory as schemas function to organize and interpret new information based on prior learning experiences” (Frawley, 2008, p. 292). As children read or visually experience gender behaviors that are different from their own experiences, this interferes with their gender schema and may cause them to manifest distorted or erroneous information from

their text. According to McKenna, Conradi, Lawrence, Jang, and Meyer (2012), this might also affect their attitude about reading. In attitude theory, attitude is not innate but acquired through innumerable episodes of exposure to an object or behavior. These episodes may be favorable or unfavorable, which directly contributes to an individual’s attitude by shaping their belief structure (Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975). Evidence of

this theory was not only clear in the studies within this research, but it also assisted in explaining the ideology behind the responses children give to their literature.

The last leading theory I found within the research was social learning theory. According to this theory, children’s learning is influenced by the significant people in their lives. This influence is based on what they know about their leisure activities and daily tasks, as well as the way these people reward and punish the children for their actions (Greever, Austin, & Welhousen, 2000). With this theory in mind, children’s various responses to literature come from what they learn through their social lives and the important people around them. Social learning theory joins transactional theory, critical discourse analysis, Kohlberg’s theory of cognitive and moral development, gender schema theory, and attitude theory under the sociocultural umbrella that helps us understand reader responses to literature.

Factors to Consider

After reading through the selected studies within this type of research, I noticed several things that one should consider prior to planning a study of their own, or even when using pieces of these studies in their own research. When looking at a reader response study that deals with gender issues, the gender of the participants in the study factors into the results. Some of the studies within this

literature review used either girls or boys, but not both. When girls and boys are responding to literature without the other sex present, this could affect their responses. Also, the results you obtain with a reader response study is directly affected by the sociocultural environment in which you set up your study. This was clear in all of the studies within this research.

Another factor to consider would be the

literature that is used for the study. Most of the studies that were found used literature that was

purposefully selected based on gender stereotypes. This would clearly encourage a critical response from children, as opposed to a natural critique of gender in a gender-neutral piece of literature. The gender of the main character is also something to be considered, especially if the storyline contained actions or expectations that can be classified as traditional gender characteristics. The last factor I came across while reading through these articles was the issue of attitudes. The attitudes that boys and girls have about reading is typically different before they even enter a classroom, which is due to the sociocultural environment in which they are raised. This is a whole other struggle in itself; one that can majorly influence the responses of readers before they begin reading their text.

Findings

As discussed above, there are many different types of studies with many different factors involved that can yield reader responses to literature. These factors are directly related to the sociocultural environment in which each child is

surrounded on a daily basis. In this section, I will

summarize the findings within these various studies and mention multiple themes that arose while researching this topic.

Age

While gathering the data in these articles, the theme of age appeared quite clearly. Age was used not necessarily to show a difference in genders, but rather a developmental progression of the same ideals over time within each gender. In 2008, Timothy J. Frawley compared the responses of 36 first graders to 36 fourth graders as they retold and discussed their recollections of two Caldecott

Award-winning books. The first selection, Mirette on the High Wire, told the story of a retired high-wire walker named Bellini who feared to return to his

professional career of performing, and a little girl who encouraged him to face his fear. Although the book specifically stated that Bellini, at first, would not teach the little girl to walk on the tight rope due to his own personal fear, most of the first graders and half of the fourth graders distorted the story to say that he did not have a fear. They clarified that he was acting as a male protector and that he would not teach the little girl because she was the one with a fear. In the second selection, Peppe the Lamplighter, the main character takes a job as a lamplighter even though he is a young boy. He takes this job in order to support his family who as immigrants in America during the early 1900s experienced poverty. His father does not approve of his job, so there is a moment in this book that exhibits lots of

emotion from Peppe and results in him crying. When responding to this part of the story, both grade levels ignored the emotions that were displayed and described him as anything other than sad. The first graders described Peppe as mad, angry, or content during this time. The fourth graders described Peppe as angry or even happy, as if nothing was wrong, and they denied that Peppe ever cried. Many of the fourth graders even mistakenly said that Peppe’s younger sister was the one who cried. As you can see, both genders responded the same in this situation, but varied by age in their responses. Further evidence of age was found in Ann M. Trousdale and Sally McMillan’s article in 2003 focused on a five-year study about a girl named Nikki and her responses to fairy tales. Trousdale and McMillan (2003) compared Nikki’s responses at age eight to her responses of the same questions at age twelve. When Nikki was eight, she viewed fairy tales as tales of action and adventure. She also pointed out that the capable and strong characters that she admired used their special abilities to help others in need. When Nikki was twelve, her perception of these same stories changed into tales of marriage and romance. She also began to point out that a character’s strength was comprised of inner strength and sufficient self-confidence. The transition from eight years of age to twelve years of age is clearly different and more critical. This is credited to the fact that after the early years, “many young women become increasingly aware that their lived reality is not easily aligned with the reality that is propagated by dominant cultural scripts”

(Trousdale & McMillan, 2003, p. 24). As children develop in age, so does their awareness of the world they live in, which influences them to create their identity based on those factors. Continuing on this idea of reality, another interesting discovery worth mentioning is from the 2008 study of Katarina Eriksson Barajas on addressing stereotypes through school book talks. The greatest find within all of the reader responses in this study was the common tendency to be less stereotypical when children discussed characters that were in their own age group. When adult characters were discussed, the children viewed them as potential parents and not as pupils they could identify with. They were more critical of these older characters and placed more traditional expectations on them. They were very stereotypical of these characters while tolerating nonstereotypical behavior from characters in their age group. It was easier for these children to be accepting of nontraditional behaviors from the characters their own age.

Attitudes

The studies within this literature review

allowed for me to see beyond the responses, into the feelings children have towards literature. After reading an adolescent novel about Maria de Estrada, a female conquistador who served in battle for the conquest of Mexico, Evelyn Arizpe (2001) analyzed and compared reader responses from students who were in private, high-income schools and students who were in government, low-income schools. Their attitudes varied not

only about their self-concepts as readers, but also their realistic understandings of the novel. Boys within both school types saw themselves as below average or average. Girls within both school types saw themselves as average or above average. In regard to the attitude towards men, boys within both schools stated that their generation was different from past generations, and they intended to help their future wives with traditional roles such as childcare and housework. Although the girls were not as positive as the boys about the roles of men, girls from the government schools had a more optimistic outlook as they gave examples of the male role changing over time. The girls from the private schools were not optimistic about the male role changing towards a more nontraditional role, and assumed that each boy would turn out like their father, so the cycle would never break. In further discussions, it was clear that the boys tended to focus on the history of the story while the girls focused more on the main character’s development. As the boys engaged in their historical discussions, it was clear that the boys from private schools actively engaged in the discussion and defended their opinions. The boys from government school showed less interest as they remained silent during most of their response time. One particular point of interest was the author’s description of the main character. Although she describes the main character in great detail, she never states whether or not she is pretty or beautiful. Some of her descriptions mentioned

words such as strong, robust, and tall. The boys responded to this by stating that for a woman to be manly, they would have to be ugly, and this is why they assumed she was not a beautiful character. Trends within this study also revealed that the girls showed their main tension around topics of freedom and limits, risk and loss, and strength and sensitivity. The boys showed their main anxieties around power, violence, and feminism (Arizpe, 2001). Within the theme of attitudes is the issue of

resistance. In Sipe and McGuire’s 2006 study of children’s resistance to literature, they found that although boys may reject a book because it is considered one for girls, girls are much more tolerant of books with a boy as the main character (Childress, 1985). However, boys were found to be able to handle more uncomfortable issues within a

piece of literature while girls were unable to fully appreciate a book if it contained issues of racial intolerance or blatant discrimination. These issues

were too emotionally draining and painful, which made the story uncomfortable for them (Sipe & McGuire, 2006). Another factor of resistance came from nontraditional characters who portrayed roles that were difficult for both gender to identify with. For example, in a fractured fairy tale in which the princess was an empowered, self-confident woman and the prince was a weak, self-centered man, girls could identify with the strong female role, but boys felt misrepresented. When considering resistance behind the attitudes of readers and their responses to text, Apple (1993) adds, “Students bring their own classed, raced, religious, and gendered biographies with them as well. They, too, accept, reinterpret, and reject what counts as legitimate knowledge selectively” (p. 61). Although literature has the power to educate and influence children, their attitudes are created before they read any selected that is given to them in a classroom, so an educator must keep this important factor in mind. In 2001, Gurian and Henley found that between 70% and 80% of students in the

classroom who demonstrate low motivation in

reading are boys. This could be due to the fact that boys “increasingly consider themselves to be nonreaders as they get older” (Smith & Wilhelm, 2002, p. 11). Smith and Wilhelm (2002) also noticed that boys express less enthusiasm for reading than girls, they read less than girls, they take longer to read than girls, and they generally provide lower estimations of their real reading abilities than girls do. All of these factors can contribute to a very poor attitude when reading and could elicit more negative reader responses than girls.

Interests

Children like to surround themselves with

things and experiences that interest them, thus, creating a supportive sociocultural experience according to what they like. In order to understand reader responses to literature, we must first understand their interests. According to the studies within this literature review, the interests of boys and girls vary greatly. This could be a good indicator of why reader responses vary between

different genders. In her study, Arizpe (2001) found that the main reading material of boys during a two-month span was comic books and magazines. The girls read fewer magazines, and largely favored books. This shows a clear difference in gender preferences as they select literature independently. In a study on reading attitudes of middle school students in 2012, McKenna, Conradi, Lawrence, Jang, and Meyer had students rank their preference of academic reading in print settings, academic reading in digital settings, recreational reading in print settings, and recreational reading in digital settings. The girls’ preferences of both academic settings and the recreational print setting largely outweighed the boys. The boys exhibited the most positive attitude towards recreational reading in digital settings (McKenna et al., 2012). This shows a clear distinction between academic and recreational

reading preferences among boys and girls. In Kara Reuter’s 2007 study of children’s book selection in a digital library, girls reported selecting their books based on interest, liking, and quality. The boys reported selecting their books based on content factors within the book, such as books solely on machines or sharks. The girls focused more on one book at a time while the boys accessed more books in order to inquire about more topics (Reuter, 2007). The interests of boys were centered around dark covers and concentrations such as cars, sharks, and skeletons, while the interests of girls were centered around lighter, more colorful covers with topics such as bugs and rabbits (Reuter, 2007). Book selection goes even deeper in a 2009 study by Farris, Werderich, Nelson, and Fuhler. While studying fifth-grade boys and their preferences in literature, the following observations were noticed:

1. They selected books that “looked good,” featuring a character on the cover that engaged in a dangerous, life-threatening activity. These books also had noticeably wide, generous margins and easy-to-read fonts. Books with unusual or interesting fonts and different textual features were also of large interest to them. 2. They enjoyed books that were part of a series or written by a favorite author. 3. They chose fact books and informational books that had short passages supported by photographs or cartoon drawings (Farris, Werderick, Nelson, &

Fuhler, 2009, pp. 183-184). As you can see, there is little evidence of interest in traditional literature above. Nicole Senn

(2012) supported the above findings as she discovered that fourth through sixth grade boys tend to focus on topics in books that are related to action and exploration, while girls were more interested in relationships and communication. Davies (1993) and Cherland (1992) were two more studies in which gender differences in interest were found to be important factors in responding to literature. They both discussed our culture as one that supports interests of girls that are based on feelings, while the interests of boys are based on action.

Perceptions

Children’s perceptions are created from their prior experiences and the various influences in their daily lives. Some perceptions are static, strong, and not willing to change. Some perceptions are more fluid and change over time with a child’s development. Both types of perceptions are directly influenced by the sociocultural surroundings of each child. Whether or not they can be influenced by an educator varies. In a 2006 study by Peggy Rice, sixth graders read a Japanese folktale called Three Strong Women about a man who is trained by three women in order to win a wrestling tournament. Boys and girls within this study were to recall the story in their own words. After analyzing their responses, Rice (2006) categorized their events into traditional and nontraditional characteristics of the story. The results of this study showed a large difference in boys’ and girls’ perspectives of the story. When the three strong women assisted the man, the girls focused on the women making him stronger while the boys focused on the fact that the man was now ready to fight. Although they both agreed on the outcome of the story in which the man won the wrestling tournament, the girls gave credit to the women who trained him for the event while the

boys credited the man for his effort. Of the events that were recalled, the girls reported ½ traditional characteristics and ½ nontraditional characteristics

of the story. The boys reported ¾ traditional characteristics and ¼ nontraditional character-

istics. The end result of this study is that the boys left nontraditional aspects of the story to be implied and acknowledged the traditional aspects while the girls tended to be inclusive with both traditional and nontraditional. It is clear to see that

the way both genders perceived this folktale were very different. A few years after this study, Peggy Rice (2002) looked closely at children’s perspectives of masculinity and femininity through children’s literature. After reading two books with nontraditional female roles and two books with

nontraditional male roles, Rice (2002) surveyed third graders on the major characteristic of each nontraditional protagonist. When asked if most girls are adventurous, 50% of boys said no and 100% of girls said yes. The reason for boys saying no was because they didn’t believe that girls liked to get dirty. When asked if girls are brave, 67% of boys said no and 67% of girls said yes. The reason for boys saying no was because they believed that girls are not brave like boys. The reason for girls saying no was because boys have to rescue girls. When asked if boys would have helped a teacher in the story, 67% of boys said no and 100% of girls said no. The reason for boys saying no was because they imagine the boys would be outside playing. The reason for girls saying no is because they believed that boys aren’t kind and caring. Finally, when asked if it is okay for boys to tap dance instead of playing sports like basketball, 67% of boys said no and 53% of girls said no. The reason for boys saying no was because they believe it would be weird, considering that sports like

basketball are boys’ sports and tap dancing is not. The reason for girls saying no was because they also thought it would be weird. What is interesting about these results is that a couple of them are opposite and a couple of them are similar, but all of them offer different perceptions of the main character within each story. The last example to help solidify this theme of perception is another study from Peggy Rice (2002). In this study, Rice (2002) examines the effectiveness of dramatizing stories that portray nontraditional gender roles. Children scored four carefully selected nontraditional stories based on a 1-3-5 scale with one representing a dislike of the story and five representing a strong like of the story. After a dramatization of each story, children scored the stories again to allow for comparison. Based on the results of the children’s collective

scores, it was clear that both genders scored each story higher than they did before the dramatization. “The results indicate that

dramatizing stories affects children’s responses to a story in which the characters are portrayed in nontraditional roles in a positive manner, especially boys” (Rice, 2002, p. 6). After reviewing the comments from the children in the study, several of them mentioned how entering the story through drama affected them and helped them get to know the characters better. Their perceptions of the characters prior to dramatization and afterwards had changed significantly once they were able to actively understand more about the role they played.

Implications

The major implications of this literature review are clear. Overall, boys and girls arrive at literature with different attitudes based on their

interests and gender schema. As they read through that same literature, many factors influence the perception they use to understand it. Parents, family members, peers, media, educational settings, educational personnel, and instructional materials are examples of sources that directly and indirectly send messages about gender roles to children. Behavior, language, and visual representations are a few ways in which these messages are received (Greever, Austin, & Welhousen, 2000). The sociocultural environment in which each child is

placed, plays a major role in their individual learning. This places a large part of the responsibility of gender responses to literature in the hands of parents, teachers, and administration. One of the issues surrounding reader responses and the differences between genders is a child’s gender schema. Considering that this gender schema interferes with the accurate recollection of information within reading (Frawley, 2008), we need to start there. Our children are forgetting information, adding incorrect information, and distorting information from their text based on what they know about gender. This is where educators come into play and educate their students on nontraditional gender roles. Literature is a powerful tool in the agent of change, and teachers should take advantage of this tool in their classrooms. They can bring parents,

administration, and community members on board in order to educate them on the resources available.

As educators, we cannot expect a boy to think like a girl or a girl to think like a boy. We also cannot accept a boy to think only like a boy or a girl to think only like a girl. We need to expose them to all ways of thinking and allow each child to think according to how they individually process this new awareness to nontraditional thought. The research within this literature review

should make it clear that there are many factors outside of our control that form the identity of each child, and those factors are still very traditional. Traditional is not bad, and nontraditional is not necessarily good. What we need to do is accept children for who they are, but help them see that their chosen identity is not the only one in existence. The reader responses in this research reveals the limited view of children based

on their gender. In order for them to become future global citizens and agents of change in our society, we must expose them to the fact that their gender is part of who they are, but it is not all they are. The goal is to stop limiting our students and help them see that being different is not a bad thing, both for characters in their stories and people in their real lives. We need to help them understand that adjusting their thinking will not change their chosen gender, and that it is okay for them to expand their perspectives.

Conclusion

What I learned through this research is much more than I had first anticipated. It is more than children responding to literature, it is a whole new world in its own. I was not only able to find more information concerning the reasons behind Chavo’s struggle, but I also found topics for further research. The topic of this article is far from complete, and this literature review has only hit the tip of the iceberg. I believe there needs to be more research about the role parents play in the gender schema formation of their child. I also think that

research needs to look deeper into teacher attitudes and their chosen instruction when it comes to

gender roles and how they portray them. Finally, the difference between the preferences of boys and girls has never been clearer. It is not our children’s fault that they have the perceptions they do when we continue to exhibit the same traditional

behaviors and use the same traditional literature.

Before we look at student responses, we need to look at our own behavior as educators. Boys and girls do not necessarily need to change their literature preferences, we need to change our methods. Instead of immediately trying to reach boys and evaluate them through fictional literature, we first need to expand into their personal interests. Including nontraditional roles within nonfiction and factual text would be a great place to start. This would also assist girls who enjoy these genres. We cannot continue to expect that children will adapt and expand their thinking on our terms; we need to start going to them and making adjustments to our own thinking first.

References

Apple, M. W. (1993). Official knowledge:

Democratic education in a conservative age, New York, NY: Routledge. Arizpe, E. (2001). Responding to a ‘Conquistadora’: Readers talk about gender in Mexican secondary schools. Gender and Education, 13(1), 25-37. Bakhtin, M. (1986). Speech genres and other late essays. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press. Barajas, K. E. (2008). Beyond stereotypes? Talking about gender in school book talk.

Ethnography and Education, 3(2), 129-144. Cherland, M. (1992). Gendered readings: Cultural constraints upon response to literature. The

New Advocate, 5, 187-198. Childress, G. (1985). Gender gap in the library: Different choices for boys and girls. Top of the News, 42(1), 69-73. Davies, B. (1993). Shards of glass: Children reading and writing beyond gendered identities. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press. Farris, P. J., Werderich, D. E., Nelson, P. A., & Fuhler, C. J. (2009). Male call: Fifth-grade boys’ reading preferences. The Reading Teacher 63(3), 180-188. Fishbein, M., & Ajzen, I. (1975). Belief, attitude, intention, and behavior: An introduction to theory and research. Reading, MA: AddisonWesley. Frawley, T. J. (2008). Gender schema and prejudicial recall: How children misremember, fabricate, and distort gendered picture book information. Journal of Research in Childhood

Education, 22(3), 291-303. Gee, J. P. (2011). Discourse analysis: What makes it critical?. In R. Rogers (Ed.), An introduction to critical discourse analysis in education (pp. 23-45). New York, NY: Routledge. Greever, E. A., Austin, P., & Welhousen, K. (2000). William’s doll revisited. Language

Arts, 77(4), 324-330. Gurian, M., & Henley, P. (2001). Boys and girls learn differently: A guide for teachers and parents. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Kohlberg, L. (1966). A cognitive-developmental analysis of children’s sex-role concepts and attitudes. In E. E. Maccoby (Ed.), The development of sex differences. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 82-173. Lopez-Bonilla, G. (2011). Narratives of exclusion and the construction of the self. In R. Rogers (Ed.), An introduction to critical discourse analysis in education. New York, NY: Routledge, 46-67. Marsh, J., & Lammers, J. C. (2011). Figured worlds and discourses of masculinity: Being a boy in a literacy classroom. In R. Rogers (Ed.), An introduction to critical discourse analysis in education. New York, NY: Routledge, 93-115. Martin, C. L., & Halverson, C. F. (1981). A schematic processing model of sex typing and stereotyping in children. Child Development, 52, 1119-1134. McKenna, M. C., Conradi, K., Lawrence, C., Jang, B. G., & Meyer, J. P. (2012). Reading attitudes of middle school students: Results of a U.S. survey. Reading Research Quarterly, 47(3), 283-306. Reuter, K. (2007). Assessing aesthetic relevance: Children’s book selection in a digital library.

Journal of the American Society for Information

Science and Technology, 58(12), 1745-1763. Rice, P. S. (2000). Gendered readings of a traditional “feminist” folktale by sixth-grade boys and girls. Journal of Literacy Research, 32(2), 211-236. Rice, P. S. (2002, May). Examining the effectiveness of entering the story world of characters portraying diverse gender roles. Presentation at the annual meeting of the International Reading Association, San Francisco, CA.

Rice, P. S. (2002). Creating spaces for boys and girls to expand their definitions of masculinity and femininity through children’s literature. Journal of Children’s Literature, 28(2), 33-42. Rosenblatt, L. (1994). The reader, the text, the poem: The transactional theory of the literary work (2nd Ed.). Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois Press. Senn, N. (2012). Effective approaches to motivate and engage reluctant boys in literacy. The Reading Teacher, 66(3), 211220. Sipe, L. R. (1999). Children’s response to literature: Author, text, reader, context.

Theory Into Practice, 38(3), 120-129. Sipe, L. R., & McGuire, C. E. (2006). Young children’s resistance to stories. The Reading

Teacher, 60(1), 6-13. Smith, M. W., & Wilhelm, J. D. (2002). Reading don’t fix no Chevys: Literacy in the lives of young men. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann. Trousdale, A. M., & McMillan, S. (2003). “Cinderella was a wuss”: A young girl’s responses to feminist and patriarchal folktales. Children’s Literature in Education, 34(1), 1-28.