Page 95 - Getting of the fence

Students’ perspective on the benefits of literature lessons
this combination, indicating that students regard the benefits of EFL literature in terms of Language and Context related elements. Furthermore, 56% (n = 335) of the students mentioned either the Context approach or the Language approach, or a combination of the two. At the other end of the spectrum, a total of 11.5% (n = 73) of the students mentioned the combinations in which the Text approach features, which ranged between 0.3% (n = 2) and 4% (n = 27).
In general, 74% (n = 472) of the students mentioned the Language approach at least once, followed by 56% (n = 355) for the Context approach, 33% (n = 211) for the Reader approach, and 12% (n = 73) for the Text approach. Table 4.5 presents a detailed overview of the elements within the four approaches as mentioned by the students. Most students mentioned more than one element.
A large majority of the students (74%, n = 472) felt that the benefits of EFL 4 literature lessons were Language approach elements, especially ‘Vocabulary and
idioms’ (44%, n = 279) and ‘Language skills’ (26%, n = 163). Over half of the
students (56%, n = 355) mentioned Context approach elements; the most frequent
element mentioned in this approach was the ‘Historical, cultural, and social context’ element, mentioned by 47% (n = 298) of all students. A third of the students mentioned Reader approach elements; the most frequent element mentioned was ‘Personal development’, mentioned by 28% (n = 178) as a beneficial element in their EFL literature classes. The approach that was mentioned by the smallest number of students was the Text approach (12%, n = 73). None of the students’ answers related to the elements ‘Setting’, ‘Characters’, or ‘Reading experiences.’
The elements connected to the core curriculum standards for foreign language literature were mentioned by a remarkably small number of students. ‘Literary terminology’ (Standard 1) was mentioned by 2% of the students; ‘Genre’ (standard 1) were mentioned by 1% (n = 5) of the students; ‘Literary history’ (standard 2) by 7% (n = 46), and ‘Reading experience’ (standard 3) was not mentioned by any of the students at all. This large discrepancy in the number of times these elements were mentioned and the number of times other elements were mentioned raises important questions for the classroom and is examined in the discussion section.
In order to answer our second research question, whether there is a difference in perception between students from different schools, we compared how many students from each school mentioned the approaches at least once. Table 4.6 lists the schools according to the frequency with which each of the approaches was mentioned by the students. Ten of the fifteen schools show a pattern where the
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