“Setting is really about rule setting.”

Let's get back to reflecting on Literary Elements and How to Teach What Really Matters About Character, Setting, Point of View and Theme. In previous blogs we discussed character, what matters in teaching students about it, and how to best do that. These next few entries will be dedicated to discovering what really matters about setting, why, and how to best work through those ideas with students.

After reading this chapter I have to admit that I am guilty of poor teaching in this area. I have always taught my students a definition of setting to memorize – the time and place in which the characters are placed – and that is about it. Authors Smith and Wilhelm have showed me that setting is one of the most overlooked elements in a novel. There is more to understand regarding setting and there is importance in understanding the setting. Our teaching and thinking have to be much deeper and more nuanced than it generally is. I have to warn you, Reader , that this information is new to me and I have not fully digested it. I will do my best to pass on to you what matters most about setting.

Let's think about setting for a minute and what matters about it in our personal lives. Setting is directly related to our behaviors, actions and words. Take for example two settings of the office and the home. In the office we try to look nice, we speak politely, and we behave in a professional manner. At home on the other hand we slip into comfy clothes, raise our voice if needed, and let our hair down. Two other examples would be the classroom and the playground. In the classroom we teach our students to use inside voices, not to run, and to be kind. On the play ground students yell, run, and are often unkind.

So what does all this mean in relation to text? Every setting will imply certain rules of behavior. It is vitally important for students to understand the setting in detail to understand why characters behave in the way that they do, whether their behavior or words are appropriate, weird or normal according to the rules of the location and time period. For example if students are to understand why a certain character is seen as impertinent they must know that men were not supposed to talk to unmarried women during certain time periods. Understanding the setting helps us get a feel for the motivation behind the characters actions. How people follow, adapt, or violate these rules says a lot about their character and relationship to the social settings in which they are operating.

When considering setting we must keep in mind that there are multiple contextual influences on characters and situations. Our job is to figure out which ones are important to notice keeping in mind that all activity is situated and must be understood in that context.

1) the microsystem – the family, friendships, church, school, and neighborhood
2) the mesosystem – the government, entertainment and transportation
3) the macrosystem – the global climate

Note to self: I tried to apply this information in my classroom this week as we got into our new novel Silas Marner. I wanted the students to really understand fully the English countryside setting at the time period and how the people stayed very much to their own communities and how anyone from outside was suspect. I felt that this was important because it resulted in the countrymen's behavior towards Silas. This did cause some confusion for me because we have talked about not giving the students our interpretation of the text before they have read and had a chance to make meaning themselves. I wonder if I should have let them read some chapters first and waited to see what questions they had. However, I am suspicious that they would not ask anything and just get a very small bit of the meaning out of the story. Maybe that is OK.