Week 3 - Reading Discussion

Leader: Stefan Roussos

This week we participated in a workshop discussion on the reading tasks which we were assigned to do in preparation for week 3 in relation to the reading by Gamble and Yates (2008). Some of the main points which we covered included:

• ·         Appropriate referencing
• ·         Narrative structure
• ·         Narrator type
• ·         Freedom of point of view
• ·         Importance of illustrations and written text in picture books
• ·         Importance of verb tenses in narratives

Within the discussion we explained to each other the meaning of these concepts and how they were evident within the books we have been reading within our personal reading program. Within our discussion I thought it was interesting to see the wide range of narrative structures which was apparent as we discussed our story shapes that we completed before the workshop. For example the book which I had been reading which is Deadly by Morris Gleitzman and Paul Jennings did not follow a traditional narrative structure because it started off with action, climax and a temporary resolution before the setting. On the other hand a book which Michael had been reading named Pog by Lyn Lee followed a traditional narrative structure.

During the discussion we also set out to find some of the meaning to some key terms within the reading and rewrite them in our own words. These key terms included coda, credibility, didactic, iterate, moral, dialogue, sequence, reiteration and the timeless present.