Millennials by Heart: Memorization as an Active Learning Strategy for the SparkNotes Generation
Abstract
With the advent of online synopses, e-guides, and Internet study aids, millennial college students have many ways to evade direct interactions with the texts assigned in humanities classes. As a result, fewer and fewer of them are developing the analytical and close reading skills that college instructors value so highly. In this essay, the author advocates for an exercise that educational scholars have long dismissed as an archaic relic of an earlier and unenlightened pedagogical era: the memorization of poetry. Not only does learning poetry by heart circumvent students' overreliance upon Internet study aids, it also acquaints them with one of the most pleasurable experiences available in English classes: an unmediated encounter with a literary text. The assignment's design moves beyond rote memorization as an end in itself by incorporating principles of active learning. Perhaps most significantly, asking students to memorize verse encourages them to contemplate the importance of poetry--and the humanities in general--in our fast-paced, digital world.
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