Mediating Emotive Empathy With Informational Text: Three Students’ Think‐Aloud Protocols ofGettysburg: The Graphic Novel

Abstract

Although the popularity and use of graphic novels in literacy instruction has increased in the last decade, few sustained analyses have examined adolescents’ reading processes with informational texts in social studies classrooms. Recent research that has foregrounded visual, emotional, and embodied textual responses situates this qualitative study, in which three eighth‐grade students learned about the graphic novel format, responded in writing to interpretive prompts, and thought aloud during their reading of Gettysburg: A Graphic Novel by C.M. Butzer. Analyses of students’ responses to the multimodal text revealed how constructing inferences between visual and linguistic sign systems mediated their emotive empathy—a central, if limited, component of historical empathy.

A Suite of Strategies for Navigating Graphic Novels: A Dual Coding Approach

“…Interestingly, Chisholm, Shelton, and Sheffield () recently reported on a study in which eighth‐grade students read an informational graphic novel in a social studies class. Using strategies requiring students to adopt the perspective of a character in the novel, the researchers concluded that the visual images, more than written dialogue in the text, prompted students’ emotional empathy.…”

The “Bane of the Bassinet”? Graphic Novels as Informational Texts

“…This demonstrates the power of multimodality-through physically seeing the image, the reader was able to empathize with a nameless character. 10 Having readers create their own graphic novels allows "increased critical thinking [that] comes into play when students are asked to create a comic book that does not just require them to regurgitate information about a story or time in history, but to reflect on the story." 11 For historical graphic novels, prompts can include to tell a different ending, to portray the story from one actor's point of view or to think about how events would be different in modern times.…”

Using picture books to raise historical consciousness in the adolescent classroom

“…For example, compared with The Rabbits, an informational text such as Gettysburg: The Graphic Novel gives an uncomplicated account of a well-known historical event. Nevertheless, it can still convey novel insights beyond the scope of a textual account (Chisholm et al 2017). More importantly, regardless of whether the stimulus book offers few or many discussion opportunities, a teacher aiming to encourage sophisticated levels of historical awareness in a classroom will need to be strategic about the type of thought problems that students contemplate.…”

“…First, they enhance readability. A common misconception among teachers is that picture books are most suitable for struggling readers (Chisholm et al 2017, p. 289). However, Youngs' (2012 studies showed that all students, struggling or not, gain additional meaning from imagery.…”