Teaching Milton


This day workshop at the University of Manchester’s Centre for Enquiry Based Learning (EBL), considered the teaching of Milton, with particular emphasis on the deployment of new technologies and innovative pedagogies. The panellists and contributors agreed that Milton still proved popular to a select group of undergraduates, but that some of the complex issues associated with his work and times meant that teaching Milton, while rewarding, took care and attention. The day was ably opened by Sharon Achinstein (Oxford) and Karen Edwards (Exeter), who discussed the challenges of teaching such a complex poet to undergraduates. Martin Dzelzainis (Royal Holloway) and Gordon Campbell (Leicester) then debated the consequences of interdisciplinarity to pedagogical practice, with Martin offering a particularly rich reading of a Milton sonnet as an example of the multiple concepts that would need to be communicated to a class. Two further sessions looked at ways in which e-learning and new web-based technologies could enhance teaching. Rosanna Cox (Kent) talked of her experiences of making educational podcasts. Marcus Nevitt (Sheffield) gave a small case study of his use of EEBO in a third-year class. Tom Corns (Bangor) and Jerome de Groot (Manchester) both talked about ways of utilising the multiple web resources devoted to Milton – both textual and contextual – in order to augment traditional teaching methods. After a presentation on the use of EBL pedagogy in teaching, the workshop then broke into smaller groups to discuss the issues that had arisen throughout the day. Jerome de Groot, University of Manchester

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Magazine Issue 1 - April 2009

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English Subject Centre - ISSN 2040-6754

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