ABSTRACT
When I entered the public school classroom in 1988, I was well aware of Rosenblatt’s theory of reader response and looked forward to implementing it in my classes with an expectation of exciting results. However, reality proved to be a rude awakening. In the “real” public school classroom, I was assigned 150 students; a tight sequence of novels, stories, and plays; and very little prep time. Files of former teachers and prepackaged curriculum packets for one or two of the novels were available as resources. Time constraints made working with other teachers hurried and brief, mainly efforts to achieve synchronicity in lessons and skills by the end of each semester when, in a yearlong course, the computer would scramble and reassign many students to another teacher. The seasoned handouts of tenured teachers, all neatly typed and ready for production, were intimidating.
