ABSTRACT
Maybe it is simply stating the ridiculously obvious, but we believe that literary texts are a vital part of instruction in the teaching of English. One concern about the CCSS voiced by many English teachers is that the standards privilege informational texts, even, perhaps, as more “complex” than fictional texts. We don’t see the value of considering informational versus fictional texts as a simplistic either-or question. As indicated throughout this book, when English instruction is based in critical inquiry, literary and informational texts clearly belong together. Perhaps the important point for this chapter is that literary texts have a vital role in critical inquiry. Literature stimulates our students’ imaginations, raising whole hosts of questions about human and social relations, history, politics, and culture. Literary texts enhance students’ development of empathy and moral tolerance and are critical to imaginatively experiencing alternative perspectives (Alsup, 2013; Mar, Oatley, Hirsh, dela Paz, & Peterson, 2006).
