Language teachers warn of a progressive loss of weight of the history of literature in high schools that has been accentuated in the last year with the implementation of the Celaá Law. The educational reform of the Government seeks to promote the reading habit of students with texts closer to their interests and gives more importance to contemporary readings. In exchange, he loses the study of The Quijote o The Lazarillo within its time and historical movement.
The teachers consulted denounce that literature has been suffering cuts for years, in parallel to the general crisis in the Humanities. They hold all educational laws, both the PP and the PSOE, responsible for this. The last one, the Lomloethe way of teaching the class has changed Language and Literature, with an approach where data, dates and rote learning are less important, syntax and grammar contents are reduced and oral and written communication is enhanced. The study of literature is now more focused on the personal “experience” of the student to build his “own reading identity.”
«Learning to read has been linked almost exclusively to literary reading for centuries, although for decades communicative approaches have emphasized the need to teach reading all kinds of texts, for different reading purposes. On the other hand, knowing how to read today also implies browsing and searching the net, selecting reliable information, preparing it and integrating it into one’s own schemes”, says, as a declaration of intent, the state curriculum of the THAT.
The state curriculum is key because it lists everything that students have to learn throughout Spain. If there is something that is not expressly mentioned, it is at the mercy of what the CCAAs later detail in their regional curricula or what each center establishes. The curriculum of Baccalaureate de la Lomloe does prescribe «the reading of relevant works of Spanish literature» and cites the Middle Ageshe Romancethe ages XIX, XX y XXIand even specific moments: the Silver age of Spanish culture (1875-1936), the civil warhe exile and the dictatorship.
But that of the ESO does not mention any period or historical movement. It only urges, in a very general way, “the reading of relevant works and fragments of national and universal literary heritage” and “contemporary youth literature.” That leaves the compulsory nature of the readings in the hands of each institute because most of the CCAAs do not specify either. Only Madrid y Castile and Leon have shielded these historical periods in ESO. In Baccalaureate they also go beyond the state norm and prescribe to Cervantes, Quevedo, Lope de Vega o Calderon of the boat and works like The Quijote, The Lazarillo or he New Ballads.