English Literature - Experienced: Jeffrey House

Entering my 33rd year of teaching, I'm just starting to learn the job. I currently teach at a small, private school south of the San Francisco Bay area, but I've taught in public schools around the state in suburban and small town settings. I have a BA in journalism and an MA in English Literature, taking most of my coursework at San Jose State University. I've experimented with teaching environments, having taught learning disabled, mainstream, and honors students in traditional and interdepartmental courses. My studies over the last decade in mythology, American culture and writing led to published articles in English Journal and other periodicals and the creation of several websites for teachers and students. My Writing is Dialogue: Teaching Students to Write (and Think) like Writers, a writing text drawn from classroom experiences and much of the material used in my lectures on teaching writing, was published in March of 2006 by Christopher-Gordon Publishers. I'm currently working on a study or archetypes and how mythological approaches to literature can make analysis more accessible for students; the work will be entitled Below the Moon: Using Archetypes to Study Literature. The recipient of seven NEH grants, I've traveled across the continent a few times in the study of African-American literature, early eighteenth-century American and British lit; humanities and the Renaissance; Medieval Germanic epics; and Shakespeare. Finally, I've lectured for the College Board, the California Association of Teachers of English, the California Association for Independent Schools, and the San Diego-based AVID, and I'm a consultant for the San Jose Area Writing Project. After three margaritas, I've been known to pull out my guitar and sing 60s protest songs, so I drink moderately.

Participants should feel free to contact me at 408-362-9753 if they have any questions in advance.