Pedagogic Value of ‘An Anthology of Short Stories’: A Course, Taught to Postgraduates at National University of Modern Languages (Peshawar’s Campus)

Abstract

This study was carried out to evaluate the pedagogical appropriateness of the prescribed course. For the pedagogical analysis of the course, the theoretical framework of the investigation included four components: instructional objectives, content analysis, teaching method and strategies, and assessment. The instructional objectives were analyzed against the revised Bloomian taxonomy, and contents of the course were evaluated against the following parameters: intent, content, target, effect, critique, and response. Data was collected from two types of respondents—teachers and students—through semi-structured interviews, using convenient sampling. The collected data were analyzed qualitatively. Along with that, a few short stories from the anthology were analyzed following the criterion mentioned for content analysis. The study deduced that the course lacked in explicit mention of the objectives. Despite some reservations of the respondents, the contents of the course were found pedagogically appropriate for the said level. In the end, the paper offers a few suggestions, keeping in view the responses, to enhance pedagogical appropriateness of the course.