When I was at school I would have much rather written about the books of Georgette Heyer than Jane Austen, since I was devouring them at 15. My teacher didn't consider them exactly high literature so I wrote about Much Ado about Nothing instead. I am not a fan of the Twilight books but reading is reading and perhaps some proper critical analysis of books themes might benefit the students.

The problem here seems to be that all this student can say about Lord of The Flies is how stupid it is. Surely the point of education is to broaden and develop students' minds, which often means studying more challenging texts. I agree that popular fiction, such as Twilight/Dan Brown etc, is not devoid of interesting themes, characters, but they hardly stretch one's critical thinking. Even if they don't like so-called classic literature, I still think they should be 'forced' to learn it and write about it; then they may be able to articulate more clearly why they don't like it. This should promote greater and more sophisticated engagement all round, Twilight included.

I agree with Nick #2 - a key competence of studying English at this level is to stretch and develop critical thinking skills. Critical thinking is a skill needed for the rest of student's lives, regardless of what they go on to do. In my opinion, Twilight is not well written enough to be able to go into the depth required to develop this skill well.

Nanny state much... Pop culture is great learning, but a balance is required. I was last of the Bursary lot (and did Cambridge exams as well). Great learning about Apolopse now, the colourings of the 20's as epitimised in Great Gatsby. But noone can teach me what I learnt from the poem Dulce et Decorum est (propatria mori sun sp).

this is hard to comment on as I agree with the whole critical thinking and twilight being poorly written etc. But when given something a student likes they are more motivated to achieve a better result and work harder to achieve best goals. And also when you go to Uni, you can do essay on which ever examples you like. For e.g. I did a 3rd year paper where I wrote about Britney Spears and got a A result. I was shocked by my result. I also the examples mentioned are rather poor for high end merits etc. I see them as more opinion than critical analysis.

Really, just no. For level one, Twilight might suffice, but the level of thinking in the book is so juvenile that ... no, it's just not good enough. The Handmaid's Tale, which you mention here, is a fascinating book, and I wish that I'd been able to do that for my Level One exam, but well, too late now. If you must write about something that's simple, even Harry Potter is better - you could talk about how the books develop with the initial reader's ages, and how simplistic themes can become more complex. All I can say is that I'm glad it's only the first book - the second book may develop into psychoanalysing depression, but I doubt people who read it think that deeply about the actual idea of depression. The examples you quoted above are quite horrifically worded, and lack the sophistication I thought would be necessary for Excellence. Other books which would appeal to teenagers and actually offer good themes and plenty to write on include Hunger Games, and its sequels (especially Mockingjay). Or if into the supernatural, then even the Tithe series. Hunger Games is a complex book and many 'lessons' can be learnt from it - not to mention its post apocalyptic setting and the return to savagery is a really good idea that can be expanded upon in millions of ways. And arguments about human rights and torture in particular can be brought up. Tithe, on the other hand, is all about identity, and can be paralleled with the changes all teenagers experience as they grow up - just expressed in more obvious terms. Level One always was quite simplistic in thinking, and I suppose in that regard, Twilight fits the bill. But in higher levels? You're joking.

Something I should have clarified - even if students do write about Twilight in one part of their NCEA English course, during the year they'll also study other types of texts such as poems, films, oral recordings, short stories, Shakespeare, the usual. They're not going to get to uni on vampires alone. Nick: I'm with you on Dan Brown lacking the scope for proper study. But I'm a grown-up with an English lit major, and I do find my critical thinking stretched by some of the ideas in Twilight, particularly the debates around its anti-feminist themes (women = weak, clumsy, vulnerable; even the vampire women are beautiful and graceful rather than strong/protective) and ideas about sex/power. Disclaimer: I'm also nuts for Edward Cullen.

@ Catherine - Fair point. I see where you are coming from; I'm doing my Masters on popular music at the moment and there are, historically, similar kinds of debates about whether 'low-culture' should be the focus of attention. I intensely dislike people who disparage all popular music as 'loud noise' in the same way, I imagine, you would dislike people who write off (pun intended!) Twilight etc without giving it a chance. Having come from a classical background, I tend to appreciate those pop songs that do something musically or lyrically interesting; something that forces you listen to a song more than once to 'get it.' I think the same idea is applicable to popular fiction - sure, Dan Brown is great fun to read, but it's all there on the page! Obviously in your opinion, Twilight has a little more depth...I think the debate required here is not over Twilight, per se, but popular fiction more generally because once you open the floodgates, it will be very hard to turn back!

Now that I think about, I did a Level 3 presentation on NZ Masculinity and covered Mulgan, Baxter, McGee and also the film Stickmen. Likewise, I recall scholarship English being more 'issue'-based, so there could be potential for bringing in a wider range of texts there, so long as they can be discussed in the critical, sophisticated ways that everybody seems to want!

Are these students writing about Twilight with the critical eye required to discuss themes such as the anti-feminist thread that runs throughout the series? I don't think Meyer intentionally 'stretches your critical thinking' with such themes, and I'm not sure that teens who are big fans are going to be looking at that angle.