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Read-Alouds: No thank-you?
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From: Maia Cheli-Colando <maia>
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 2004 19:32:34 -0700
Karen Sue,
Good question! My eldest little sister, a voracious reader, commented to me yesterday that "what I really don't like are read-alouds in class." She didn't seem to be referring to a teacher reading, but to a tape... "especially where a man reads and he does all these high voices for the girls." She also said that "some things are just meant to be in your mind's eye, you make your own picture of them."
I can certainly see where the wrong reader could turn off kids. And I confess that when I thought about it, I realized that I almost never buy books on cd/tape unless the author-readers are strong oral storytellers who happen to have written a book, e.g. Tanya Robin Batt. Few writers are equally good readers, and few actors who are not the authors get the voice-color-image right for me.
The exceptions to the first rule tend to be performers or musicians in their own right -- folks like Berlie Doherty, Ashley Bryan -- people whom could have as easily been oral culture keepers round the fire.
(Our tapes of Seuss and Arnold Lobel are okay, but nowhere near Berlie and Ashley, to my mind's ear.) I'll let you know if I think of any exceptions to the second; I'd love to hear other folks suggestions. I like the /idea/ of books on cd. But like my sister, I want the right colors in my head!
Yet, to hear someone whom I know read, live, is an entirely different thing. I am engaging with them and their world and their lens and the story simultaneously, and can somehow pull them apart. So, I think that hearing a beloved teacher/parent/lover read may be entirely different thing than hearing a book on tape, brought in to give the kids some diversity? (And I admit that when I listen to Ashley on tape, I see Ashley, the shape of his hands moving in the air. Thus, there is a combination: a very fine writer, fine storyteller, and a person for whom I feel affection. So...)
Maybe I am just awfully picky. I love the song-stories on cd by Music for Little People (Los Lobos in Papa's Dream, Joanne Shenandoah in All Spirits Sing, Karan Casey in Seal Maiden) and California song-storyteller Jessie Modic's fine work. Berlie and Ashley might as well be music, to my mind.
A sidenote to my conversation with my sister, she noted that she doesn't like reading sad books in class. Reading them for class is fine -- just not in class. She wants to read To Kill a Mockingbird first. Why? She knows she will cry, and wants to cry first on her own. She said that when she read the Outsiders she was so glad that she had read it first, so she could get all her crying out before she was in the classroom.
So maybe, sometimes, when kids resist it isn't for predictable reasons? Perhaps hearing some books read aloud might be painful, e.g. for, say, a private, sensitive child?
Maia
Received on Wed 25 Aug 2004 09:32:34 PM CDT
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 2004 19:32:34 -0700
Karen Sue,
Good question! My eldest little sister, a voracious reader, commented to me yesterday that "what I really don't like are read-alouds in class." She didn't seem to be referring to a teacher reading, but to a tape... "especially where a man reads and he does all these high voices for the girls." She also said that "some things are just meant to be in your mind's eye, you make your own picture of them."
I can certainly see where the wrong reader could turn off kids. And I confess that when I thought about it, I realized that I almost never buy books on cd/tape unless the author-readers are strong oral storytellers who happen to have written a book, e.g. Tanya Robin Batt. Few writers are equally good readers, and few actors who are not the authors get the voice-color-image right for me.
The exceptions to the first rule tend to be performers or musicians in their own right -- folks like Berlie Doherty, Ashley Bryan -- people whom could have as easily been oral culture keepers round the fire.
(Our tapes of Seuss and Arnold Lobel are okay, but nowhere near Berlie and Ashley, to my mind's ear.) I'll let you know if I think of any exceptions to the second; I'd love to hear other folks suggestions. I like the /idea/ of books on cd. But like my sister, I want the right colors in my head!
Yet, to hear someone whom I know read, live, is an entirely different thing. I am engaging with them and their world and their lens and the story simultaneously, and can somehow pull them apart. So, I think that hearing a beloved teacher/parent/lover read may be entirely different thing than hearing a book on tape, brought in to give the kids some diversity? (And I admit that when I listen to Ashley on tape, I see Ashley, the shape of his hands moving in the air. Thus, there is a combination: a very fine writer, fine storyteller, and a person for whom I feel affection. So...)
Maybe I am just awfully picky. I love the song-stories on cd by Music for Little People (Los Lobos in Papa's Dream, Joanne Shenandoah in All Spirits Sing, Karan Casey in Seal Maiden) and California song-storyteller Jessie Modic's fine work. Berlie and Ashley might as well be music, to my mind.
A sidenote to my conversation with my sister, she noted that she doesn't like reading sad books in class. Reading them for class is fine -- just not in class. She wants to read To Kill a Mockingbird first. Why? She knows she will cry, and wants to cry first on her own. She said that when she read the Outsiders she was so glad that she had read it first, so she could get all her crying out before she was in the classroom.
So maybe, sometimes, when kids resist it isn't for predictable reasons? Perhaps hearing some books read aloud might be painful, e.g. for, say, a private, sensitive child?
Maia
Received on Wed 25 Aug 2004 09:32:34 PM CDT
