CCBC-Net Archives
[CCBC-Net] VAMPIRE STUDIES
- Contemporary messages sorted: [ by date ] [ by subject ] [ by author ]
From: Cindy Dobrez <dobrez>
Date: Thu, 9 Jul 2009 20:07:02 -0700
Could be that some of the classics became high school curricular staples decades ago because YA Lit HADN'T BEEN WRITTEN YET? I wrote poetry in high school but didn't appreciate the "classic" poets until I was in college and older. I don't think Huck Finn is a 7th grade book, really, and I don't think that Walden Pond is a high school read. Not to say that some kids won't read them and love them and understand them at those ages, but I think that some of the important elements of literature can be taught with our Printz winners in high school and engage today's students better than The Great Gatsby or other classics that were written for adults. If a student studies Monster by Walter Dean Myers (the first Printz winner) and afterward can discuss plot, setting, character, theme, etc. is that a failing of an English teacher that she didn't use The Scarlet Letter? If the students learn how to understand what they read they will be able to apply it to anything they go on to read later. Better to me, that the whol e class hangs on every word of Laurie Halse Anderson's SPEAK and understands what the curriculum needs them to while going away with a message about teen issues than they give up before they get started because they don't care about a Glass Menagerie or what have you. Tell me that the farming brutes in Laura Ingalls Wilder's one room school house wouldn't have responded better to Gary Paulsen than they probably did Pilgrim's Progress or whatever she was forced to teach them?
And, Lee, I don't think anyone is teaching TWILIGHT in the curriculum, my teachers don't. That's what the students are reading for leisure reading. I've had 8th grade boys who had never read a book in its entirety until I gave them Eve Bunting's SOMEONE IS HIDING ON ALCATRAZ ISLAND for independent book reports. Those guys wouldn't have made it through TREASURE ISLAND and you can bet they aren't making it through FLOWERS FOR ALGERNON that's excerpted in their text book. But you should have seen their faces when they learned that they could finish a whole book. I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss YA literature for the classroom. Have you read the Octavian Nothing duet? These boys might eventually because they figured out they could finish a book thanks to YA lit (and a librarian who read widely and spent time to match them with the right book--not that public schools value that skill too widely these days.)
Cindy Dobrez dobrez at chartermi.net
Received on Thu 09 Jul 2009 10:07:02 PM CDT
Date: Thu, 9 Jul 2009 20:07:02 -0700
Could be that some of the classics became high school curricular staples decades ago because YA Lit HADN'T BEEN WRITTEN YET? I wrote poetry in high school but didn't appreciate the "classic" poets until I was in college and older. I don't think Huck Finn is a 7th grade book, really, and I don't think that Walden Pond is a high school read. Not to say that some kids won't read them and love them and understand them at those ages, but I think that some of the important elements of literature can be taught with our Printz winners in high school and engage today's students better than The Great Gatsby or other classics that were written for adults. If a student studies Monster by Walter Dean Myers (the first Printz winner) and afterward can discuss plot, setting, character, theme, etc. is that a failing of an English teacher that she didn't use The Scarlet Letter? If the students learn how to understand what they read they will be able to apply it to anything they go on to read later. Better to me, that the whol e class hangs on every word of Laurie Halse Anderson's SPEAK and understands what the curriculum needs them to while going away with a message about teen issues than they give up before they get started because they don't care about a Glass Menagerie or what have you. Tell me that the farming brutes in Laura Ingalls Wilder's one room school house wouldn't have responded better to Gary Paulsen than they probably did Pilgrim's Progress or whatever she was forced to teach them?
And, Lee, I don't think anyone is teaching TWILIGHT in the curriculum, my teachers don't. That's what the students are reading for leisure reading. I've had 8th grade boys who had never read a book in its entirety until I gave them Eve Bunting's SOMEONE IS HIDING ON ALCATRAZ ISLAND for independent book reports. Those guys wouldn't have made it through TREASURE ISLAND and you can bet they aren't making it through FLOWERS FOR ALGERNON that's excerpted in their text book. But you should have seen their faces when they learned that they could finish a whole book. I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss YA literature for the classroom. Have you read the Octavian Nothing duet? These boys might eventually because they figured out they could finish a book thanks to YA lit (and a librarian who read widely and spent time to match them with the right book--not that public schools value that skill too widely these days.)
Cindy Dobrez dobrez at chartermi.net
Received on Thu 09 Jul 2009 10:07:02 PM CDT
