Fighting City Hall...

[seawasp]

... or at least school administration.

I have finally had it up to HERE with the choices given by the schools for summer reading, so I just sent this:

I've ignored this for the past few years, but I am finally driven to demand:

Why is it that EVERY reading list chosen for children, including the current list for my 10th-grader Chris, seems CALCULATED to drive kids away from actually LIKING reading? Selecting things ranging from bittersweet down to "commit suicide after reading, it's happier that way"? I would have hoped we'd have gotten away from that since I was a kid and had marvelous (note that this is extreme sarcasm) material such as "Lord of the Flies" shoved down my throat. Had I not already cultivated a love of books long before I entered school, I would give even odds that school would have solidified a long-standing hatred of the printed word.

Really, children don't need to be fed on a diet of "realistically grim" material. Upbeat, cheerful, and optimistic books not only are easier to read, they help cultivate a similar attitude in the kids. And most importantly, an attitude that maybe books aren't to be dreaded as assignments.

At least offer some choices that HIT the bright side of the spectrum, rather than the brightest one being something peeking out of a closet at dusk.

I don't expect to CHANGE things, but I feel somewhat better in having finally SAID something.

Comments

[muirecan.livejournal.com]

Oh having been in more than one high school english class to look at the computer or network while they are reading one of the assigned books.... Gah no wonder people don't want to read. I think school reading assignments are designed with nothing more in mind that driving as many people away from reading as they want.

Maybe to kids in the 30's or 40's or possibly the 50's some of these 'classics' might have resonated but they might as well be reading oh Bullwar-Llyton for all the kids today are going to connect to the characters in the books they are made to read. :p

I quite agree where are all the fun books designed to interest and tantalize people into reading. Why do they have to be weighty serious self important books?

[rezendi.livejournal.com]

Word.

I've long thought Goldman's MARATHON MAN would be ideal high-school fare.

[lilfluff.livejournal.com]

Firmly in agreement.

There are also the books that are not horridly depressing, but seem designed to convince you that reading is at best dull and boring. I had The Great Gatsby as assigned reading in a college class. The only reason I could stand to read it was that it could be spread out throughout the semester. Characters ranged from, "I'm supposed to like this guy because...?" to "I care not one iota what happens to this character."

Fortunately my parents made it clear that they were more concerned with my reading than just what exactly I read. They might look at something I picked up and express surprise that I'd want to read it, but they wouldn't stop me from doing so. As a result I think I started reading The Right Stuff somewhere around fourth grade and IIRC made a first try at A Canticle for Leibowitz around fifth grade.

In fact the only time I can recall their taking away any books when I was a kid, was when a coworker said, "Hey, you're son likes to read, right? I've got a whole box of books my brother is done with." They looked through and pulled out a few that they decided looked like porn, but left behind the science fiction and fantasy and the rest. So the only time I can remember the doing that was with books I hadn't even picked out myself.

And while I wouldn't want to have to go through grade school again, there is one thing I miss from that time. I regularly went through at least three or four novels a week. When we would go on vacations I would read in the car and often polish off two or more a day (I think I went through the first eight Chronicles of Amber novels in two and a half days that way -- I had an aunt send them over with instructions to let her know if the most recently published book concluded the series yet).

[shanejayell.livejournal.com]

Way to go! I don't remember one good book that was required reading.

[fengi.livejournal.com]

What specific titles does this reference? Clearly there's a list, could you share?

[martianmooncrab.livejournal.com]

they used to let us chose our summer books, as long as we read them, and then in High School, you had a pretty long list to chose from rather than the same depressing short lists.

[nuranar.livejournal.com]

I love your own way with words. I'm glad you said it. And I'd imagine it's a different perspective from most parental complaint letters they'd get.

[jamesandbluejay.livejournal.com]

Agree with you wholeheartedly and with foamings of the mouth.

I believe the problem to be caused by a cookie-cutter approach to education by schools who haven't the resources (or the authority) to incorporate a rational list of reading and actually search for alternatives. In other words, sheer economics. "This list handed down from above must be good--it's what these learned experts studied when they went to school!" (never mind that the list is antiquated and hasn't been updated in eons--they're classics, man!)

Rather believe laziness than suspect ill intentions (must go rinse foam from teeth)

You'll Never Get a Newbery Medal With That Attitude

[tamahori]

Ah yes, I remember school, with such uplifting classics to study like Handmaiden's Tale, 1984, and Animal Farm ...

I can only assume these people are long-term fans of Russian Novels (I've talked to fans of this, and asked them if they can recommend me something that won't leave me wanting to throw myself under a bus afterwards ... they tend to think about it for a while, then suggest that Great Russian Novels may not be for me).

I honestly do wish you the best of luck with this, and hope that they do at least think about it in response to your letter.

-- Brett

[bemused-leftist.livejournal.com]

Good for you! Maybe you could send a copy as a Letter to the Editor of your local paper or some local forum, and some other parents would take it up.

[threeringedmoon.livejournal.com]

What you said.

[kengr]

I remember in high school how the teachers of a combined English and Social Studies class (it was 1971, what can I say) managed to get a number of us to read some books we'd likely have not tried.

They simply told us that they'd *wanted* to have certain books on the reading list, but were told by the school administration that the books were "objectionable".

Which is how I came to read "King Rat" by Clavell. Depressing in places, but I did learn some things from it. And much of it wasn't *that* shocking, as I'd read a number of books about WWII POWs before.

On the other hand, I recall the reading list for the prep school mom tried to get me into. The only two books that I recall are Silent Spring (tried to read it and bounced) and "The Hobbit" which I also had trouble with. More because it was a bit too "kids fairy tale" at the start.

[dragoness-e.livejournal.com]

Courtesy of my e-book reader and FREE BOOKS from Project Gutenburg, I am reading classics I avoided reading as a student, or re-reading some I did (and was bored by). I have also re-read many things I liked as an adolescent/college student. I find a mature adult perspective changes my attitude remarkably.

Some of my old favorites from college turned out to be far more... mediocre than I remembered back then (that's you, Michael Moorcock). I am less tolerant of crappy pro writing since I started writing myself, and saw way too much of it in fanfic.

Some of them have aged like fine wine, turning out far better than I remembered back then (that's you, Robert E. Howard). As a young woman, I devoured genre books for the action and the "gee-whiz" factor (in movies, we call it "eye-candy"); as an older adult, I more appreciate interesting characters and settings.

I find I like many of the classics *now*; I would not have enjoyed them as an adolescent or college student. I recently read Wuthering Heights, which is a totally awesome train wreck of dysfunctional characters. The author very carefully keeps your sympathies from battening too hard on to characters doomed to destruction, and preserves the characters she finally does let us like. I greatly enjoyed the book. I would have hated it as a student and not "gotten" it. I rather doubt I'd push it on adolescents in general, as I think they'd miss half of what's going on in that story, and care about less.

I have yet to re-read The Great Gatsby to see if it still sucks as much as it did in high school, though.

Also, Shakespeare's tragedies are far more fun seen in the theater than read as scripts. My then-adolescent daughter and the rest of the family really enjoyed a kabuki-style performance of "Titus Andronicus". There's something about that over-the-top Greek-style tragedy done as a Japanese kabuki or noh drama that just fit, perfectly. I suspect actual over-the-top Greek tragedies, like "Medea", would be cool as noh or kabuki.

(Also, if you educate your children in the classics, they'll know which stories major comic-book plot arcs were stolen from... like X-Men's Madelyne Prior arc vis-a-vis Euripides' "Medea").