Let's Talk Bookish; Required Reading in School
It’s Friday and thus perhaps time for another Let’s Talk Bookish post courtesy of Book Nook Bits and as it was freebie week in terms of themes, I decided writing a blog post on required reading.
While I’m all for exposing kids/students to a variety of books and texts, whether the text is written in the 1700’s or two years ago, I do have some issues force feeding students texts, especially if the text(s) feel somewhat boring and/or irrelevant. Let’s face it, I doubt too many students are overly keen on reading Bleak House by Charles Dickens, Poison by Alexander Kielland, or Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger.
I do understand the logistics for the teachers, as they need to create lesson plans and all that, but if it was possible to have a bit wiggle room of sorts and combine books that could be relevant for the students, yet also interesting. Both 12 Years a Slave by Solomon Northup and The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas does talk about social issues and racism, so it could be something a bit engaging comparing and contrasting those two books (at the appropriate age of course).
Even when I majored in English at university, there were books and texts I was not too enthusiastic about (giving a stink eye to The Mill on the Floss by George Elliot). I’ve had some positive reading experiences at school though, such as reading The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien.
What I think part of the problem is that the way required reading is in its current state, it kills the joy of reading for plenty of students and if they could choose a bit more freely what books to read within a certain topic/theme, and with a lot more contemporary titles instead of being force fed a bunch of texts by “dead white dudes” that hold little relevance for them, the students in turn could become a bit more engaged in class too.
I do understand the logistics for the teachers, as they need to create lesson plans and all that, but if it was possible to have a bit wiggle room of sorts and combine books that could be relevant for the students, yet also interesting. Both 12 Years a Slave by Solomon Northup and The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas does talk about social issues and racism, so it could be something a bit engaging comparing and contrasting those two books (at the appropriate age of course).
Even when I majored in English at university, there were books and texts I was not too enthusiastic about (giving a stink eye to The Mill on the Floss by George Elliot). I’ve had some positive reading experiences at school though, such as reading The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien.
What I think part of the problem is that the way required reading is in its current state, it kills the joy of reading for plenty of students and if they could choose a bit more freely what books to read within a certain topic/theme, and with a lot more contemporary titles instead of being force fed a bunch of texts by “dead white dudes” that hold little relevance for them, the students in turn could become a bit more engaged in class too.
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