Banned Book Week--Be seen with a book in public!

 

Sunday starts the annual "Banned Book Week" (ala.org).

In the current political and social dumpster fire that we find ourselves, it is all the more critical that we--and our young people-- read widely and deeply. They can't challenge the status quo if they don't have the knowledge and skills to do so--and stagnation will finish off what's left of our democracy, if we don't step up our game. 

How to celebrate reading? Read! Read to little ones, read to your partner, read to your neighbor, volunteer to read at a nursing home or hospital. 

Donate books-- new ones, some you've weeded out of your own pile, visit yard sales and buy books to give away on Halloween!

Support teachers, representatives who are interested in literacy, young families who don't have a lot of money to buy books. 

It would be super fun to have a read-in somewhere in a public place--maybe the park? The playground? The steps to your local places of worship? Your representative's office? Hmm.

I don't mean to start trouble, but maybe I do. Just a little. Kids don't read enough physical books. Computer reading is not the same, and it's no wonder so many of our students hate reading-- they either have boring (safe?) books foisted upon them, or they have to read on screens, or they have had to listen to audio books while following along when the teacher has given up on helping them explore a text. 

And yes, my students hated that when it happened to them in the past. And while we are on the subject of what kids dislike a lot about reading for school: reading logs. They only teach kids to cheat. What can we do better? Response journals! My students don't mind those at all--they get to talk back to the text. Yell at a stupid decision a character made. Write down a cool quote. Question the text about what is going on. Jot down unfamiliar words you want to look up or talk about. And, for the older kids, this is annotation at its most useful, and can be used to write authentic analyses. (ooo...pedagogy snuck in there)-- and yes, I still annotate books I'm reading. Because I own the books, I write in the margins. I often have a lot to say to the characters. (No surprise there.)

Read, dammit. Be seen with a book in public places. Model what adults do for those who are still searching for an identity. Keep a book in the car to read while you are waiting --sure beats doom-scrolling social media. =) 

Have a good day,

C