A love of reading is often completely unassociated with school and English classes. It is such a shame; classics such as Huckleberry Finn, The Great Gatsby, and Catcher in the Rye are merely skimmed, or completely skipped in favor of Sparknotes and Cliff Notes. New “classics” aren’t brought into the classroom. Secondary students in lit classes read only a few books in the course of an entire year. Why is this? Are the teachers driving the fun out of our standard books? Are students not given time to develop critical reading skills which make such books understandable and enjoyable? Are standardized tests helping or hurting the state of our language arts classes?
The last question will be the focus of this blog. While trying to find an answer, I hope to also investigate the other questions. All of this so I can be the best teacher possible and pass on my fierce love of books to my students. Reading should not be a chore, but a welcome treat; students should be given time to read voraciously, constantly developing their reading skills; students should be able to choose books that interest them and share their interests with the class; reading should improve students’ own expression of themselves in their writing – the more exposure to the written word, the better.
To find answers to my questions I have subscribed to the education sections of the New York Times and Washington Post, obvious resources to articles about standardized testing and the language arts. I also have aggregated a Google search for these topics in the news and in blogs.
I am very intrigued by your question and that is actually the direction in which my own blog is moving. I had the experience you wrote about in high school: i love to read, but i often skimmed or selectively read assigned class books. i think thats because i wasn’t entertained or interested by it. I would say that standardized tests absolutely hinder the reading and learning experience for students. If the only goal that is presented to students is to do well on the test then of course they’re not going to be interested. That’s only a temporary goal and there’s no value to answering the test questions right after you graduate. If standardized testing were changed or removed I think the joy of reading would be allowed to come back into classrooms.
Comment by hannah8 — January 17, 2007 @ 6:32 pm
Bethany,
A few quick observations:
1. Missing blogroll. You should have the complete class roster from my blog.
2. Nice title and template.
3. Opening post should explain your purpose/focus and identify the feeds you will subscribe to. To me, your interest in the classics is more appropriate for my literature methods class (311) than this course. You might focus instead on examining writing for standardized tests, which you mention here.
Comment by RR — January 20, 2007 @ 12:19 pm
A radioactive cat has eighteen half-lives — Unknown
Comment by brutish uniform — October 21, 2007 @ 7:32 am
Umm…. you should also look into other method of learning.
for me i walked through all my life thinking i am stupid be bad at reading. than my life changed when i started listening to audio books the words that were normally words became alive and full of wonderful images and i started thinking.
If you really want to become a better teacher. i recommend you read the element by Ken Robison and also look in the books written by Alfie Kohn.
“please Keep in mind reading is not the only way to learn or enjoy great literature.”
Comment by Jason Yan — February 9, 2009 @ 3:35 am
Love the blog!Samhttp://www.zarpie.com/
Comment by Sam — November 20, 2009 @ 12:49 pm