Classics and the Western Canon discussion

Just following on from a comment in the Bleak House threads.

What do you think of making kids read the classics in High School? Does the school system have it right?

I was conversing with a Russian woman the other day (who was kindly correcting my french) and she told me that she had read both War and Peace and Crime and Punishment at school, and did not like either of them.

My gut reaction is that it would be a rare 16yo that could understand either of those novels. I will throw Dickens and a few other authors into that same mix. In fact, I think it would be a crime to make a person read these novels before they are reader, as you have stolen the virgin reading from them.

I will never forget when I read "Crime and Punishment". It was an amazing experience and the excitement bubbled over so that my "reads-one-book-per-year" husband read it too just so we could talk about it every night. It was amazing.

I do not believe that the average 16yo is going to have that same experience. So is it a good thing or not?

Don't get me wrong, I am absolutely for the reading of classic literature. I do remember reading "Hamlet" in high school and the process of breaking it down to understand it was wonderful, and these types of hard-to-read novels are perfect for that teacher led environment. I would possible argue for those types of novels.. Canterbury Tales, maybe even Beowulf, the type that need a group read. (Maybe Dickens fits in this category).

Conversely, there is a wealth of wonderful fiction for young adults, some of it is less relevant when we read it as adults. "Looking for Alibrandi", "The Catcher in the Rye", etc.

What do you think about it? What mix of books are important? What things do we need to be wary of?

As an ESL teacher, I looked at your question and I thought of something else that should also be considered when reading the classics in high school. The language that is used. If too many unknow words or concepts are used then readers may lose interest, this can happen regardless of age. This can be overcome, I'm thinking of the Folger Shakespeare Library here; where words and phrases are explained using more modern language.

However, once you add in cultural differences then it becomes even more difficult. I read Anna Karenina on my own recently and I know that missed whole chunks of the story that focused on the politics of the age, simply because I didn't understand the culture and history of the country. Perhaps some 'hard' books can be read in high school but maybe they should be more the purview of history classes. Dickens, because of his social commentary makes an excellent example of a book that might have more value for students of history than purely literature students.

But you did a make an excellent point that some books are great classics for teenagers to read. Also, other adult classics are a bit more accessible, perhaps the Brontes or Doyle or, as you said, Beowulf, and could be treated as a means of teaching teenagers how to read classics in addition to everything else that can be learned from them.

With an international audience like this one I'm sure there will be a range of responses to this question. Here in the U.S., especially in Common Core states, the trend is to reduce the amount of fiction taught in the classroom in favor of non-fiction. High school English classes, as everyone remembers, involve a lot more than literature. There's time devoted to teaching writing and increasingly visual literacy is competing for space in the curriculum. So, the time available for literature is already limited.

Additionally, if you take British Lit as an example, you have almost 1200 years of literature to teach. There are also all the different genres that must be taught. It's almost an impossible task. In my experience it's hard to fit more than four novels into a year - two in class and two outside of class. If I was designing a curriculum I would include: Pride and Prejudice, Brave New World, Animal Farm, and The Fellowship of the Ring. I'd probably allow the students to substitute a book of their choice for one of the out of class readings. The things I consider when choosing a book are: length, appropriateness for the classroom, and appeal to both genders.

Having said that, I'm imagining an AP class. It's hard to get more than a few of the regular students to read anything - at least that was my experience with the schools I was familiar with in San Antonio.

I realize I limited my response to novels, but it would take too much time to give a full curriculum. Beowulf, Chaucer, Spenser, Milton, etc. would all be taught through excerpts. The only plays where I taught the entire work were Shakespeare and Wilde. There's just too much literature and not enough time.

I have been trying to gather my thoughts on this topic for an hour now. What can I say? I never would have had any exposure to the classics if it hadn't been for reading them in high school.

My mother is a reader, but she really doesn't enjoy many classics. My father reads noticing print, only audiobooks. He was an English Major in college, but for no other reason than it was the easiest way to declare a major at his college, which favored liberal arts.

It is because we read Shakespeare my freshman year of high school that I have read Austen, Dickens and others over the years. Because of my love of Shakespeare from that most impressionable time, I took Brit Lit in college and discovered Pope, Blake, Shelley and Bronte.

Books that we read in high school I couldn't finish? "Huck Finn," and "Sound and the Fury." I just couldn't get into them. Maybe someday I'll get those read.

Cass wrote: "
What do you think of making kids read the classics in High School? Does the school system have it right?"

There are a lot of factors involved in this question, but I think schools would do students a great service by recognizing that not all students are the same. Some will fall in love with Dickens and Shakespeare in the traditional curriculum. Most won't. The "classics" are not the perfect fit for every student, and to be honest, not every teacher is up to teaching them either. I think it's up to the teacher to know when a student is flailing under the weight of "the classics", and offer an alternative.

I travelled around a lot as a kid and at one point went to four schools in as many years. I was unlucky enough to have to read Romeo and Juliet in three of those years and I can't quite describe the loathing I developed for Shakespeare. I was saved by a teacher who turned me onto Ray Bradbury and Tolkien and Hemingway. I eventually made peace with the Bard, but I'm pretty sure I'll never read R&J ever again.

My exposure to the classics through high school and college curriculum was quite limited and seemingly random. I remember enjoying East of Eden, 1984, but few others. Other assigned readings such as Invisible Man were horribly, horribly boring to my teenage self. Thankfully there were not many novels assigned. Maybe 2 per year.

Now, as an adult, I'm filling in the "gaps" in my free time. I'm very much enjoying myself as I do. :) While in school, I did read a decent number of classics, most memorably Anna Karenina during my freshman year of college, but this was of my own choosing. Perhaps there is just something off-putting about being "forced" to spend hours upon hours reading a book selected by an instructor. My husband, who attended school in a different part of the country, was required to read many of "those boring classics" (his words). These experiences completely turned him off from most all classics. He is an energetic reader but will opt for non-fiction, mostly history. We enjoy reading together but he will not approach the work of Dickens, Eliot, or others where the characters "just talk and talk and nothing happens."

I don't think it's the age; I think, as several people have suggested, it's the student and the teacher.

I have a set of the original McGuffy readers, and the works which elementary school students were expected to read is astonishing. And in English schools, at least according to many of the essays and biographies of the times, children under twelve in the public schools were routinely expected to translate and read Homer, Caesar, Cicero, and the like.

On the other hand, many young people of that age attended only village schools with much more limited curricula and dropped out by that age to go into apprenticeship or work in factories of the new industrial revolution.

In every generation, I think there are students who can handle and benefit from reading the Classics, and others who can't. However, the idea prevalent in my day of tracking students between college bound and non-college bound is no longer in place, and ability tracking is also frowned upon, so either every student or no student in a 9th grade English class must read Silas Marner. Some are ready for it, some not, but a teacher in a class of 33 students can't individualize.

That some students can still handle these works with benefit is, I think, made clear in some of the more challenging private schools, such as the ones I taught in for some years, where students come to the school, and parents send their children to the school, expecting that they will be challenged with serious reading and writing. Those curricula are not (yet?) dumbed down. But the public schools which must educate every student (including those with learning challenges) and mainstream as many as are possible simply can't impose these works on an entire mixed class of abilities.

Perhaps someday elitism will no longer be a dirty word, and it will be acceptable again, as it was in my day, to expect some students to do more challenging work than others, but that day isn't today.

(Some will argue perhaps that this separation is acceptable in that only some students qualify or want to take Advanced Placement courses, and that may once have been the case, but now schools are pressing more and more students into these classes because high school evaluation matrices look at the percentage of students in AP courses as a measure of the quality of the schools. In our local high school, almost every student is expected to take AP classes, though far from all of them get the grades on the AP exams that qualify them for college credit.)

Patrice wrote: "Since we're all equal citizens with equal votes we all need to be educated to be free.
"

We all need to be educated in the principles of democracy, in our history, in how to analyze political speak and decide when politicians are being sensible and honest and when they're being evasive and blowing smoke.

But we don't all need to be able to translate Caesar's commentaries.

Yes, by all means, students should be given the opportunity to enjoy the classics. If they don't enjoy them in high school, at least they'll know what they are and perhaps pick them up again later. As for "Crime and Punishment," I think it is tailor-made for teenagers. I enjoyed it much more at 15 than—um—later.

Besides reading disorders, do we have much understanding of why considerable numbers of people do not like to read? Are students actively taught how to balance their time between reading and other activities, or does that just happen by circumstance and personality?

Here's a book I found helpful: Why Literature?: The Value of Literary Reading and What It Means for Teaching

The author not only provides practical reasons for reading but also identifies some of the biggest obstacles and how to overcome them. Her research suggests that if children do not become interested in reading by eighth grade they probably never will. As far as once avid readers who lose interest in reading are concerned, I imagine they'll return to the joy of the written word eventually. The key is really to get kids interested in reading at early age. The "classics" may not be the best way to do that.

Jeremy wrote: "Here's a book I found helpful: Why Literature?: The Value of Literary Reading and What It Means for Teaching

... Her research suggests that if children do not become interested in reading by eighth grade they probably never will. ..."

Figured there would be knowledge on the subject within this group! Thx, Jeremy.

Jeremy wrote: "The key is really to get kids interested in reading at early age. The "classics" may not be the best way to do that. "

I suggest that properly chosen classics are. What very young child can resist Goodnight Moon? What 12 year old boy doesn't enjoy Kidnapped?

But any reading is the point. If I hadn't devoured Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys, Tom Swift, etc. early on, I might never have discovered the joy of books.

But like almost anything else,it's the parents. Parents who read to their children. Parents who read themselves so that children, who are inveterate copiers, see that reading is an enjoyable activity. But if parents work all day and come home to TV, Internet, etc. and never open a book, how are the children ever to realize that reading is something that is a great way to spend one's time?

I suppose it depends on how classic is defined. When I read The Very Hungry Caterpillar to my daughter (over and over) I guess I'm reading a classic. I was thinking more along the lines of how no one in my ninth grade English class could get much out of the excerpts of The Iliad and Odyssey that we read. Or how none of the 19th century poetry ever made sense (except for Poe). I suppose the instructor plays an important role in helping students understand what they're reading. I knew a woman who taught English at a charter school who had only completed two freshman composition courses and introduction to literature. She knew she was underqualified to teach the subject, but she stayed on waiting for a social studies job to open up. And not to sound like an elitist, but the requirements for public school teachers aren't much more rigorous. I'm sure it varies by state, but I think you only need eighteen credit hours in a subject and to pass a test and you're certified. That breaks down into two composition and four (possibly random) literature classes. Students often come into the classroom unmotivated, but teachers are seldom equipped to engage them in the assigned literature anyway.

Enough ranting though. I agree 100% with what you said about parents. Almost all parents will say that they want their kids to read well, but few will take the time to model the behavior.

Jeremy wrote: "I suppose it depends on how classic is defined. When I read The Very Hungry Caterpillar to my daughter (over and over) I guess I'm reading a classic. "

For that age group, it's definitely a classic. It has stood the test of time, appealing to many generations of children and parents. It's sold very well and consistently -- it's #2 on the School Library Journal's list of top 100 picture books of all time.

For all parents (and grandparents!) who are interested, here's the list:
www.slj.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/0...

Doesn't that illustrate my suggestion. That certain classics are age-appropriate and for certain stages in life. As an adult I can certainly appreciate the story, but its true audience is the child.

Further, reading some children's books as a parent my eyes are much wider open to how they impact my child, then when I was not a parent.

Cass wrote: "Further, reading some children's books as a parent my eyes are much wider open to how they impact my child, then when I was not a parent.
"

Absolutely. Parenthood changes much.

Everyman wrote: "For all parents (and grandparents!) who are interested, here's the list:
http://www.slj.com/wp-content/uploads......"

You have probably just aided my holiday shopping. Thx!

Lily wrote: "Everyman wrote: "For all parents (and grandparents!) who are interested, here's the list:
http://www.slj.com/wp-content/uploads......"

You have probably just aided my holiday shopping. Thx! "

You're very welcome. I applaud any person who gives children* books for any holiday. Or for no reason at all.

*Not just children, of course, but children especially since they can't buy them for themselves.

Cass wrote: "Just following on from a comment in the Bleak House threads.

What do you think of making kids read the classics in High School? Does the school system have it right?

I was conversing with a Russi..."

Sure. Even if they don't 'get it' the first time around, as with reading the Bible, later in life they may have an 'ah ha!" moment when experience shows them how it all suddenly falls into place and they understand what that passage or character was all about. If it is a classic, some of it will stay with you, and if you go back to re-read the book at various stages of life you will learn something new from it.

Making teenagers read books they don't get is a recipe for failure. If you're going to assign great literature then at least pick books they might like. Then your own enthusiasm and your belief in their intelligence as readers will carry through for some. It's amazing what kids (=people) will do if they believe it's worthwhile and that other people care -- about it, about them.

If you think great literature should be taught in school then good luck. The students are not the people you have to convince.

I wasn't much of a reader until the summer before 9th grade. We had to read several classics in middle school that I hated on principle (To Kill a Mockingbird, Huck Finn, The Giver, etc) that if I reread today I would probably love. I found out over the summer before 9th grade that not all books were awful and promptly devoured everything in sight. In high school I found I liked the selections and would even request the review questions early because I'd read ahead.

I will never forget that the classics I read in middle school almost made me hate reading forever.

Patrice wrote: "Maybe there should be more choice involved. I think there is a natural rebelliousness at that age. I know I felt that way. You don't like being told what to do or what to like. I wonder if, giv..."

I'm not even sure that would have worked. I was a sullen, contrary little so-and-so.

Patrice wrote: "Maybe there should be more choice involved."

Some of our teachers charged us with reading a certain number of prescribed books plus one "reader's choice". Invariably the students tended to choose the shortest one they could get away with.

As I recall, time and priorities were different at that age.

Patrice wrote: " But the pity is how badly great books are taught..."

I had lunch with a friend yesterday. Her youngest has started high school. My friend said her daughter complains about the reading... said she loses points if she doesn't has an abundance of sticky notes in the book to show that she has many questions about the reading.

My friend said she went to the parent-teacher conference and told the teacher: "You are sucking all the joy out of reading."

Adelle wrote: "My friend said she went to the parent-teacher conference and told the teacher: "You are sucking all the joy out of reading."

My mother would have sat down with me and found a way of supporting the teacher. But then, she had been a teacher herself.

A viewpoint on Shakespeare in high schools:

"Stepping out of the high-school office, we stood on the freshly laid linoleum in a common area. The tiles, picked by Moskowitz, have a grassy motif. In her eyes, the painted lawn hints at a college quad. There, as she envisions it, her students will soon be lingering to chat about 'Hamlet' and 'King Lear.'"

"...But other elements are more idiosyncratic — and more crucial. There’s her fierce engagement with literature, starting with picture books in her kindergarten curriculum. She told me she was determined to avoid the torpid sentences that flood the children’s-book market ('Scholastic should be shut down!' is her position on the publishing giant)..."

"...the training sessions I sat in on this summer were less about teaching teachers to teach than about teaching them to think. I watched Jessica Sie, the associate director of literacy, lead an auditorium full of elementary- and middle-school faculty members in a discussion of the nuances in a short essay from The New Yorker. They wouldn’t be using the essay with their students. But Moskowitz wants her faculty to know how to read in the deepest way, so they can model this for their pupils right from the youngest grades, when everyone is discussing 'The Tortoise and the Hare.'

"During another training session, a principal, Abigail Johnson, coaxed new faculty members through a conversation about a Christina Rossetti poem. She later told me about her dread, a few years back, when Moskowitz subjected her and other school leaders to a written exercise on literary passages. After they turned in their assignments, Moskowitz led them in a training session. Two former teachers complained to me that Moskowitz was downright imperious. But the stringent instruction fit with one of Moskowitz’s favorite themes: The failure that pervades so much of public education has little to do with the blighted backgrounds of the children and everything to do with the adults who sit at the front of their classrooms...."

I found myself wondering what Dickens would have written if he had been journalist here rather than Daniel Bergner (once a middle school teacher himself according to the ending byline). Have little idea what my position would be if I were one of the key players here, from NYC parent to financier to politician to ... Our own family's was to find a community with strong public schools and to pay the property taxes.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/07/mag...

Most high school English teachers, even if they can read and write well themselves, which isn't always the case, don't know how to pass those skills on to their students. I know that's a sweeping generalization, but I can at least confirm it anecdotally. The education courses I took didn't spend much time on focussing on how to teach a particular subject. Instead the classes were about managing the classroom, types of assessments, curriculum, etc.. Theory and practice of teaching composition was an optional course and theory and practice of teaching literature wasn't offered until graduate school. Maybe student teaching is suppose to fill in the gaps in the poor preparation future teachers are receiving. If ridiculous practices such as evaluating a student based on the number of sticky notes he's attached to his book are common, then our teachers need more guidance.

Patrice wrote: "Maybe there should be more choice involved. I think there is a natural rebelliousness at that age. I know I felt that way. You don't like being told what to do or what to like. I wonder if, giv..."

It does help to call them adults (albeit young) rather than kids. As a teacher I find that helps me have a lot more empathy for the requirements placed upon them. How would any adult feel being incarcerated for 6hrs per day, subject to abuse and bullying from teachers (not to mention kids).

I am a high school teacher by trade, and I bristle a little when we forgot that the 14 and 15yo people who attend our classes are also adults, albeit very very young ones. I know I would engage in many rebellious acts if I were placed, at my age, in a similar situation.

I still remember that in the later years of high school I found myself skimming and even failing to read some of the written books. It surprised myself even back then. I knew it was out of character for me, but I knew that I didn't want to read it. In year 12 I didn't even bother to read the Great Gatsby (and I am glad I didn't, because when I read it last year it was amazing - I never would have read it again if I had actually read it in high school). I remember the wonderful teacher set an assignment task of writing his eulogy. He must have thought it was a wonderfully creative task. But I recall just writing rubbish as I hadn't read the book.

Not rebellious, I just wasn't interested (despite 6months earlier having read Hamlet in absolute adoration).

Patrice wrote: "I'm remembering... High School students have so much work! When we read a book wee can take our time and enjoy it. ..."

I went to a college prep high school where they really piled it on. I remember reading Oliver Twist in two days for sophomore English, though I'm sure we had more like two weeks to read it and I put myself in that position by procrastinating. Still, it's true in any challenging academic environment that reading quickly (but well) is encouraged. But it's also true that this does not usually encourage reading for pleasure. It surely did not improve my approach to Dickens.

I'm a student teacher who is getting ready to lead a unit on The Odyssey to what are the lowest level readers and writers at my school. This in itself is a struggle, but to add insult to injury, the textbook the kids are reading from has taken out significant portions that gave color to a frequently dull story (at least for the kids). While I can only speculate and assume the publishers were attempting to make it "school appropriate" by removing Calypso, Circe, and the final battle with the suitors, I feel this will only confuse my students more. Taking out the climax and inserting a note that the suitors and Odysseus fight and then Odysseus wins is about as boring as it comes and is a huge let down to the students who were looking forward to seeing how the final book progresses. It's downright mean. (As a side note, I am trying to find better ways to patch the plot jumps.)

This said, I love the idea of teaching from the originals, as it were. My students don't know plot or conflict yet, and these elements are pretty darn clear in The Odyssey. As we read together in class, I will have to frequently stop and explain things in modern terms, and I will be walking them through this step-by-step, but I think their understanding the story is more than possible. Whether they'll appreciate or enjoy it as much as a seasoned reader is almost a definite negative, but (and I hate to say it) that is not the purpose of this particular reading. As several have mentioned above, I think the choice of the classic is important. The Odyssey is foundational to the rest of Western literature; Anna Karenina is not. Neither will be enjoyed by 14/15 year olds that haven't been reading from a very early age in an environment filled with books, but one gives them a bit more insight into the broader world of literature. If we want them to enjoy the classics, we might move towards things like Anthem, Jane Eyre, or A Midsummer Night's Dream. But even with those stories that students typically like better, after 14/15 years disliking or being unable to read, a lifelong love of reading is not realistically going to happen.

An alternative to the classics is young adult fiction, something many teachers are hesitant to employ.

Hope wrote: "I'm a student teacher who is getting ready to lead a unit on The Odyssey to what are the lowest level readers and writers at my school. This in itself is a struggle, but to add insult to injury, th..."

What a horror. Toss that wretched textbook out the window, close the door, and give them something real to read while no-one's looking. If not Homer, then some appropriate real work, not expurgated rubbish.

Patrice wrote: "Oh gosh! One of the best lessons I ever gave was on the Odyssey to sixth graders, and yes from a textbook. The excerpt on the sirens was easy. I asked them if there was anything in their lives t..."

It certainly one of the very best works of literature. I read the full version translated by Fagles and it certainly renders the ancient Greek marvelous. That being said it honestly is pretty lengthy and would be deemed boring by the majority of my peers. However there are some good abridged versions, I heard the Lombardo one is very good.

Back to the essential question of this topic, what should be read in high school?

As a currently enrolled junior in high school I have a fairly good picture of what "teens" are like these days. For one thing it can be generally stated that females tend to read far more than their male counterparts. That being said very few teens that actually read, challenge themselves with the classics i.e. the large majority sticks with the various YA popular texts e.g. the Fault in Our Stars, Hunger Games, Percy Jackson, Harry Potter and whatnot.
I must be, at any rate, one of the few 15 yr olds that "wastes" his leisure time, (often at night) on James Joyce's Ulysses. Maybe I am insane. Maybe not.

In my schools there are three main class levels: the regular, honors and then the Cambridge classes, where the "smart ones" go (me being one of them).
In my Literature class this year we will read texts that range from Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, Shakespeare's Hamlet and Midsummer's Night Dream and a selection of his sonnets, Me Miserable from Paradise Lost, various romantic poets amongst which Blake, Coleridge, Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats and Tennyson. From the Modern Age the works of Wilfred Owen, Joyce's the Dead, Hemingway's Big Two-Hearted River, then a Passage to India, Miss Lonelyhearts, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf and Half a a Yellow Sun. (I have not included several poets that I didn't even know existed).

But this is from the most advanced class. I know that last year the "regular" classes read Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, Lord of the Flies by Golding and then started but did not finish Things Fall Apart by Acheebe. All of them were considered "boring as hell".

I believe that the real question should be how are this texts taught and examined. If I were to be in those classes I would probably end up hating English class as much as they do. Piles and piles of pointless book work e.g. who is this character? What happened to this other one? etc. Another horrid feature of those English classes is the approach to literature and thus to Art. It seems that there always has to be a right or wrong answer. Even when reading a poem many students ask the teacher what does the poem mean in the same way you would ask your math teacher the answer to an equation. As Hedonistic Wilde once remarked: "The advantage of emotions is that they led us to astray, the advantage of science is that it is not emotional". I say that we have to differentiate the two disciplines and teach them accordingly to themselves.

I remember endless discussion of the books we read. Critical essays were assigned to us, not mere knowledge of the plot. I believe that is the way to go. An appreciation of literature should be transmitted. I do realized that it is a most extraordinary task nowadays where reading is a mere entertainment nothing more than movies, video games or pointless soup operas for that matter. Arguably the most universal statement among adolescents nowadays remains "Reading is boring" emitted with singular bluntness I should add.

The themes of the plot, the story line in itself is deemed of great importance. The barrier imposed by the language are a problem for many. The time when it was written constitutes in itself a problem as well. If you ask me what texts should be read I would hope from modern classics, some texts that are layered, but that results a bit vague. Perhaps something like A Brave New World by Huxley, or something by Kafka. However it is certainly clear that I haven't read enough literature to make this kinds of claims i.e. I myself only have a vague idea of what should be read in high school during these times.

Patrice wrote: "Very impressive! May I ask where you go to school?"
Lee County Florida.

Thanks, Patrice. I needed that encouragement right now. =] And Roger, rumor has it that one of the teachers kept a copy of the old textbook which held onto some of what was taken out. Why the most recent edition felt the need to truncate it so thoroughly is beyond me.

Sebastian, I completely agree that endless comprehension questions get in the way of savoring a truly great piece of literature. I, too, prefer writing critical essays that address the deeper questions and implications present in a text. However, not everyone is like this. The logic behind comprehension questions (even though I don't hold that they are necessarily beneficial) is that they help draw attention to the hard facts of the book. From there, the student would be able to begin to see the more intangible aspects of the work. The moral of The Gift of the Magi is lost if a student doesn't realize that her hair/his watch were their prize possessions.

I'll be honest, It seems unfair to just hand my students a book they cannot read and ask them to write about abstract concepts they will not be able to pick up on, especially when they lack the ability to compose a coherent paragraph, let alone essay. They have never done anything like this before. Most can count on one hand the number of books they've read throughout their lives. I love these kids, and they are bright. As we progress through the Odyssey, I want to build their writing skills so they are able to finally address some of the greater ideas therein. And, optimist that I am, we will do it and we will do it well. I am firmly determined to make this a worthy freshman English class for them. But it will be hard for them, as hard as learning another language. My question is what is to be done for individuals who have virtually no background in reading, who gloss over a text to the point where they don't know what actually happens?

I think a larger question related to the core of this discussion is whether or not everyone needs to be an avid reader. Is there a point where it is "too late?" I believe that reading is freedom. The sad thing is I have found few people want that. Is it our job as readers and English teachers to try and force that once they become young adults? How much responsibility is their own? (these are the questions that keep me awake at night...)

And Sebastian, your curriculum sounds lovely! I haven't seen anything like that around these parts. You're in for a great year. =]

Sebastian wrote: "Arguably the most universal statement among adolescents nowadays remains "Reading is boring" emitted with singular bluntness I should add."

Second only to "I hate maths".

Both of which, I believe, are learned statements because ironically school is not an environment conducive to learning, instead it breeds a hatred of anything that seems too hard.

The same children who stare at a question like "118x3" with hatred, could tell you how much it would cost to buy 3 iceblocks at $1.18 each (but only if that question where asked in a canteen line, if it was in written form on a test paper it would elicit an even greater revulsion).

School has, in the past, had as much to do with indoctrinating young people than it did or does have to do with educating them. I can remember being 16 and though I was capable, I didn't find my schoolwork challenging enough to bother with it very often. I remember one time I set my mind to giving a critical and well thought out answer to an essay question and the instructor later accused my of plagiarizing because he thought the answer was "too mature" to have been written in my own words! I didn't know whether to be offended or flattered. Anyway, l learned that combining critical thinking with vocabulary words wasn't necessarily going to win any points unless I buckled down and proved I was a hard working student.

Sebastian wrote: "Patrice wrote: "Oh gosh! One of the best lessons I ever gave was on the Odyssey to sixth graders, and yes from a textbook. The excerpt on the sirens was easy. I asked them if there was anything ..."

Thanks for your input Sebastian. I enjoyed reading that.

Thomas wrote: Still, it's true in any challenging academic environment that reading quickly (but well) is encouraged. But it's also true that this does not usually encourage reading for pleasure. It surely did not improve my approach to Dickens. "

Excellent point. And to add to it, when we read for a class we are worrying more about what the teacher wants us to know for the test or write for an essay than we are with simply enjoying the book.

Hope wrote: " (As a side note, I am trying to find better ways to patch the plot jumps.)"

You can always send them to Gutenberg or Perseus to read those passages that the bowdlerizers left out. For free!

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/searc...
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/s...

Theresa wrote: "School has, in the past, had as much to do with indoctrinating young people than it did or does have to do with educating them. "

And today, it's almost entirely centered on job training. More immediately, on passing standardized tests, but those tests are centered around what employers demand that they know. If something won't help them get or keep or succeed in a job, it has no place in school. Art, music, ancient history? Useless. Waste of time that is needed to cram for the standardized tests. Toss them.

Everyman wrote: " Art, music, ancient history? Useless. Waste of time that is needed to cram for the standardized tests. Toss them. "

Straight to the point. Here in Florida is all about passing the FCAT and all about passing EOC's and Benchmarks, it seems like logos is being completely annihilated. All it matters is passing those logic.less assessments in a robot-like manner.

Well I can say from my experience, that my parents weren't much of an influence as far as my love of reading, but my teachers and friends were. I started out loving goosebump books then fantasy and science fiction, by the time I got to Jr. High I deffinitly didn't like doing book reports but I loved reading anything and getting into the stories. We even had a teacher let us listen to some ray bradbery tapes that were awesome! In high school I never did really well in my english classes, laragely because of my spelling IMO (and as you can see from this post :-), but I enjoyed the classics and it all reached it's peak with my AP english class my senior year. I had an awesome teacher who had a real love for learning and a love for us and for the classics. I didn't pass that test, but it was the best class I ever took. He instilled in me a desire to take on hard literature as a challenge to help me improve myself, and not a pain in the neck to steer clear of. It made enough of an impression on me that 10 years later after finishing college and staring to raise a young family I wanted to have those books apart of my life again and decided to crack them open again and set some lifelong reading goals and join awesome goodreads groups like this one! :-)

Jeremy C. wrote: " It made enough of an impression on me that 10 years later after finishing college and staring to raise a young family I wanted to have those books apart of my life again and decided to crack them open again and set some lifelong reading goals and join awesome goodreads groups like this one! :-) ."

In the end, these books really are more for adult readers than adolescents. Most adolescents simply don't have enough life experiences to understated the nuances of the books.

I went to law school in my 40s, and was amazed in many of my classes how little real world knowledge these very bright and very motivated post-graduate students were. In our contracts class, for example, many of them had never negotiated a contract for anything, and had no idea how the process really worked. In Family Law, those who weren't married and weren't parents could only approach the subject theoretically, and had very little visceral knowledge to go on. They had the theory down pat, but how it actually worked in the world was something else.

I think the classics are the same way. High schoolers can read them and understand most of the idea intellectually, but it isn't until they've engaged in some real world experiences that they can read them on a deeper level.

Everyman wrote: "I think the classics are the same way. High schoolers can read them and understand most of the idea intellectually, but it isn't until they've engaged in some real world experiences that they can read them on a deeper level. "

Well put.

Everyman wrote:

You can always send them to Gutenberg or Perseus to read those passages that the bowdlerizers left out. F..."

Thanks for the links! I'm sure those will be helpful for more than just this. =]

Everyman wrote: "I think the classics are the same way. High schoolers can read them and understand most of the idea intellectually, but it isn't until they've engaged in some real world experiences that they can read them on a deeper level."

Excellent point! For us teachers, the idea is to find books that can parallel experiences our teens may have. A lot of them have a shocking amount of "life experience," even though they definitely process it at a younger level. As we move closer to the actual reading of The Odyssey, I get more and more excited. Quite a few of my kids are looking forward to the mythology aspect just because it's fun. Others, however, will definitely relate to the military family dynamics or the difficult suitors (i.e. boyfriend) messing with their mom. The more I think about it, the more I believe The Odyssey is the perfect book for them right now. No, they won't get everything, but books were made to be reread. ;)

What other classics do you guys think might do a good job relating to a younger crowd?

Hope wrote: "What other classics do you guys think might do a good job relating to a younger crowd? "

If it's sensitively handled, Tess of the Durbervilles might be an interesting one to read. The problem of life with a drunkard father, the innocent young girl seduced (or raped, depending on your reading of the text, but I think seduced is more accurate) by the insistent pursuer, the pains of single motherhood, the love which both think will last forever but doesn't survive the first crisis, all those factors are highly relevant to the young.

It's not an easy book, and some parents may object to it, but it certainly contains a lot of material that any kids who have reached puberty can relate to.

Can I ask a further question then (or perhaps this is one for another thread).

Would you object to a book being read by your child?

Everyman wrote: "Hope wrote: "What other classics do you guys think might do a good job relating to a younger crowd? "

If it's sensitively handled, Tess of the Durbervilles might be an interesting one to read. Th..."

When I was in high school the AP classes read Tess. I didn't read it until my capstone class as an undergrad. I read it twice so I could write my major paper on it (the tension between the pagan and Christian symbols in the novel). I know some like Everyman contend Tess was seduced, but I would argue strongly that she was raped. Because of that part and some other content I wouldn't introduce this book before junior year. Ultimately though I'm with Patrice - I don't want my daughters to be required to read this in high school.