![]() “There’s a whole generation of kids who associate reading with assessment now,” LaGarde said.īy middle school, not only is there even less time for activities such as class read-alouds, but instruction also continues to center heavily on passage analysis, said LaGarde, who taught that age group. But read-alouds are now imperiled by the need to make sure that kids have mastered all the standards that await them in evaluation, an even more daunting task since the start of the pandemic. ![]() Jennifer LaGarde, who has more than 20 years of experience as a public-school teacher and librarian, described how one such practice-the class read-aloud-invariably resulted in kids asking her for comparable titles. Jumping into a paragraph in the middle of a book is about as appealing for most kids as cleaning their room.īut as several educators explained to me, the advent of accountability laws and policies, starting with No Child Left Behind in 2001, and accompanying high-stakes assessments based on standards, be they Common Core or similar state alternatives, has put enormous pressure on instructors to teach to these tests at the expense of best practices. The process of meeting a character and following them through a series of conflicts is the fun part of reading. “Nonliteral language” becomes a whole lot more interesting and comprehensible, especially to an 8-year-old, when they’ve gotten to laugh at Amelia’s antics first. Then, kids read a single paragraph from Amelia Bedelia and answer written questions.įor anyone who knows children, this is the opposite of engaging: The best way to present an abstract idea to kids is by hooking them on a story. But here’s how one educator experienced in writing Common Core–aligned curricula proposes this be taught: First, teachers introduce the concepts of nonliteral and figurative language. ![]() Take this requirement from the third-grade English-language-arts Common Core standard, used widely across the U.S.: “Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, distinguishing literal from nonliteral language.” There is a fun, easy way to introduce this concept: reading Peggy Parish’s classic, Amelia Bedelia, in which the eponymous maid follows commands such as “Draw the drapes when the sun comes in” by drawing a picture of the curtains. This disregard for story starts as early as elementary school. Read: How to show kids the joy of reading But this hyperfocus on analysis comes at a steep price: The love of books and storytelling is being lost. Critical reading is an important skill, especially for a generation bombarded with information, much of it unreliable or deceptive. Now the focus on reading analytically seems to be squashing that organic enjoyment. In New York, where I was in public elementary school in the early ’80s, we did have state assessments that tested reading level and comprehension, but the focus was on reading as many books as possible and engaging emotionally with them as a way to develop the requisite skills. What I remember most about reading in childhood was falling in love with characters and stories I adored Judy Blume’s Margaret and Beverly Cleary’s Ralph S. I recently spoke with educators and librarians about this trend, and they gave many explanations, but one of the most compelling-and depressing-is rooted in how our education system teaches kids to relate to books. A survey just before the pandemic by the National Assessment of Educational Progress showed that the percentages of 9- and 13-year-olds who said they read daily for fun had dropped by double digits since 1984. The ubiquity and allure of screens surely play a large part in this-most American children have smartphones by the age of 11-as does learning loss during the pandemic. But what parents today are picking up on is that a shrinking number of kids are reading widely and voraciously for fun. Not every child is-or was-this kind of reader. By middle school, I was reading voluminous adult fiction like the works of Louisa May Alcott and J. ![]() When I was in elementary school, I gobbled up everything: haunting classics such as The Witch of Blackbird Pond and gimmicky series such as the Choose Your Own Adventure books. ![]() These days, when I explain to a fellow parent that I write novels for children in fifth through eighth grades, I am frequently treated to an apologetic confession: “My child doesn’t read, at least not the way I did.” I know exactly how they feel-my tween and teen don’t read the way I did either. ![]()
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