Today is one of my favorite days in our summer reading program: Barnes and Noble Day! We set aside money each year to take the high school students to Barnes and Noble to buy books. Each student is allowed up to $15 to pick any type of book he or she wants. I encourage my YA lit students to help--letting the class out 1.5 hours early. I provide my students with tape recorders and flip cameras to "record" their conversations with the teens: What book are you looking for? What type of book do you want to buy? Do you have any favorite authors?
The questions start there, but what my students quickly find out is that it can be hard for them to help the high school students find books. One female student stared at the teen section shelves.
"Can I help you find something?" I ask.
"I want a scary book," she replied.
"Okay," I say. "What type of scary would you like? Monster? Vampire? Blood and guts? Teenagers involved?"
NOTHING. Not a sound.
It was clear that she had no idea what type of scary she wanted. I pressed on.
"If it was a movie, what type of scary movie do you think you would want to see?"
Still nothing.
At that point, another student came up and I grabbed a Lois Duncan book and asked her to read the back and let me know if this was the type of scary she was looking for.
This scene was being played over and over throughout the store. I could tell by my students' faces--and the way the high school kids looked lost.
After the bus took the high school students back to campus, my students stayed behind with me, voicing their frustration over not being able to help the kids (six of us tried to help one student--he ended up getting a nice sketch book instead of a book to read).
Gretchen Dougherty** writes, "One thing that I have taken for granted as a lifelong reader is how I choose books that are right for me and that I know I will enjoy. I noticed that this skill does not come naturally for many of my unmotivated and uncommitted readers. Non-readers are unfamiliar with different authors and genres, and they don’t know how to use the book itself to determine whether or not they might enjoy reading it. These students also have unformed ideas about the types of books that might interest them."
For students to know what they want or like to read, they need exposure to and many opportunities to read for pleausre--without the penalty of lost points for AR. Without a 10 question quiz. Without the mandatory book report. This problem is compounded for our students who are reading several grades below level. They don't like to let others see them reading "baby books." So, they often don't read, not realizing the consequences that lie ahead.
I hope that the experience today stays with my students as they enter their methods block this fall and student teaching in the spring--and their own classrooms down the road.
**http://www.otterbein.edu/education/JTIR/volumeII/dougherty.pdf
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