*Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links which means I may receive a small commission from any purchases. However, these are all books that my children love and all opinions are my own. *
In my last post, I talked about the three strands of reading: silent reading, reading aloud, and being read aloud to. I shared in that post that the silent reading part is left completely up to my children. One of my favorite reads as a homeschool mom is The Well-Trained Mind by Jessie Wise and Susan Wise Bauer. There is so much in that book that I heartily agree with. Their suggestions for library visits is not one of them. In the book, Jessie Wise says that on library visits, she required her children to "check out the following books: one science book, one history book, one art or music appreciation book, one practical book (a craft, hobby, or 'how-to'), a biography or autobiography, a classical novel (or an adaptation suited to age), an imaginative storybook, a book of poetry." (The Well-Trained Mind p. 6) Even as an adult, this control sounds stifling to me. And who exactly has to hound the kids to actually read this list of books? I certainly don’t want to. And if there’s no guarantee that they are going to read, say, a book on how to knit, why make them check it out? To me, a library is like a carnival. Your library card is like that string of paper tickets, and you can explore and spend them however you like. So take your kids to the library and let them explore! The only limit I put on my kids is playing computer games - I give them like ten or fifteen minutes, then they have to go look at the books. (Of course, ever since Covid, our library has taken out the computers. They have the one with the card catalog, of course, but no computers to play games on.) The Well-Trained Mind also recommends monitoring what your children read. In some ways, I agree with this. We sometimes think as long as they are reading, it doesn’t matter what the content is. Yet we don’t let our kids watch, say, HBO’s Game of Thrones at age ten, so why would we let them read the book? Would you give them pornography as long as it’s in a book and not online? Of course not! I think most parents are on the same page there. However, Wise and Bauer take this one step further. They are also against comic books and series like Sweet Valley Twins. (In the outdated 2nd edition of the book I have, anyway. Newer editions may call out Junie B. Jones books or something, I don’t know.) Wise and Bauer first off claim that comic books don’t qualify as reading because they are too visual. As for popular series, they say they are “fluff” literature with over simplified plots and uninteresting sentences. They call them the reading equivalent of candy. I highly disagree. Let’s first tackle comic books. This genre has come a long way. Many are so complex, they have the much more accurate label of graphic novels. The stories can be very rich, the dialogue intelligent, and the themes surprisingly deep. Yes, many graphic novels and comic books have adult content. They can contain graphic violence, over-sexualized depictions of women, and mature sexual situations. However, this genre has overall gotten a bad rap. Not all of them are risque. Especially these days, there is a wide array of comic book content, even books written for kids, tweens, and teens. My rule of thumb is that if the comic book is in the children’s section of the library, it’s probably okay (not that I don’t still look them over). If it’s in the teen or adult section, proceed with extreme caution. Also, the visual nature of comic books is especially appealing to reluctant readers and students with learning challenges. It isn’t “dumbing things down” to encourage their reading passions. It’s just a different genre. To help you out, here are some great graphic novels and comic books that my kids love:
Now let’s talk about those series like The Babysitters Club and Sweet Valley Twins that we read growing up. My daughter’s favorites would also fall into this category: The Never Girls and Nancy Clancy. Are these the literary equivalent of candy? If we let our kids read these are they never, as Wise and Bauer suggest, going to want to read more challenging books? Well, how about this: I read Sweet Valley Twin books like crazy as a child, and I went on to major in English and become a teacher. It’s just a ridiculous suggestion, in my opinion. Plus, it’s like the old adage: You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink. I could tell my kids they can only check out the classics or Newberry award nominees or something, but I can’t make them read them. The books they read ON THEIR OWN have to be books THEY choose. And if I act like the snooty literary police, the joy of reading will be sucked right out of them.
I’m not saying I don’t sometimes say, “the content of this book is not morally appropriate, I don’t want you to read this.” I absolutely do. But that is VERY different than looking down my nose at them and saying, "that’s not a very challenging piece of literature, so you can't read that." This is what they are choosing to read for fun, for heaven’s sake! Some people look down their literary noses at what I like to read for fun. I like to read clean/Christian romance novels. There, I said it. I read romance novels. *whisper* I write them too. If what I read for pleasure is seen as “fluff” to many, who am I to judge my kids for just wanting to read something fun? So, moms, I set you free. Don’t worry so much. Just foster a love of reading in your kids. It will pay dividends for many years, I have no doubt. I know because it did for me. Here are some of my daughter's favorite "literary candy":
When she was a little younger, she loved this series:
So, go ahead, let them read candy!
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AuthorHi, I'm Melanie! I'm a homeschooling mom of three kids ages 13, 11, and 9. I have a BS in English Secondary Education from Asbury University plus 30 hours of gifted certification course work. I've taught in just about every situation you can imagine. Public school, private, homeschool hybrid, and private tutoring. The most important thing I've learned? One on one, individualized instruction can't be beat. Archives
July 2022
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