Have you hugged your teacher today?

As you may know, I feel strongly about giving ourselves permission to read for pleasure, at what ever age, and whatever books might be the ones that we love. When I was in high school and college, because the only books assigned in English classes were the classics, I came to believe that they were the only books in existence that were good for me, and for many years I ceased to read for pleasure. This was my fault, not my English teachers'. They never told me I shouldn't read anything else (though I did hear one teacher mock the popular novels). However, I've maintained that English teachers are in a very powerful position to encourage teens to be lifelong readers. By recommending and even assigning a variety of literature along with the classics, I believe their students are more likely to fall in love with reading.

An example. I spoke recently with a man who had a very difficult time in high school. His reading skills/interest was low. He struggled in his basic English class. Then the teacher assigned them the book The Princess Bride. He ate it up. He read the classics too, but it was that one book that really stood out. Because it was assigned by his teacher, it was as though he was given official permission to read for pleasure. And as an adult, he still does. His favorite reads now aren't funny or fantastic like The Princess Bride--he prefers poetry and literary short stories. But that act by that teacher allowed him to keep reading after high school until he found the kind of literature that he loved.

My point, dear reader--even one silly book, one fun book, one different book among the Hemingways and Steinbecks and Melvilles, made a huge difference for this reader. So many teachers are already doing this. Thank you. Some aren't, and it's to these teachers that I appeal.

Because this is an issue I feel so passionately about, I speak about it with strong words and have unfortunately led some people to believe two erroneous things about me: that I hate all classics and that I blame the English teachers. This is not true! Again, I do NOT think the classics are bad and should be banned. Far from. I only think that there should be some variety in the curriculm, even just one assigned book with some humor or adventure or with a protagonist that a teen can relate to, written in the vernacular. And I most certainly do NOT think that English teachers are bad or are to blame for the problems. My goodness no. I've been pretty heartbroken that my words made anyone think this way. English teachers have a tough, nigh impossible job of monumental importance and the last thing they need is to some writer making them feel underappreciated.

So let's do something positive, shall we? Let's spend some time this week thanking our English teachers or librarians or people who have sparked in us a love of reading. Write that former teacher a letter. Go thank that current teacher for all she/he does. Share a story here of a particularly powerful teacher. I'll start.

For 9th and 11th grade English, I had two of the greatest teachers of all time. We all knew that they truly cared about us and wanted to instill in us a love of words and the ability to think. My 9th grade teacher asked us to find vocabulary words from the books we read that we didn't understand. She posted them around the room and we learned those new words all year. I still remember them. Both teachers were so patient with me and allowed me to fulfill assignments in a creative (and perhaps ridiculous) way. I remember doing a presentation on Edgar Allen Poe as if it were a funeral, with lights out and candles lit. I remember doing a reading of a poem with drums and mock-interpretive dance. They not only put up with me but encouraged me to be creative. They not only helped me survive high school, but they gave me a class that I loved. I owe them much credit for anything that I've accomplished since. Thank you Ms. Fowler and Ms. Romney!

Comments

[Rika]

That was how I used to be. I really hated reading for the longest time until I discovered that actual, well-written books were out there. ^_^ Memoirs of a Geishia was the "Turning-point-book" and it was my favorite book for the longest time until I discovered I like old-fashion stories and fantasy (yes i know that Geishas were real).
English teachers are helpful-My teacher reccomended the book to me. Thank you Mrs. Troth!

[Emily]

My school has Sustained Silent Reading, or SSR. We have to read for a certain number of open periods, and we can read any book that we want as long as it wasn't assigned by a teacher. I've gotten a few of my friends into Shannon's books by borrowing them SSR books. It's a good way to get the whole school to read more.

[Anon]

You didn't do Shakespeare until high school? What is the academic world coming to? In my day, we read Shakespeare at the age of eleven. Professors can be wonderful people, yet can also be rotten, totalitarian jerks. Even within the same subject. It all depends on who you are and how hard you are willing to work.

[Mollie]

Thank you Mrs. Hunt, though you where *obsessed* with teddy-bears, your utter passion for reading and writing flickered on the little light in me that now burns like a bonfire.

[Q]

Anon--I read "A Comedy of Errors" in 7th grade, my first real exposure to Shakespeare. I am glad I did not start earlier or the language probably would have turned me off of Shakespeare forever, and I am an advanced reader. I read it in a GT (Gifted and Talented) English class, and I don't think many other kids at my school would have been ready at that time to tackle Shakespeare. So yes, this generation is coming to something awful.

[Anne]

Anon & O: classrooms today are very diverse. i don't think the ELLs (English Language Learners) would appreciate Shakespeare. i know some teacher who do recommend shakespeare to students who can tackle it. but to make the class read shakespeare would just result to frustration and as O said, an aversion to reading.

[Q]

Anne--The ELL students are not the only people who would not appreciate it--even some native English speakers would not understand it. Some of them still did not comprehend it in 9th grade when we read "Romeo and Juliet."

PS My name is Q :P

[Gretchen]

This goes out to all of my wonderful teachers, especially the English Teachers!

To Mrs. T in 6th Grade: Thank you for teaching me how to manage my time and putting up with my bizarre spelling bee suggestions.

To Ms. T in 7th Grade: Thank you for fostering a love of all kinds of books and for the poster of The Beatles you had above your door.

To Ms. B in 8th grade: Thank you for making us do hours upon hours of grammar worksheets-really. Also, thanks for letting me do my year-long research project on the best topic of all--chocolate! Those trips we took to the downtown library with Dunkin' Donut stops and pizza breaks were awesome.

To Mrs. A in 9th Grade: You made my transition to moving to Utah so much easier.

To Ms. C in 10th Grade: You had some great projects. I'll never forget creating "Who wants to reach Nirvana?" with my best friend in connection with Siddartha.

To Ms. C in 11th Grade (different Ms. C): Thank you for appreciating my writing and for the quote board you had in your class. You always made me laugh.

To Ms. B in 12 Grade: Without you, I would not have passed the AP test. You were amazing, plan and simple. Plus, I might not ever have tried haggis were it not for you. :P

To My Eng 311 Teacher: Thanks for lots of things, but most of all, thanks for the coolest writing group of all time and thanks for letting us call you "Buster."

Whew! That's it.

[Anne]

Q - sorry Q for calling you O ;)
but what you said is oh-so-true. times really are changing. nowadays, there are so many distractions that reading is usually at the bottom of the "fun things to do" list. that's why i like reading the posts here. it gives me encouragement and hope. Kids (and the young at heart) reading for fun is just AWESOME!!!

[Q]

Anne--I can see where you'd make that mistake. The tail is hard to see. :P

Reading is about half of my life. I only wish I had more to read, because I can't seem to find anything. There are too many choices! :P

[Anon]

Anne-I, too, was thinking more of regular English class, or as you might refer to it, Language Arts class. Not ELL. ELL students are delightful and enjoyable to teach, although occasionally frustrating, as are all students at some times.

[Tink]

Anon--

I never said I didn't read Shakespeare until high school. My sisters and I, instead of watching "My Little Pony" played "MacBeth" in our backyard. I just didn't fall in love with Shakespeare-the-man until high school.

My mother exposed us to Shakespeare before we could even read. I read all of his works by the age of 10. I can recite all of Titania's lines in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and have been able to since I was 6.

And not all professors are jerks. That's like saying all blondes are stupid. And we're not.

[Anon]

Tink-You forgot to mention that in your semi-CV thing you wrote. You did not mention any reading of Shakespeare before high school. I also actually SAID that professors can be WONDERFUL PEOPLE, but can ALSO be rottten totalitarian jerks. Not just unpleasant. I have had both in times past.

[Lindsey]

I thank my mom! (I am homeschooled.) She lets me read so much. And she made me read those occasional classics. (It's not that I don't like classics, I just love YA stuff so much.)
Go, Tink. Blonds are NOT stupid. Finally, someone stands up for me. Well, for blonds, anyway.

[duchessaofrandomness]

OH! I would love to huggle a teacher, but some of my teachers are kind of, well, mean and strict, and I would hate to imagine what they would do if I tried to hug them!

[Susan]

This comment is a bit late coming to the web site but...There is so much good reading out there. I totally agree with the theory of shaking up the HS curriculum a bit. I have two "for instances" on this-
1. My parents were the anti-reading parents. They just plain hate books and so reading wasn't a big part of my childhood. It wasn't until late high school that I became interested in reading and it was due to a teacher that took complete interest in his class and assigned/explained how cool Shakespeare could be. I'll also mention here the various interpretations of Shakespeare - plays, books, movies - that help relate to our generation NOW. Perhaps present these first, spark the interest, and then work backwards into the classics from there.

2. Back to the parents hating books again- The danger of this situation was that if I had never caught a spark I would never have realized how awesome reading is. There needs to be a spark. We all have the opportunity to go to school - however, not all our parents like to read or encourage reading.

Yea rah rah sparky-teachers!

[ginifur]

I so agree that a desire to read is important in the continued literacy of everyone! I have always been fortunate in the desire to read for pleasure, and it's true you will rarely see me without a book... But I wish we had more interisting books in class! I admit, when we were assigned to read Animal Farm by George Orwell, I thought it was an amazing book and I loved it. But reading other books assigned by the school have become a chore for me-I go in with a negative attitude reading them, because I have created a stereotype for books assigned by school-bad and boring, that I am asked to look too far into, way past my comfort zone of analyzing a book. I don't want to write a paragraph on the significance of a white tablecloth being mentioned, or the significance of a comma placed in a certain point and what effect it has on the rest of the novel! There's so many kids in my class that don't read, and I understand why!
Personally, the teachers I had through elementary school were the most supportive in getting me to read all the time. My sixth grade teacher, Mrs. Lekas, especially-We only had a couple of assigned books, (The Time Machine, The Oddessy, Castaway, and Catherine Called Birdy) and the rest of our book reports were off a list of newer books-The Princess Bride [William Goldman], The Legend of Lady Ilena [Patricia Malone], and Witch Child [Celia Rees] among them. Those were all some of my favorite books, even to this day-They all inspired me to my current love of historical fiction, fantasy, and my obsessions over the Salem Witch Trials and Pirates.
It's great that one book can inspire years of enjoyment, maybe even leading to finding that one book you will love forever (which for me is Twilight by Stephenie Meyer-I know you've read it) Finding that one book can be so important to the continuance of the love of reading, all teachers should encourage their students to read other books based on their interests outside of reading. If I was a teacher, I'd include at least one novel that has standing in what's going on now, in the lives of teens, that they'd be interested in. I'd tell my students to find out if their favorite movies were inspired by books, and then to read those books. If teachers would just take an interest in their students' interests, school would be so much better!