Who decides what kids should read?

[SFG75]

A great article from MSNBC. Author writes a book for the young adolescent, which addresses relational issues with parents, self-esteem, and the anxiety one feels in general at that age. Countless letters pour in to the author regarding how the book helped them come to terms with who they were and what an inspiration her work was. Book gets banned in a large district.

This is not your usual story about a rural school official pulling “The Catcher in the Rye” because kids shouldn’t read such trash.

Carroll County lies in an urban corridor about halfway between Washington and Baltimore, and its schools are rated among the best in Maryland. Ecker, a former two-term county executive in neighboring Howard County, has a doctorate in education administration and has served on numerous state and regional commissions in more than 40 years as an educator.

He is quick to praise a worthy book when he finds one, and he thinks teenagers can learn a lot from “The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things.”

But it “also had some foul language in it and some sexual things in it that I thought was unfortunate,” he said in an interview. “I didn't think it added to the message. I thought it took away from it.” So he overturned a committee that voted to keep the book after a parent challenged its language and sexual themes.

The book is remarkable for its realism, which Mackler, 32, who lives in New York, said is something she can’t compromise on, because the only way to reach adolescent readers is to speak to them in their own language.

oooooooooooh my.

 

[abecedarian]

Great article! I'm sorry the book has been banned, but perhaps the very act of banning it, and the hoopla raised, will help the book get read by more kids AND their parents. I've always said we parents need to be aware of what our kids are reading. It isn't always possible, as the article points out, but we still need to make the effort. It doesn't make sense to ban a book outright. I think the better approach is for parents to read it so they can discuss the issues rationally with their kids. We say we want our kids to respect us and our values, but we need to respect the shift in reasoning ability of our kids as they grow up. One way to do this is to encourage them to read widely, and treat them like peers when they do read. We say we want them to grow up, but when they try, we slap their hands and try to get them interested in kiddy books again. Life is a hard, and if a book with difficult themes helps my kid through a rough patch, I want to read it with him or her. It is insulting for me to say, "reading makes be feel less alone" and hold my teens to a different standard.

 

[Billy]

Very good point abecedarian. Having double standards doesn't make our kids have more respect for us, but less.

I don't like it when I see that books are banned. As a parent, I feel that it is my job and my job alone, to decide what my kids can and can't read and I don't appreciate someone else feeling that they can take that away from me.

Kids hear foul language and talk about sex everyday at school. It is their reality and pretending it's not is just foolish.