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[Innisfree]

Nm

Edited May 15, 2019 by Innisfree

[Innisfree]

Bump

[Critterfixer]

It's hard to stay with a theme you don't like or are unfamiliar with for an entire novel. Could you start with classic short stories? That's what I'm planning to do. I would also recommend tough themes be handled together and with discussion. The discussion can center around the theme, but sometimes it is helpful to back off and consider it with some analysis. I enjoy taking a character and discussing what makes that character a good one for the theme discussed. If Beth had to die, what made her character so expendable? What lesson does the main character take from that death? Could it have been taught in any other way? Once you take it to the level of character and plot, some of the visceral reaction is tempered by understanding. It helps.

 

 

 

[Innisfree]

This is helpful, thanks. I'm thinking this over.

[HomeAgain]

Moving Beyond The Page has a great lit guide for the Giver....although I would be very inclined to make sure I had the Messenger on hand for her to read after she finished since the ending leads people to assume one of two options.

Do you have Deconstructing Penguins?  There are several book recs in there that slowly introduce harder topics, but teach how to think about them and break down the themes.

[Kfamily]

We usually divide our literature book into categories.

 

Category 1=books that I deem important enough that we read them together

Category 2=books that I would like her to read but know that she enjoys and will read happily on her own and/or something that she won't mind reading and I don't mind if we don't dig deeply into it

Category 3= books that are entirely of her own choice and that I don't require any output at all from

 

Category 1 books are the books that we use for a deeper study. These are the books that we read together (as in she generally reads aloud to me) and we then discuss together. We tie writing assignments and narrations with these books.

 

Category 2 books are books that would be nice if she read but that I know in the greater scheme of things are not going to be detrimental to her if they are not-historical fiction and other well-loved books are in this category. I only require oral narrations for these books, but with the once a week rotating written narration. So, I just ask her to pick one each week for a written narration and the rest are orally narrated for that week. Sometimes I create Book Notes and/or lessons for these books and sometimes I do not. If I do, I give her a lot of freedom to choose what she would like to narrate and am flexible enough to adapt as well.  Some Category 1 books end up here-when life gets too busy, years go by and some books start to slip through the cracks LOL!-and when they do I have the comfort of knowing that they did get some attention 

 

Category 3 books are just books that she picks out. I don't do anything more than keep track of them on a list. If she tells me about it, then I listen enthusiastically.

 

Category 1 books are where we introduce/accomplish our studies. I agree with Critterfixer, sometimes it's better to create your own teaching notes about the books, read it together and just talk about it. This way the burden of background is on you the teacher and not her the student. I introduce some very basic literary terms and story elements and throw in a few thoughtful questions and would consider this a good start. I like to pay attention to my student to test out the waters. If she seems frustrated, overwhelmed,  or has the ok-mom-I've-had enough-of-this-look on her face, then I know that it's time to wrap this conversation up and save it for another time. I also like to throw a thoughtful question to her, let us discuss it only a little bit and then send her off to write about it. The discussion gets her thoughts flowing and the move to writing allows her to be alone with her own thoughts and put them down on paper.

 

My daughters write their narrations in notebooks. I read their narrations and then write comments. I combine comments of gentle critique...such as spelling, punctuation, lack of clarity, etc.-all of this based on abilities/age-with comments of interest, delight and excitement. I might ask a question such as "I wonder why this character is behaving this way?" or "Your description of the house was so well-done. I could really see it." or "I like your choice of words in this sentence." My younger daughter eagerly awaits my reading of her narration notebooks, so that she can read my comments. :)

 

I think that your ideas of starting with books in which she's interested is a great idea. Rosemary Sutcliff and Robin McKinley wrote some great books which retell myths and fairy tales. These might be a good starting place for comparison too. One of my older daughter's favorite books is titled A String in the Harp by Nancy Bond. This story is based on Welsh mythology.

 

[8filltheheart]

I have had to wait on some topics b/c my kids weren't ready for them. I tried to plan a fairy tale study with my dd in 8th grade. Shortly after I started, I abandoned the project b/c she was not ready for the themes. We are doing it this yr, 11th grade. To quote one of the sources I am using, " [fairy tales] had their origins in a culture of adult storytelling: 'They were the television and the p*rn*gr*aphy of their day..." When you read the non-Disney versions of fairytales, there are serious adult themes going on.

 

I have had kids not ready for books like Tale of Two Cities, 1984, Brave New World, etc. It is just simply OK to wait until they are ready.

[Innisfree]

Nm

Edited May 15, 2019 by Innisfree

[Innisfree]

Nm

Edited May 15, 2019 by Innisfree

[Farrar]

I think it's totally okay to wait and you absolutely have to know your kid and know what they can handle. But... and I'm sure I'll take some flack for this... I also see people on this board and others saying that their high school aged kids aren't ready to read about racism or death or the Holocaust or anything with s*xual themes and I have to admit that it makes me a little dismayed. For a neurotypical kid, I think those are all things they should read about, in part because those are important things to be thinking about and know about and in part because if you eliminate those themes, you've eliminated a ton of great literature.

 

I think the way you do it is by never shying away from it so that you use age appropriate books at every level. For example, an upper elementary schooler can read Number the Stars, a middle schooler can read Diary of Anne Frank, a high schooler can be ready to watch Schindler's List. Or, another thread, a young child can read picture books like Freedom Summer by Deborah Wiles or The Story of Ruby Bridges, an older elementary schooler can read One Crazy Summer or The Watsons Go to Birmingham, and before the end of high school, kids are prepared to read Invisible Man or Beloved. We can see it with mythology... when they're kids, they read the D'Aulaires and get into the stories with Percy Jackson, a little later, they can read classic retellings like Black Ships Before Troy, and then in high school they can be ready for reading translations of the real epics and ready for thinking about the deeper themes. So, basically, you do it by always doing it, just always at an appropriate level for where a child is.

[8filltheheart]

I agree Farrar that these topics need to be discussed. For some kids, middle school is an ok time. For others, high school is more appropriate. There is a huge difference between a 13/14 yr old and 15/16 yr old., at least in my own children. Most older high school students should be able to handle difficult topics.

 

Fwiw, here is an article discussing some of these issues: http://harvardmagazine.com/2007/11/the-horror-and-the-beaut.html

[Farrar]

I agree Farrar that these topics need to be discussed. For some kids, middle school is an ok time. For others, high school is more appropriate. There is a huge difference between a 13/14 yr old and 15/16 yr old., at least in my own children. Most older high school students should be able to handle difficult topics.

 

Fwiw, here is an article discussing some of these issues: http://harvardmagazine.com/2007/11/the-horror-and-the-beaut.html

 

Oh, that's a great article. Thank you for linking it. I had a course called Psychology and Literature in high school - the first half was all Hawthorne and Poe and so forth, but the second half was a lot of fairy tales and we read Bettelheim and other fairy tale theorists. It was great stuff. That reminded me of many of the resources we read back then.

 

I agree that there's a big difference there between that cusp of high school and high school age group at least for some kids. I would definitely bow to the idea that the OP's dd might not be ready for some of the resources and lines of discussion that she proposed. But I guess that's the thing... I think there are resources for both. Like, with the fairy tales, Adam Gidwitz's Grimm series is one of the darkest things I've read in middle grades literature - but it's firmly middle grades literature and seems to me that it's something that would help introduce some of the darker aspects of fairy tales without being overwhelming.

 

And sometimes it's fine to just wait. But I think it's worth saying, hey, think about how children read things differently, how they process things differently (like that article talks about - that children dive right into this stuff and immerse themselves in the characters and story while adults want to tiptoe around it all sometimes). There's a window there a lot of the time.