2002-02-06
Reading Again, posted at 7:13 a.m.
Epiphany in Baltimore has moved to epiphanyinbaltimore.blogspot.com Well, I came in early today for the first time in the new semester and, of course, my workout partners have not come in today. This gives me a chance to do some of the shit I need to get done before first period, but I'm not taking advantage of it at the moment.What is the shit I need to do? First of all, today is the first day of my "Silent Reading Wednesdays." Every Wednesday this semester, I will devote 30 minutes of my 90-minute class period for students to do independent Silent Sustained Reading from a book of their choice. The only stipulation this month is the book must be at least 100 pages. (Next month, the stipulation may be that it be a biography, but I haven't decided yet.)
This is what I wrote about this aspect of my course in my nine-page syllabus: "Every Wednesday, students will engage in thirty minutes of silent reading
from a non-school book of the students� choice. Rules:
1) It must be a book, not a magazine or newspaper.
2) Students must come to class prepared every Wednesday with their book.
3) No bathroom passes will be approved during this portion of the class.
I am using the silent reading aspect of the course for a number of reasons.
First of all, I believe it helps prepare students for all the silent reading they will have to do in testing situations. Secondly, I have concerns that English courses have a way of eliminating the joy of reading for some students. While it is important to become critical readers and to communicate analytically with novels, I also believe it�s important that students retain the love of reading a book for sheer thrill of it. The assignments we will have based on this aspect of the course will not be like the theme and characterization assignments we have for the assigned readings; rather, they will be book talks, journals, and speeches.
I expect students to complete one book per month, and to complete a reading journal at the end of every silent reading exercise. While this is in addition to the reading that will be occurring in class, it should not be a burden, with the time I will provide in class. I�m also hoping students will choose books that they enjoy, and thus they will prioritize reading it outside of class. The first book (for February) must be any book of at least 100 pages. Books for the months of March, April, May, and June will have different themes or focuses � we will vote on them as classes. The first silent reading Wednesday will be Wednesday, Feb. 6. If you will need me to provide you with a book (any book over 100 pages), then I must know by Monday. I will provide books from the school library or my own personal library that will need to be returned in the same condition as they were lent." (End syllabus quote)
So I haven't tried this before, and haven't quite fleshed it out, but I think it could be a good thing. But about fifteen students asked to borrow a book from me, so I had to cull 15 books from my personal library last night that I thought 14- and 15-year old would enjoy. Three girls asked for The Color Purple, which is cool, but I only have two copies of it. Others asked for this book called Fly Girl, which I've never read but all the kids seem to love. Last night after school, I couldn't get into our decrepit school library to see if they had any of the books, nor into the book closet. This morning, I need to do some running around and figure all that crap out.
And I've got to get dressed. I'm still dressed in workout clothes.
What I'm most excited about with these Free Reading Wednesdays is catching up on my own personal reading. I've told students that I will be participating as well, and I'm going to stick with it. No surfing around Diaryland or grading papers will be done during those 30 minutes of reading.
After really enjoying Franzen's The Corrections (and loving the chance to talk about it with the large number of colleagues who have read it here at work), I started another book by a young male literary savant last night - David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest. It's a 1,079-page novel with 90 pages of endnotes. I got it for Christmas a few years back, attempted to read it during a summer maybe two years ago, and it ended up falling out of favor for whatever reason after merely a chapter or two. I read 17 pages of it last night, and thoroughly enjoyed it. I had a hard time getting into Wallace's rhythm at first, but got into it soon enough. He's a much different writer than Franzen, but from what I gather, their themes will be similar. (Indeed, I was reminded of Wallace's book laying idle on my shelf after reading a glowing review that Wallace had written about Franzen's novel.) I laughed out loud a few times in the pages I read last night, and look forward to finishing the tome sometime in the next few months. He has very precise word choice. I like that.
Of course, I've forgotten it today, so I will miss out on the 90 minutes of reading of it that I could have accomplished today (30 minutes per each of my three classes). Therefore, I'll be reading Richard Ford's The Sportswriter. An MSU grad, I saw Ford a few years back at an author talk at my alma mater, and was really blown away by his candor and wit. He told these funny stories about Eudora Welty and his undergraduate days and being a writer - I loved it. Afterwards, I went to the bookstore to buy his Pulitzer Prize winning novel, Independence Day (not related to the movie). The bookstore guy told me that that particular book was actually a sequel to The Sportswriter, and that I really should read that one first. He somehow convinced me to purchase both books. I read about half of The Sportswriter (this was probably 1998), and really enjoyed it, but never finished it for whatever reason. I've since bought and enjoyed a book of Richard Ford short stories (Women and Men, I think it's called), and want to get through one of his novels. So I packed up The Sportswriter last night before I convinced myself to tackle Infinite Jest, so I'm going to have two novels going at once for a bit. The Sportswriter, at perhaps 250 pages or so, is a lot easier to digest than Infinite Jest, so I may finish that one first. We shall see. I'm more excited that I'm just reading again - for me. I never should have gotten away from it. In high school, I carried a book around with me all the time - teachers had to interrupt my reading to get me to participate in class sometimes.
English teachers should be reading works that are new and exciting to them - constantly. It will remind them that reading books for the first time can be a visceral experience, and help them make it a similar experience for their students as they guide them through novels.