(no subject)

[electricland]

bookslut is always a rich mine of information. Today, I learned that:

"Female teachers... have traditionally gravitated toward girl-oriented literature - plots built around characters and social interaction. Such plots bore boys and might permanently affect their interest in reading, experts say."

Cue weeping for the fate of Western society.

Comments

[raithen.livejournal.com]

*sigh*

[elissa-carey.livejournal.com]

There goes teaching To Kill A Mockingbird. Too girly. *eyeroll*

[lietya.livejournal.com]

Poor boys, forced to read about *characters* instead of about blowing things up and swearing.

(While I think that in some instances the current pedagogy is in fact less compatible with boys' learning style, this is ridiculous - what they're calling "girl-oriented" is also simply the mark of a well-written book!)

[electricland.livejournal.com]

Exactly! I think there's obviously a problem with the mismatch between boys' and girls' reading abilities, and I think a lot of what the article is talking about is worthwhile, but come ON.

[lietya.livejournal.com]

Yeah - let's NOT replace Shakespeare with booger books, OK?

[electricland.livejournal.com]

Wasn't Shakespeare a guy? How did he slip through?

[swestrup]

I can see the problem from both sides. Sure, you need characterization and sure, you need social interaction, but you also need to care about what is going on. If the only conflict is social, then the boys simply won't care.

I remember the first SF book I read (at around age 9) was E. E. "Doc" Smith's "Spacehounds of IPC". Its a short book, but the first 1/3 of it introduces the hero and his growing relationship with the daughter of the captain of his ship. As a young boy I skipped all that in disgust. I mean, who cared if some guy likes some girl? How is that a story?

Later when the ship is attacked by aliens and he manages to rescue her, but they end up stranded on a small moon and are fighting to survive, there is just as much social interaction and romance as before, but now I cared. I devoured the rest of the book and was hooked on SF for life.

So, having been one of the boys mentioned above, who grew up to love books, I can see where they are coming from.

[ide-cyan.livejournal.com]

Suffer the poor little boys.

Where are the fucking articles about male teachers turning girls off science, eh?

[ide-cyan.livejournal.com]

When the girl ghetto moves into a particular area of education, it loses value in boys' eyes.

And now they're revising history to reflect a completely essentialist approach to a socio-political problem.

I just want to slap them with a copy of Dale Spender's Invisible Women.

[electricland.livejournal.com]

When the next slot comes up on my library hold list, that's going in it. Remind me...

[pretentiousgit.livejournal.com]

Jah, me also.

And I think? All of this is so much BS. I hate Austen sometimes, but Thackeray is no better, and I would have hated Captain Underpants hella more. All I hear about from my friends from the public system is how outside of fantasy there are no strong female role models!

Sigh. Teh rage.

[nellisir.livejournal.com]

Errr, I dunno where to stand. What are -boys- supposed to be interested in, then? Taking it seriously, I'm assuming its something more than booger books. I've certainly read my share of books where the characters moan on and on and on about how terrible life is, until you finally want to grab the book and beat it against wall, screaming "THEN DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!!!"

I'd be up for a good "character" book that is interesting and moves along, and I'd be bored to tears by an "action" book that never gets anywhere.

But maybe this is why I never liked "the classics".

[pretentiousgit.livejournal.com]

I am, in general, raising the roof in your direction.

Although I, too, skipped the mushy stuff, and I'm a girl. Maybe it's to do with testosterone, but really, Much Ado is hilarious. In high school, I think it may well be the trend towards looking dumb being cool, rather than any problem with the curriculum itself.

[nellisir.livejournal.com]

Since it's a choice between adding books and having them really not reading at all, I'm not sure this is so bad. Anyways, since when is having a plot driven by a character's actions and not a character's emotions such a revolting choice?

[simplystars.livejournal.com]

*ponders books read with class this year*

Charlotte's Web
Stuart Little
Harry Cat's Pet Puppy
The Boxcar Children
Socks
Captain Underpants

Hmm. I suppose I should 'fess up to unduly promoting animals over people? *rolls eyes*

Female teachers. Can't take us anywhere, can't trust us to teach your children. ;-)

[lietya.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but they're not talking about the characters' actions (though that is how I characterized it, I admit) but about books about snot. Books about snot, that is, that *have* no plot - and while books imparting scientific snot-related information are also useful, I suppose, they're really not a replacement for the kinds of books that have plots.

At least, that's the part I found rather objectionable - because if we have to change "literature" to the point where it *isn't* in order to get them to read, we've just defeated the entire purpose. Replacing To Kill A Mockingbird with snot is not reasonable.

If they're just picking some books with action in them as well as the "emotional" kind, that's fine. I just figured that can't be what this is about, because schools *already* do that (Mockingbird, even, has some action in it); kids read Tom Sawyer as well as Bridge to Terabithia.

[nellisir.livejournal.com]

I think people are reading entirely too much into this. Admittedly, the quote about Shakespeare & Much Ado About Nothing is inflammatory at best, but I didn't see -anything- about removing books, or taking Shakespeare off the required reading list in favor of a "snot book".

The Redwall books, for example, have plots. And characters. And action.
Is it really that terrible to do a book report on Redwall?

The point is, given the choice to read a book these -physically-not-fully-matured- boys don't or can't engage in, and nothing, most of them will chose nothing. And the only time they do read is when they -have- to. They aren't suddenly going to discover Mists of Avalon* in their free time -- most of the books they know are -boring-. They -don't- read.

And if it takes snot books to get them to start, hurrah for snot books.

*I thought Mists of Avalon was a crock, personally, but my Arthurian lit professor thought the sun rose and set on MZB, so that didn't go over too well. Another reason I switched to a creative writing major.

[nellisir.livejournal.com]

In a related thought, I wonder how many girls pick up the "books imparting scientific...information" (they aren't -all- about snot). How many pick up the books on rocket ships and space, or dinosaurs, or whales?

Because, "while books that have plots are also useful, I suppose, they're really not a replacement for the kinds of books imparting scientific snot-related information."

Maybe there'd be more women in science if those books -were- on the required reading list.
;-)

[nellisir.livejournal.com]

Wasn't ever that fond of Charlotte's Web. Nice, but not totally exciting. Stuart Little, not bad, not great. Thought "The Trumpeter Swan" (?) was pretty incredible, though.

Don't know the others (heard of the Boxcar Children, but never read).

[lietya.livejournal.com]

The problem, I guess, is that I know (my husband was a teacher) that time is limited, so the reading list is basically a zero-sum game - you *can't* add new stuff without dropping something. However, I'd have no problem with an equal mix of character-action and character-emotion books; I think the schools are mostly doing that *already,* but if it makes them happy to slap a new psychological label on the theory, go right ahead. (In fact, *I* think purely emotion-driven books are often sappy and boring. I can't think of too many that are made required in middle/high school, though....)

[lietya.livejournal.com]

Put them on the science classes' reading list. :) Seriously, I think you make an excellent point there. I'm just not sure it belongs in *English* class. Although I suppose if that were the only way to do it, you're right, both sexes would probably benefit from "books that make science interesting." (I'd just pity the science teachers who still had to work with boring science books!)

[monkeycommando.livejournal.com]

I'd consider TKAM a heavily plot driven book. At least that's how I remember it.

[ide-cyan.livejournal.com]

Chapter 4: Make Trouble - Get Results!

[electricland.livejournal.com]

I think the problem is mainly that it's not a very good article. Also, I chose the quote that caused me to wail in despair. It's as though the only choice of reading matter in the adult world were between Tom Clancy and Barbara Cartland, and I think we can all agree that would be a pretty unpleasant world to live in.

I'm not even sure how true the quote is. I mean, I certainly didn't start off my voracious reading life on books with plots built around characters and social interaction. I started with Famous Five books, thankyouverymuch, moving on to encompass Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys, and any number of pony books. And my share of non-fiction-for kids. I'm obviously not the only one, either. It may well be that girls start to like plots built around characters and social interaction earlier than boys do, but I don't think we necessarily start off that way by any means.

[electricland.livejournal.com]

Yep. See my response above.

But I suppose if they'd just said that, we wouldn't be having all this discussion now. ;)

[electricland.livejournal.com]

And I hope you take full responsibility for the fact that Everything That Those Kids Do And Become is All Your Fault. FOREVER. ;)

I remember The Boxcar Children!

I also remember Charlotte's Web being incredibly traumatic.

What is Socks?

[electricland.livejournal.com]

As I said above, I think part of the problem is that the article isn't very good. Aside from anything else, it melds a whole bunch of different age groups into one soggy mass.

I certainly remember being bored to tears by books that were ONLY about "character and social interaction". Maybe I'm weird. (Hell, I know I'm weird.) It may well be that girls start to like those plots earlier than boys do.

I'm all for a mix of books that boys and girls enjoy, or hell, books they BOTH enjoy. As lietya says, though, what you DON'T want is to be replacing actual literature with snot books.

[simplystars.livejournal.com]

Socks is by Beverly Cleary, who wrote the Ramona books, among others. Socks is about a kitten who is adopted by a couple who then have a baby, and is told from the cat's POV as he and they have to adjust to the new family dynamics.

One of our reading units is on families, so... :)