I love to read, I have always loved to read. If anything I spend too much time reading. Why is it then that I find so many books on required reading lists to be odious? My son is required to read two books this summer. Unfortunately, right now we aren't 100% sure which two books those are. His high school has four tracks. The summer reading list we got shows that she should be reading the books for a particular track--but his admission to that school was conditioned on him attending their summer program--a program in which they are supposed to read one of their summer reading books. However, the book they are reading is for a different track than the one assigned through the mail. When I called the school I was told that a determination of the track on which he will be placed will be made following the summer program.
Right now he is reading Whirlygig which he says is ok. If he moves up to the next track, he will have to read A Lesson Before Dying, which doesn't sound real exciting to me. Are these books supposed to make the kids love to read? Who decides that these are "good" books anyway?
For Social Studies, he may have to read Secret History by Procopius. At least it is short--I checked it out tonite so that I'll have it read before he starts. I love to read, I love history and this doesn't hold any attraction to me. Surely there is something out there that the kids would enjoy more and that would teach them about the ancient world.
i looked for many a book to help kids get ancient history and found few. I think the idea of reading the classics are so that if the child HAPPENS to end up at an ivy s/he can say "Oh yes, When I read...". Of course none actually read them- just did cliff notes.
ReplyDeleteMy son ran into this at WP and I ended up sending him a few cliff notes to keep up in the round discussions his classes would have about nothing in Freshman English! It was, as they say, a p-ssing match that ended soon after English class melted into Math and Physics:>)