Teaching, Gove, reading lists, and "Of Mice and Men"
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DISCLAIMER : all views expressed in this piece are mine and mine alone. I know that thanks to the joys of the internet as soon as I hit "post" this is out of my hands. No specific discussion about my school, students, or work policies will be entered into save for the ideas mentioned in this piece. I reserve the right not to answer or respond to anything that I feel may reflect on my profession, my workplace, my colleagues and/or my students. This is a personal response to a BBC article, adding my metaphorical two cents' worth.
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A friend recently asked me, in my position as an English teacher, to answer a few questions about kids reading. This apparently stemmed from an article they'd found on the BBC website.
Why do children study 'Of Mice and Men'?
The article goes on to talk about the apparent reasons for including Steinbeck in the curriculum, including - but not limited to - its length.
But why does a novella written in 1937 about displaced ranch workers during the Great Depression hold such enduring popularity in schools?
The answer is that Steinbeck's classic is short, comprising only six chapters, and that its themes continue to be considered relevant to 21st Century society.
I read this book with my Year 10s for their first GCSE coursework piece back in September. I won't deny that the length helped massively; so many kids are turned off reading by the length. But why is the length, or lack thereof, a bad thing?
The idea is that we should start reading when we are kids. Most parents instil a love of reading in their children and therefore some are just as happy with a book in their hands as they are a Nintendo DS.
I was one such child. When I was reading as a kid OF COURSE it was short books. I didn't have the attention span and I hadn't been "trained" to read longer, in depth books. To track characters across hundreds of pages, to remember key plot points and lines for dozens of chapters. That, like any skill, takes practice.
Today's kids, it's sad to say, aren't all like that. I teach kids who have their noses stuck in a book every break and lunchtime and it's fantastic to see. And I have kids who look at five sides of A4 and go, "I have to read all this?"
One of the writing Assessment Foci (AFs) I have to teach involves being able to create a structured piece; linking openings to endings, developing ideas throughout and creating whole text cohesion. You can't teach that without examples. Now I can track characters and themes over novels, but you want something short and sweet to help make your point, not labour through two hundred pages to identify a handful of things.
So OMAM fits into this nicely. Short, sweet, six chapters showing structure, development and whole text cohesion. Now my Year 10s have an idea what I mean when I start to talk about it. I could see it evident in their own writing which then helped them massively with their following piece of coursework.
Back to the article...
"Students often struggle to understand why George shoots Lennie," she says, "particularly at the lower end of the ability spectrum, but once explained they do get it."
Before I even got to that bit we had a discussion, ostensibly about Crooks, about whether it would be a good thing to kill someone who was suffering. Curley's wife had reminded the stable buck that she could have him lynched, and after explaining what that meant and what would happen, I led a discussion about how that would feel.
I skirted around the "right to die" issue, using it as illustration, but as soon as Curley said he was going to shoot Lennie in the guts and George took off, the kids knew what he was going to do and why. We discussed why George got Lennie to talk about the dream and the immediate answer was, "So he's happy, Miss. He's talking about something he loves and he's going to die happy. That'll make it easier for George."
Then, unprompted by me, they started to develop a metaphor of how George was actually killing the dream because after that he probably wouldn't talk about it or get it.
So don't tell me that the "lower ability" kids struggle to get it. It's all about presentation and approach, and isn't that what teaching is about?
Gove believes that children from the age of 11 should be reading up to 50 books each year and suggests that an over-reliance on longstanding core texts is working to the detriment of the curriculum.
OK then, Mr Gove. 50 books a year. Given that your lovely government is closing down libraries left right and centre, and given that the majority of kids who don't come from "reading" households won't read themselves, I assume that the onus for these 50 books will be on us as teachers?
I have several issues with this.
1) 50 books equates to roughly one a week. Now I read, and by that I mean that I read. I can devour books in one sitting if it grabs me and I have nothing else on. But that's not what reading is about. It's about taking your time, immersing yourself in a new world or place or situation or whatever the book is about and that takes time. Throw in the reflection and the work that you'll undoubtedly want us to do about it and we have a major time issue on our hands if we're to have time to do silly little things like prepare kids for exams.
2) Say the onus isn't on schools and that the child is going to do half, if not the majority, of this reading outside of school. Not every child is a reader and trying to get them to do something they don't want to do outside of school is just going to make them hate it. Which means when they HAVE to do it in school we'll have one hell of a battle on our hands.
3) What exactly do you mean by "over-reliance"? Do you mean books/novels that teachers have read and know? That we have already explored and unpicked? Books that we have taught for years and so not only have tried and tested lessons plans, along with resources for ALL children (abilities, learning styles and those with specific needs), but that when the child asks, "I don't get why Lennie is described as an animal" we can give them the answer.
3b) It also helps us with our time. Seriously. I had to read a book I'd never even heard of before for my Year 8s this year. Throw in all the other work I was expected to do and I was usually about six or seven chapters ahead of them. Didn't help when I realised that throwaway comment several chapters ago became epically important later on, and I'd missed a perfect opportunity to teach foreshadowing and the reading AF3 which is about making predictions from the text, which my Year 8s struggle with. Good teaching in practice? Think not.
4) Consistent reading lists help across schools, classes and families. Student does the novel, then younger sibling starts the same course a few years later. Older sibling can then help with work and younger one doesn't feel embarrassed that they keep having to ask Miss for help. Also means students can move classes and schools with minimum disruption on occasion.
5) These books are popular for a reason. I know of no department that chooses books that the kids hate or can't access/understand. If you tell us we can't do certain ones, or we should look to expand, then you're going to end up making things worse for students and teachers alike. We know our kids, Mr Gove. We know what works and we know what doesn't. I was able to do a 400+ page novel with my Year 8s because I know they'll cope. I did OMAM with my Year 10s because they're NOT my Year 8s and a shorter book helps. I did a very different style book with my other Year 8 class because of what they're like. When my first Year 8 class get to Year 10, should I be fortunate to be their teacher again, I'll still do OMAM.
6) What's better? Reading 50 (probably short) books/novellas in a conveyor belt fashion? Or what I try and do as an adult - read one (decent length) book per month, taking my time? I can read one chapter every two or three days, or sit down on a Friday night and read seven. There's no pressure, no expectation. I love reading because of my parents. It wasn't something I had to do, it was something I could do. In job interviews I've talked about getting kids onto reading. When asked I would say that it started off by finding out what little Jimmy or Jane was into, then researching for a book that suited their interest and current reading level. Not too easy otherwise they wouldn't bother, not too hard to put them off. Then it's trial and error. You have to win them 'round and that's slow going.
7) 50 books a year from the age of 11? Have you seen today's kids? With X-Boxes and DSes and iPhones we'll have our work cut out for us. A love of reading starts young so I hope the curriculum Mr Gove is planning to redesign is the Early Years one so we can hook them in. That way, when they turn up on my door they're already predisposed to the idea of reading.
I could go on forever about this. I can understand why you would want to shake up something that's been in place for ages. But there's also a saying - "if it 'ain't broke, don't fix it". Of Mice and Men works for all students; A* down to G. Everyone can get something out of it and once you've taught it a few times you become a bit of an expert on it. And isn't that what we want? Teachers in front of a class, knowing all the important stuff?
Just because it's old, just because it's American, doesn't mean we should kick it off the syllabus. The new spec GCSE allows for a wider choice but how many schools are sticking with what they know? We have the books, we have the plans, we have the resources. Financially it makes sense!
But one final thing on the subject of reading. If Mr Gove is serious about getting children reading, if his comments have the backing and support of the government as a whole, then please explain to me why libraries are closing and those of us working in education are finding our jobs getting harder by the day?
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