Nancie Atwell -”Reading the Right Stuff”
Nancie Atwell on Readingthe Right Stuff
“Eachyear, my 7th and 8th graders choose and read between 30and 100 titles,” says teacher/author Nancie Atwell in this passionate EducationWeek article. “They devour books because the classroom library ispacked with intriguing stories by serious writers, because they have daily timeto read in school, because I expect them to read at home every night, andbecause 35 years of experience has taught me that it’s my job to read,embrace, and recommend worthwhile young-adult literature to the young adults Iteach… It is frequent, voluminous book reading that makes readers.”
This approach didn’t work 50 years ago, says Atwell, becauseback then, adolescent literature mostly focused on two questions: Will themystery be solved before it’s too late? and Will she get to go tothe prom? Today’s books are far more substantive, giving youngadolescents the ability to “live vicariously, alongside three-dimensionalcharacters close to their own age who inhabit compelling stories about growingup in every time, place, and circumstance, with themes that resonate in thereal lives of adolescents: identity, conscience, peer pressure, socialdivisions, political strife, loneliness, friendship, change.”
Atwell says that advocates of the literary canon (including E.D.Hirsch Jr. and Diane Ravitch) may not be aware of this improvement in thequality of contemporary adolescent literature and how it can build bridges tothe classics. Some examples:
- CopperSun, Sharon Draper’s novel about slavery, as a bridge to ToniMorrison’s work;
- Hatchetby Gary Paulsen as a bridge to Jon Krakauer’s Into the Wild andthence to Jack London;
- E.Lockhart as a bridge to the work of Lorrie Moore;
- NancyFarmer, Michael Grant, and Patrick Ness as bridges to Aldous Huxley, WilliamGolding, and Margaret Atwood;
Atwellbelieves that immersion in high-quality young-adult literature builds thebackground knowledge and imaginative experience to understand and enjoy Prideand Prejudice, The Odyssey, All Quiet on the Western Front,and Jane Eyre.
Some of Atwell’s middle-school students have dyslexia, some aresophisticated literary critics. What they have in common, she says, is thatthey love books: “They find their interests, needs, struggles, and dreamsspoken for in the crafted stories that fill their library. More importantly,they get to experience the interests, needs, struggles, and dreams of youngpeople unlike themselves. At a critical juncture, they learn about adiversity of human experience and begin to consider both what they care aboutand who they might dare to become.”
And as they read, they build their fluency, stamina, vocabulary,confidence, critical abilities, habits, tastes, and comprehension, becomingstrong readers.
Atwell closes with a plea for schools to invest in the right books,citing the American Library Association’s recommendation that eachclassroom have its own library and that school libraries have at least 20age-appropriate titles per student. “The opportunity for every student tosit quietly and become immersed in an actual book may not be high-tech,instantly quantifiable, or lucrative for the College Board,” she says.“It just happens to be the only way that anyone ever became areader.”
“The Case for Literature” by Nancie Atwell in EducationWeek, Feb. 10, 2010 (Vol. 29, #21, p. 32), http://www.edweek.orgfor subscribers only
Paul Lindenmaier
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