Common Core

For all English Language Arts teachers, worrying over your students’ mastery of the SL’s and W’s of the new standards, Vanity Fair has a beautiful piece by Christopher Hitchens on life, teaching and the spoken and written voice:

“To my writing classes I used later to open by saying that anybody who could talk could also write. Having cheered them up with this easy-to-grasp ladder, I then replaced it with a huge and loathsome snake: ‘How many people in this class, would you say, can talk? I mean really talk?’ That had its duly woeful effect. I told them to read every composition aloud, preferably to a trusted friend. The rules are much the same: Avoid stock expressions (like the plague, as William Safire used to say) and repetitions. Don’t say that as a boy your grandmother used to read to you, unless at that stage of her life she really was a boy, in which case you have probably thrown away a better intro. If something is worth hearing or listening to, it’s very probably worth reading. So, this above all: Find your own voice.”

The wisdom and power of Carol Jago’s presidential address to the 99th annual meeting of the National Council for the Teaching of English earlier this month reminded us that there’s simply no better advocate for great teaching than great teachers themselves.  Here’s a sample.  We hope you will read more.

“If we care only about keeping our kids satisfied with their lot as Deltas [de-emotionalized beings from Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World], turning the language arts curriculum into a giant online game may be an excellent plan.  If, on the other hand, we believe that our mission as teachers is to prepare students for life in the real world, teaching literature seems to me a much superior one.  We need to help kids figure out how to make this a better, not an alternate universe.”

And,

“I do not believe that teaching literature should be about dragging students kicking and screaming through works they hate and poems they find opaque.  It should be about nurturing the next generation of readers – readers who one day may choose to buy a ticket for a performance of Macbeth, who will excitedly order the latest Cormac McCarthy for their Kindles and Nooks, who can find solace in poetry during times of trouble.  Much is made of the economic impact of education, but I’m more concerned about preparing students’ hearts and minds for whatever the future may hold.”

Lynne Munson

English teacher Carol Jago, who is also president of the National Council of Teachers of English, has published a provocative commentary in this month’s Council Chronicle. In “A Literary Education–Priceless” Jago argues that there continue to be a raft of reasons to read excellent literature, and insists that students still have time to read books, despite claims to the contrary. We recommend reading the whole article (just like we recommend that students read whole books), but here’s a brief excerpt to heighten your interest:

“Your students won’t read 19th-century novels, you say? Too long? Too boring? That 21st-century students raised on Twitter need a faster pace? I say English class may be the last place where they can unplug themselves from the solipsism of Facebook postings and enter a milieu different from their own in order to learn about human problems worthy of attention. “But my students won’t do the homework reading I assign,” teachers wail.  It isn’t as though students don’t have the time.  A 2010 study by the Kaiser Family Foundation reports that children aged eight to eighteen spend an average of seven and a half hours a day “consuming entertainment media.” And this does not include the hour and a half a day they spend texting friends. Our students have the time to read; they simply choose not to. Teachers and parents need to help young people make better decisions about their use of time. What will it matter if the U.S. wins the economic race to the top if we lose all feeling for others apart from those in our close and closed circle of friends in the process? Reading literature nurtures empathy. Your students won’t read 19th-century novels, you say? Too long?  Too boring? That 21st-century students raised on Twitter need a faster pace? I say English class may be the last place where they can unplug themselves from the solipsism of Facebook postings and enter a milieu different from their own in order to learn about human problems worthy of attention. “But my students won’t do the homework reading I assign,” teachers wail. It isn’t as though students don’t have the time. A 2010 study by the Kaiser Family Foundation reports that children aged eight to eighteen spend an average of seven and a half hours a day “consuming entertainment media.” And this does not include the hour and a half a day they spend texting friends. Our students have the time to read; they simply choose not to. Teachers and parents need to help young people make better decisions about their use of time. What will it matter if the U.S. wins the economic race to the top if we lose all feeling for others apart from those in our close and closed circle of friends in the process? Reading literature nurtures empathy.”

Please, read on.

Lynne Munson