If you’ve been in one line of work long enough, you have a story for almost everything. Years ago, when I was teaching in a traditional school, I assigned Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 for summer reading. When we got to discuss the book, the class was mostly silent. Finally, one student asked why the walls talked. I wanted to scream.
If you’ve read the book, you know Ray Bradbury wrote it on a typewriter in 1950. He not only predicted in-ear headphones. He predicted massive flat-screen TVs that would cover entire walls. He predicted people would stop reading. He showed us how technology would drain our attention, leaving us strangers to ourselves and one another, with rampant hopelessness, drug abuse, and suicide. Sound familiar?
But if you don’t see why the walls are talking, you’re going to miss all that. These kids had big flat screens on their walls at home, but they needed help recognizing their own world in the book. Only then could they begin to see and feel everything else Bradbury had to show them about their world. I wasted that opportunity by assigning the book at the wrong time and by not preparing them to connect with it. It wasn’t interesting to them, and it certainly wasn’t fun.
Many schools and programs like to pack their summer reading lists with classics. I love classics. I believe kids should read them. But for most people, summer reading is independent reading. First, choose something your child will be capable of enjoying on their own.
Here are several factors I consider, in order:
Relatable characters: Will my child enjoy imagining themselves in this story as they read? This doesn’t mean all your main characters have to be young teenagers, but there needs to be something that will grab your reader’s imagination.
Comprehensible plot: Can my child independently understand what is happening? If so, they’ll be able to enjoy suspense and start rooting for the characters. If there are frequent passages that require outside help or lots of historical context to understand, save it for an in-class read.
Future discussion value: Once they enjoy the plot and characters, are there deeper ideas we can talk about later?
“Now I know what a good book can be.”
Choosing a great book doesn’t educate anyone by itself, but the experience a child has with that book can change everything.
I recently brought another group of students back to Fahrenheit 451. This time, we read it mostly together in small chunks, often out loud, unpacking key passages as we went. Before long, they caught on and began unpacking many of these passages on their own. At that point, I could see them beginning to enjoy the book for themselves. And that is what we want, after all, isn’t it?
—A classroom veteran, George Rietz encourages teachers, teaches homeschoolers, and invents new tools to reshape education. Contact him through ExploreMyWriting.com.
