reading

Thoughts on the Common Core Standards: English Edition

There’s been a lot of chatter about the new Common Core Standards. We have a set for English and a set for mathematics. As a math teacher who writes novels, I have thoughts about both, but I’ll focus on the English standards for this post.

The big attention-getter for these new standards is that it calls for more reading of informational, non-fiction texts, going from 50% of reading material in elementary school and gradually increasing to 70% in high school.

That’s where the chatter comes in. Many are upset about the units on classic literature, beloved favorites, and poetry getting cut from the curriculum, as noted in articles here and here.

I have thoughts on both sides of this. I’ve seen personally that students are definitely lacking in their ability to read text for factual information, to reason through technical material. I agree that more focus on developing these types of reading skills is necessary.

I also agree that nurturing a love of reading for pleasure is important. Reading fiction has boundless benefits, especially for children and teenagers.

I’ve heard some say that technical reading is for science class. Basically, let the science teachers handle all that, along with the social studies teachers for historical documents. Leave the English teachers to focus exclusively on the fiction side.

On the other side, content area teachers say they don’t teach reading and writing—that’s the English teacher’s job.

Which side do I fall on? Both, or neither.

From my time working in a school for the deaf, I have it ingrained in me that all teachers are language arts teachers. We don’t all cover all aspects of language equally, but we all have parts we can build up, develop, and reinforce. I see no reason that shouldn’t carry over to non-deaf education.

At the same time, English teachers are in more of a position to focus deeply on the nuances of non-fiction, informational writing without splitting as much attention with the concepts and other skills to be mastered. They also have more training in the teaching of reading and writing.

So ideally, a balance between both. Teachers brainstorming about texts that fit within their curricula, including English class. Working together. Supporting each other.

As much as I love fiction, it’s not the be-all, end-all.

As much as I love math and science, they’re not the be-all, end-all.

So my first step? Try to open some dialogue with the English teachers at my school … because without Twitter, I wouldn’t have even known as much as I do about these new standards.

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The Addict’s Scorn

Since my students often borrow books from me (particularly books that the school library doesn’t have), they also share their opinions on those books. Sometimes it’s just a quick, “Yes, this was good!” or, “Eh, it was okay,” when they return it. They know that if I haven’t read it yet, I don’t want to know details. If I have read it, we’ll chat a little more about what they liked or didn’t.

Yesterday, one of my students walked in and declared, “I hate this book!”

I spotted the bookmark. She’s halfway through. And she’s still reading.

If she really loathed it, she’d have quit earlier and traded for another book. They do that all the time. Since it’s one I haven’t gotten to yet, she didn’t get specific. But from what I can gather, she’s frustrated with something about the course of the plot. And/or it’s not giving her what she wants when she wants it.

This particular book is part of a series. The same student has been very vocal in her opinions (both positive and negative) on earlier books in the series. Overall, she likes it. But that didn’t stop her from passing through my room on the way to lunch and shouting, “I hate the book even more now!”

There’s another series the same student has read. That one, she really hates for very particular reasons. But she’s said, “Will they just finish the stupid series so I know how the stupid thing ends?”

She hates it, but she’ll still finish it.

In both cases, the author has her hooked. She’s addicted, and she can’t let the stories go until she knows how they end. There’s a difference, though.

When the author of Series 1 begins a new series, my student will probably buy in and get hooked on that one, too. With Series 2, I don’t think my student will give that author more opportunities to torture her.

They have something in common—they’re both addictive.

They’re polar opposites—one makes you revel in the addiction while the other makes you curse the person who got you hooked.

I wish I could put my finger on the key to that addictive quality. I’d bottle it up and pour copious amounts on my manuscripts. My best guess is it’s some bit of magic balancing characters that feel real and a compelling plot.

So where do the two series diverge? I think it’s a matter of those qualities slipping away as the series goes on. The authenticity of characters is weakened when they make unrealistically stupid choices for the sake of plot. Consequently, the plot may start to feel obnoxious and contrived.

With Series 1, my student may not like some turns the characters and plot are taking, but those turns must still feel authentic. She still believes.

What do you think makes some novels so addictive? What pitfalls have you noted that make an initially addictive novel fall flat?

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Avoiding Authorial Convenience

This is something that’s bugged me forever.

When you’re reading along and something happens that makes you think, “Oh, Author, you totally wedged that in just because it’s convenient to the direction you want the plot to go in. Lame!”

Don’t get me wrong. We all do it. We all contrive events to shape the story. I’ve even discussed the joys of throwing wrenches into the works, just to mess with my characters. The problem is when the reader can tell that’s what you’re doing.

So, how to avoid? I think one key is consistency. If you get halfway through the rough draft and decide making Character X your MC’s brother (plus he knew it all along, but kept it secret) is going to solve all your problems, great. But realize you’re going to have to go back through and reshape Character X’s early behavior. Not enough to give it completely away if it’s a big twist, but enough that looking back, the reader can say, “Oh, yes, I see now!” (Foreshadowing/Hinting vs. Telegraphing … have I done a post on that yet? No? Hmm, I probably should.)

When things come out of nowhere—even when there’s nothing in the text to explicitly preclude them—it’s just annoying. As a reader, it makes me feel like I’m being jerked around. I don’t like that feeling.

What if the twist or turn comes in a later book in a series, though? What if earlier books are already published, thus establishing “canon”? That’s trickier. I guess all you can do is try your best to make character and plot choices that are reasonably organic to what’s already set in stone.

This is one of those things that I’m right on top of as a reader (and a hyper-critical one at that), but worry that I don’t know how to avoid/spot/fix in my own writing. So if anyone has other thoughts or suggestions on how to prevent your readers from rolling their eyes, please—let’s hear them!

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Reading Spree: Conquering the TBR Mountain

Last week, on a whim, I made a little poster and put it up in my classroom. It’s my TBR (To Be Read) Mountain. There are seventeen books on it, and my stated goal is to finish them all before the end of 2011.

Yeah. Seventeen of them. During the school year. And while working on writing stuff at the same time.

Good thing I’m a fast reader. Double-good thing I have a full week off at Thanksgiving.

I posted it so my students could see me setting reading goals, and they’ll be able to watch my progress as I note the date I complete each book on the poster. Hopefully it’ll be a fun little side thing to talk about in class … y’know, other than common denominators, derivatives, and quadratic functions.

While I’m at it, I might as well make my goals even more public, so here’s the list and the little bit of progress so far (in no particular order other than the order my brain remembers them since I’m not at school):

1. Monsters of Men by Patrick Ness—finished 9/30
2. Goliath by Scott Westerfeld—finished 10/5
3. The Curse of the Wendigo by Rick Yancey
4. The Isle of Blood by Rick Yancey
5. Everlost by Neal Shusterman
6. Everwild by Neal Shusterman
7. Everfound by Neal Shusterman
8. The Death Cure by James Dashner
9. The Dead-Tossed Waves by Carrie Ryan—finished 10/13
10. The Dark and Hollow Places by Carrie Ryan—finished 10/17
11. Carrier of the Mark by Leigh Fallon
12. Dark Inside by Jeyn Roberts
13. The Slayer Chronicles: First Kill by Heather Brewer
14. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie—finished 10/10
15. Crossed by Ally Condie
16. Ashes by Ilsa J. Bick—finished 10/7
17. Possession by Elana Johnson

And really, I’m just impressed that I remembered all 17 titles.

We’ll see how this goes.

Do you guys have any reading goals?

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Genrefication

One of my co-workers (an English teacher) has a serious addiction to books. I know a lot of us think we do, but I’m telling you, most of us don’t have anything on this friend of mine. In the past year, I believe she’s spent thousands of dollars on books … frequently at bargain prices.

Yeah, it’s a lot of books.

That’s okay, though, because it means our students have more access to current MG and YA novels than they would otherwise.

She moved into a different classroom this year, so it was a great excuse for getting organized. One day last week, she asked me and another teacher who reads a lot of MG/YA (the other math teacher, ironically) to come over during lunch and help her figure out the sub-genres for the fantasy and science fiction.

It was a fascinating experience. And really hard at times.

Some books I was already familiar with and could immediately declare as steampunk, urban fantasy, or paranormal (we meant largely paranormal romance, but left “romance” off the label so as not to scare the teenage boys away). Some books I could just glance at the cover art and/or title and could guess what it was, then checked the back cover to verify.

Those back covers are where a few less-obvious books gave us trouble. Some looked like a hybrid of more than one thing. Others fell somewhere in-between two genres. For instance, some were clearly high fantasy, others clearly urban fantasy, but there were some that didn’t seem “high” enough for high or “urban” enough for urban. What are they? We ended up with a “just plain fantasy” category, which didn’t quite satisfy me.

I also felt like Terry Pratchett should have a section all his own. If she’d had more books of his, I might’ve insisted.

I’ve critiqued queries before where the writer needed feedback on narrowing down the genre, and it hasn’t usually been that hard. Maybe it’s due to a fundamental difference between queries and cover blurbs. Even though they’re similar and we’re advised to use the same mind-set when writing queries, they serve slightly different purposes. Some cover blurbs are much more teasing, with much less revealing detail than a query will often have.

So when someone says you need to clearly identify your genre, it’s not just so the publisher knows where to shelf your book. It’s so hyperorganized English teachers can categorize it, too.

Do you have any rules of thumb for identifying the many flavors of sci-fi and fantasy? Any favorite genre-breaking examples?

P.S. Our moment of shame that afternoon: We couldn’t figure out where to place A Wrinkle in Time. It seems like I must have read it once, but it was when I was too young (and read too large a volume of books) to remember details. And her copy had no blurb.

*crawls under rock*

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Potential Pitfalls: Writing Blind (v1.0)

Like all great potential pitfalls, this one is tricky because it involves a balancing act.

First, my inspiration for this post.

Exhibit 1: Riley Redgate’s post on writing what you know (or not)

Exhibit 2: Allison Winn Scotch’s post on whether writers must be readers

These got me thinking about something I’ve come across, and a trap I hope I’ve steered well clear of—writing a novel with no knowledge of the genre/category.

Yes, I’ve seen writers attempting a fantasy without ever reading any. Others writing for teens without reading a single book from the YA shelves.

I’m sure if you look, you can find a handful of examples where an author did their own thing without any real knowledge of what came before, and yet was wildly successful. Perhaps I’ll do another Potential Pitfalls post on acting like exceptions are the rule. More often, the writer’s lack of reader-knowledge is neon-sign obvious.

How so? A common sign in YA is teen characters that feel like they were written by an adult. The voice is off, the actions don’t fit—either coming across as a stiff adult in a teen’s body, or falling deep into stereotype. Sometimes it’s harder to put my finger on, but I have this instinctive feeling that the writer (a) has little-to-no meaningful contact with teens, and (b) hasn’t read a YA novel published within the last five years (or even ten).

But like I said, it’s a balancing act, because there’s another pitfall right across from this one: Unintentional Rip-Off. Oh, and there’s one in front of it, too: Authorial Laryngitis (Loss of Voice).

I know some writers that don’t read fiction while they’re drafting a novel (but may read non-fiction during that time). That’s a strategy that makes sense to me. Some of us are susceptible to having another writer’s voice seep into ours if we’re reading and drafting at the same time.

I guess the bottom line is, know the conventions and requirements of your genre, but find your own voice and story. You know what they say, if it were easy …

Any opinions on reading within your genre? I didn’t discuss reading other genres, but there are benefits there as well. Thoughts?

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