"So how do you get kids to love reading in this age of standardized test prep?"

Probably not the answer you're looking for, but how about homeschooling?

Speaking from my own middle and high school experience, teachers mostly want kids to read on the student's time, not the teachers - and of course the school system will only give you credit for reading what's assigned to you, and nothing else. Otherwise, the years I spent surreptitiously reading history and sci-fi under my desk would have put me on the honor roll instead of summer school.

Suffice to say, my love of reading contributed to the decision to homeschool my children rather than subject them to a curriculum committee's idea of appropriate reading material, as "taught" by someone with lousy SAT scores and a union contract.

There seems to be no lack of great books for kids in the lbrary these days - way better than what I remember from my youth. And I am astounded that some of my favorite books are assigned reading in school, e.g. Island of the Blue Dolphins. I think the hardest thing is making the time to read. We started establishing pleasure reading at bedtime early on - initially with a parent, but quickly as a solo experience, so that adult judgement was removed from the equation. They can read books below their reading level if they want to, manga if they want to, the same book over and over agan f they want to. Over the summer boredom is countered by "what book are you reading now?" or "should we go to the library?" It's a little harder with the special needs kid, but the same general approach - be gentle, encouraging and avoid tears if at all possible.

A love of reading can come from anywhere, but I know mine started at home. I grew up when Atari lost out to Nintendo, Voltron was on at 7am followed by Transformers and GI Joe, and toys were still made of di-cast metal... and I couldn't participate in any of that unless there was a steady book in my hand. My mother got me in the library, made me go, she purchased books, and made sure I read every day at some point for at least an hour. I have 90 minutes with Baltimore's high school age children. I already have to teach them.. well everything they need to know in and outside of academia. If I (successfully) got all my 10th graders into Shakespeare and poetry, parents can step their game up and introduce reading over xbox at home.

On a sidenote: Studio didn't fail because of Cosmo Girl, it failed because it was a terrible program that wasn't successful in any tested school system, nonetheless one of America's most broken systems. Cosmo Girl's advice on how to please your teenage boy toy was just the icing on the cake for that debacle.

It's 6:30 am and I getting ready to take my "lousy SAT scores and my union contract" to school to among other things try to instill the love of reading to my students. I agree that testing has affected the way we teach reading but there are other times during the day that literature is used in other ways. I read aloud each day to my students and also give them a chance to read independently from books of their own choice. I maintain an extensive classroom library with books from all genres and on a wide range of topics. My love of reading came from my family and the many trips to the public library. Many of my students have not been to the library and do not have books at home. Instead of reading during free time they often watch TV instead. As with all aspects of children's education the love of reading is a partnership between family and the school.

I have tried to start an independent reading day in my advisory once a week with mixed success. There is no substitute for a personal relationship with a student and being aware of their interests when attempting to get them to read.

I had one advisee who stubbornly refused to look at other books when I took my kids to our library. The next day I brought him "Monster: The Autobiography of an L.A. Gangster" and told him just to read the back cover. He tried to hide his interest with his friends around but he took the book and has since completed it.

Seems to me like anything else in education. Personal attention, persistence, follow up, positive reinforcement...etc.

A good opportunity to mention TV turnoff week: how about going to the library to pick out books to read? Even older children love having books read aloud to them. And one of the best things a parent can do is to model the love of reading for his/her children: let them see that you read and you love it! We bowse for magazines at the bookstore, and buy magazines that interest our children (not Cosmo Girl, as it turns out, but sometimes "adult" magazine like Discover, Time, National Geographic, etc., as well as kid magazines like the Lego Club magazine, Ranger Rick, etc.) Comic books and graphic novels are also good for kids who struggle with reading, because the images provide clues to help decode the words -- plus, it feels like the naughty junk-food of reading. But reading is reading, and the more practice the better!

Why are we blaming the teachers...shouldn't the parents/guardians have some of the blame and more of the responsibility.
I love to read because it was made to be special in my household. From the time I could remember my father took us to the library on Thursday evening, every Thursday that the library was open. We got to chose the books and spend time in the children section and then other sections when we were older. We read to Mom and/or Dad when we were younger and needed help, then were encouraged to read alone when we felt we had time. TV was not a big thing in our home and still is not, never will be.
Surprise, surprise my siblings and my parents are all voracious readers...
Parents need to start taking some responsibility, initiative and realize that children learn everywhere, not just at school.

Dear Baltimoron~

Probably not the answer you want either but keep your kids at home if they come with your attitude!

"Speaking from my own middle and high school experience, teachers mostly want kids to read on the student's time, not the teachers - and of course the school system will only give you credit for reading what's assigned to you, and nothing else"

Actually, kids read at school and at home. Also at reces, at kunch, and after school. Obviously, we would not get other important instruction covered if we read all day every day. We do give credit for all sorts of reading including reading for content and for pleasure.

"Otherwise, the years I spent surreptitiously reading history and sci-fi under my desk would have put me on the honor roll instead of summer school"

I hope my students never feel they have to read surreptitiously. We have plenty of time for self-selected reading,independent reading, reading for information, and for pleasure.My students have library time every week and we have a terrific library with both clasics and current selections. There are times, however when students have to attend to other aspects of learning. Making choices about how to use their time is an important learning in itself. My own children always read in the bathroom or under the covers at night. They thought we did not know but of course we did. That was part of the fun of it.

"Suffice to say, my love of reading contributed to the decision to homeschool my children rather than subject them to a curriculum committee's idea of appropriate reading material, as "taught" by someone with lousy SAT scores and a union contract"

I respect all ways of educating children. My kids were homeschooled, private schooled, public schooled, and hospital schooled. My decisions were made on what each setting could offer not on some snapshot of a bad experience I might have had. My kids are older now and the people they revere most in life are the teachers they adored who taught all of them with love and great skill. We have lived all over the world and found amazing teachers everywhere. I am so sorry you seem to have had such a bad total(?) school experience! could tweleve years of teachers have been that bad?

By the way, I went to an Ivy League college which I entered with high SAT sores. I have three other degrees with a 4.0 in each degree. I belong to the Union for one reason! Insurance! In Baltimore City you pay almost the identical dues whether you are in the union or not. It is the law! I would just as soon not!

I would hope that you are not teaching your child to judge others as groups. We all are individuals trying to do our best for the children of Baltimore.

There are several good points raised in the comments here, but the bottom line is the priorities that the individual schools will place on reading. Some schools make room in their budget for a school librarian, which means that the students will get (at the very least) a designated library time; other schools do not and the space goes fallow, used mostly for staff development sessions.

City Schools principals have more discretion than ever in this arena, so when your school is reviewing the budget (it's taking place this time of year), let your school's principal know your feelings. Even if the budget review has been done already, principals are usually more than happy to discuss the parents' priorities with them.

As noted above, reading is reading. We don't care if it's comic books or cereal boxes. If the kids are reading it's a good thing. My own daughter was a "reluctant" reader who finally learned to love it because we started borrowing audiobooks from the library and let her read along with the narration. For her, it appears that her "mind's eye" needed a little boost.

This just occurred to me: perhaps we need to go back to training the kids to listen more closely by playing old-time radio programs for them..."theater of the mind" and all that can probably go a long way.

We are lucky enough to have a free used book store in Baltimore, the Book Thing in Charles Village. You can get all the books you want for free! No catch!

We also always give (new) books as gifts for children's birthday parties.

Reading and Writing unfortunately are two of the basics that are no longer enforced in our schools. I have sat in classes and heard students of MS and HS levels read and they are still reading on ES level. This is the same for writing. I feel that some of our teachers do not reinforce corrective spelling or reading in their classes. Our children need to learn both of these in all classes and not just in english classes. Now that my son is in HS he no longer gets spelling words.
As a parent, I always go over my sons work and if something is misspelled I have him go over it. If the grammer is not correct he has to do it over.
This is not just a parent issue, it is a school issue since our children are going to school to be taught.
Far too many students are graduating with the bare minimum and it sure didn't help once the Board said that 60 is a passing grade. If our children are taught below what they can do then they learn below what they know.
We continue to fail our children and then wonder why tests scores and graduation rates are not where they should be.
A lot of children who graduated in past years and who will be graduating in the coming years are those who have not had the right teaching put upon them.
I know this will make alot of you made, but if you are not in the category that I speak of then you should not have an issue with this.
If in fact you are one who has been teaching and knowingly have passed students who still read, write and do math below their grade level then it is up to you to own it and hopefully change it in your class.

april is the cruelest month

the key is choice, browsing--hence availability-- and relevance. stores and LIBRARIES

If you are already (and ask *yourself* if you really ar---tonight watching tv, playing video games) then you will know this is true.

your culture/their culture/our culture

reading.

"For Baltimore City in particular, where school may be the only opportunity for many of its young people to have the kind of reading experience the report importunes, the situation is bleak. With some of the worst test scores in the state, city schools have some of the worst school libraries---if they have libraries at all. The Maryland State Department of Education’s report, ”Facts About Maryland’s School Library Media Programs 2005-2006,” notes that only 3.6% of city schools---that even reported having libraries---met state collection size standards and only 29.9% met state staffing standards."

http://www.sdkrashen.com/

http://www.citypaper.com/special/story.asp?id=16744

http://www.citypaper.com/arts/story.asp?id=11476

Here's my reading idea - get every student a Kindle 2. Just got one for my birthday today, and it's amazing.

Sorry, Sara, but I'm dropping the Sun's paper edition - can't compete with the $5 a month for the Kindle version. This little sucker is going to change the face of traditional media! And, it has quite the potential to change the face of education as well!

Happy Birthday, Bill!

Yeap, lets get every student a 300-400 dollar piece of equipment in lieu of just reinforcing reading as a community. Teachers can't even get *working* laptops for free in BCPSS, but I'm sure we can find the funds for that brilliant plan.

Forget the modern face of media, Bill. Media is changing, yes, but it'll leave a large majority of Americans behind. Not to mention the millions of citizens in the world who still live in societies that don't have wi-fi, smart phones, and endless amounts of time to debate over the state of reading in their countries. Happy Birthday, for sure, but be reasonable. A Kindle 2 won't replace "the book" in every hand for a long time.

I think this brilliant comic from the folks at Penny-Arcade sums up my feelings on the aforementioned Kimble 2 plan. We don't need *new* tech to read... just... preposterous.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2009/3/9/

I'm not sure what happened to the one laptop per child plan. These days you can get a netbook at amazon for $240 when you buy them one at a time. I would guess that would start hitting closer to $100 when you buy in quantity or if you could get corporate sponsors to pitch in. At that price you should be able to give teachers and students a device that can go on the web, do word processing, graph mathematical equations, log lab data,work collaboratively on wiki's, generate power-points and download .pdf's for reading. Way more useful and cheaper than a Kindle, IMHO.

Sorry, didn't make it clear at all, I was completely kidding. I really did get a Kindle, and it's definitely very cool. But I was completely joking about buying every student one! Thanks for the well wishes!

Teachers get paid to lead the horse to water - whether he drinks or not is irrelevant. Whether Johnny can read or not, you still get the summer off, right?

Besides, do teachers actually want a class full of kids who read well and have the ability to learn on their own? Ms. Schnog may deride the practice of teachers acting as "high priestesses of literature", but she may be talking herself right out of a job. Does a classroom full of intelligent readers really need a $50K babysitter?

"Blame The Parents" is the classic defense mechanism used by poor teachers - but it has the advantage of actually being true. My love of reading sprang from two reading parents. Conversely, the kids who lived in book-free houses didn't read (and we're talking about "GT" kids here).

But isn't the purpose of the public education system to educate kids and improve their cognitive abilities? If parents are the decisive factor, and the kids are the same leaving the system as they were going into it, then what was the point? Why did we spent millions of dollars to "educate" them?

Is the purpose of public education to change kids or to employ education majors?

@Baltimoron,

You certainly meet snarky with snarky, I'll give you that. I can't speak for the city but I can speak for myself. We do read in my classroom, and by breaking down language and sentence structure I've had 10th graders "loling" over the comedic works of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and loving it.

I could sit here and list all my accomplishments to let you know how great of a teacher I am, but I won't partially out of time and partially because I don't think you're trying to single me out as a bad teacher.

I work on reading in the classroom, have regularly scheduled time for independent reading (where kids can provide their own books or use my personal stash), and work on raising reading levels all year so the students can move on to more mature (and enjoyable) texts.

But when push comes to shove, I'm their teacher... of course *I* like reading, of course *I* want them to read, and they do it for me out of respect in my classroom. They expect me to tell them reading is important, and they probably gain a fraction of the importance I place on it in the classroom.

Wouldn't the message of reading being important have a much stronger impact from an early age (I teach high school) at home? Doesn't it mean more when a sibling you look up to offers you their favorite book than your English teacher?

Don't try and paint us all as idiots who don't want successful students, the good teachers in Baltimore (like myself) are already discouraged enough by the system.

to baltimoron-

I find your blog name interesting. I feel sorry for you because something terrible must have happened to you in school. As for me and my high achieving, happily grown and working children, we had wonderful school experiences with only a very few wrinkles. Those wrinkles taught us all a lot about life and I learned that I could change my ideas, opinions, and pereceptions. I raised my last child very differently than my first.

"Teachers get paid to lead the horse to water - whether he drinks or not is irrelevant. Whether Johnny can read or not, you still get the summer off, right?"

No, I get forced unemployment and I always look for and secure work;usually teaching students.I rarely travel because I can't afford it. However, I had almost $3000.00 in receipts for the tax account this year spent on my class.

"Besides, do teachers actually want a class full of kids who read well and have the ability to learn on their own? Ms. Schnog may deride the practice of teachers acting as "high priestesses of literature", but she may be talking herself right out of a job. Does a classroom full of intelligent readers really need a $50K babysitter?"

Babysitter, guide, mentor, connector, tutor, teacher, whatever. A teacher's dream is to have well functioning, eager,well prepared students ready to take learning to a totally new and higher level. One year my kids were so capable and advanced that we deconstucted and reconstructed an old colonial home while conducting an urban archaeological did. Did I mention this was fourth grade!

We are not blaming parents! The more you do, the more we can do. Sadly, many students have had no foundation and we have to begin at the beginning, hopefully with a bright end in mind!

You are lucky to be able and wlling to teach your own but not everyone can. I did both. For those who need or choose schools, we need excellent schools with excellent teachers.By the way, we welcome home-schooled students back into school on an almost weekly basis. I am one of those dedicated teachers and I teach in a terrific school.I am not going to waste one more minute on your negativity but if you would like to talk face to face and/or see my school space, please contact Sara. Maybe we could show you the rest of the picture! As Brandon said so well, we teachers are already so beaten down by a variety of factors. Broad generalizations are meaningless and cruel. Try encouraging those of us who really care!

"

"I feel sorry for you because something terrible must have happened to you in school."

Well, that depends on your definition of terrible. I wasn't molested or abused or anything. Just subjected to a long line of teachers who were just punching a clock and considered a bright kid more of an annoyance than an opportunity. I was a bump in the road on the way to early retirement.

You and brandon sound like a couple of good teachers, and I'm not out to say that all teachers are bad at their jobs. But I didn't feel good enough about the odds to roll the dice putting my own children in school.

To be honest, if I thought my kids were going to be average, I wouldn't care. But the American education system is no place for people who can think - and that goes for students and teachers.

"But the American education system is no place for people who can think"

Apathy is what got us to this point, and isn't the tool that will get us out.