Readicide

     I have started to read the required reading for CAL, Readicide by Kelly Gallagher. I am so glad that I was introduced to this book! It has already inspired me to take a stand for literacy in our schools. Gallagher writes in such a way that the reader feels as if he is just speaking to him/her, yet he uses a lot of research to back up the points the he makes. I have taken some notes with ideas or quotes that I found very interesting. They are as follows:

"Grown educated adults can sit in a room and argue endlessly over whether a student’s pants are too baggy or whether a student should be marked tardy if he or she is not yet seated when the bell rings. They are missing the one thing our students desperately need : interesting books."

How sad, but true, this statement is! I want to be a teacher that actually addresses topics that will effect students' learning and lives one day --not trivial things.

"When we deny students to read long complex works, we are starving a part of their brains and we start producing kids who can read but cannot get below the surface of what they have read."

     Another point that Gallagher makes is that students are becoming less and less aware of the real-world events happening around them. He uses, in his classroom, interesting news articles, blogs, ect. each week that sometimes, or sometimes does not, coincide with what his class is reading/learning. He has a number of different prompts that he asks of his students from these articles.

     I think that this would be a great idea because not only is the teacher helping the students become better readers, he/she is also helping to make the students more aware/knowledgeable of current events in society that they will need to know outside of school!