Current interests help boys find relevance in literacy

Submitted by anthony on Fri, 2009-07-31 18:44

Article here. Excerpt:

'Finding tie-ins between what young men enjoy doing outside of school and activities involving reading and writing is one way to engage boys and help them find relevance in literacy. The provincial Department of Education hosted a two-day summer workshop Thursday, July 30 and Friday, July 31 entitled “Reading Don’t Fix No Chevys” at the Old Orchard Inn in Greenwich as part of the Summer Institute on Literacy. Workshop leader Michael Smith, co-author of Reading Don’t Fix No Chevys: Literacy in the Lives of Young Men and professor at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, said boys are underperforming girls in reading and writing all over the world.'

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Comments

Great. The boys get the books that are dumbed-down right from the title.

"Reading Don't Fix No Chevys" - I hate the double negative!!

My mom was a stickler for good English. I am not much of a grammar cop, but I have always hated the use of double negatives.

Encouraging boys to use poor English skills keeps them out of high paying professions. We should have higher expectations.

Do not assume it is just a catchy title, It says the books particularly appeal to minority youth. I am guessing there is a good chance that there is 'black English' through out the books because the author assumes that is all the reader can relate to. I know from experience as I have purchased some special pre-school aged books to read to my kids at night that featured black characters, only to find out that the dialogue was stereotypical black English.

My kids are bi-racial (half black) and I was disappointed that books geard for them had such low English standards, as I do not want my boys to ever talk that way.

Getting boys to read is a good thing, but perpetuating poor English might close some doors for them.

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Submitted by Kris on Sun, 2009-08-02 17:02

More mothers like yourself who are aware of the 'boy crisis' will always defend their sons and become solutions to the problem.

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Submitted by anthony on Sun, 2009-08-02 19:25