Since I teach books to kids every day, I encounter this lack of “wonder” all the time. Usually the curriculum (and I, too) read a book to teach some specific point: this is what we should do, this is what we shouldn’t do, this is how this works. It’s astounding when I end up going off script and reading something like “Where the Wild Things Are”, and then suddenly all my usual prompting questions fail. I just end up asking: “…well, what do YOU think?” and just let them talk, because it’s not trying to make some specific, hamfisted point. It’s just wonderful.
Especially loved the shoutout to the Redwall books, they were dear to me growing up and remain so–as I reread them with my 10-year-old nephew they hold up pretty well, though I will say that I find the way that Jacques splits the various types of animals into binary categories of "naughty" or "nice" quite troubling.
Lol I absolutely feel you on that. Feels like he tried to sort that out some in Outcast and in Taggerung, but such are the limits of anthropomorphized animals
Since I teach books to kids every day, I encounter this lack of “wonder” all the time. Usually the curriculum (and I, too) read a book to teach some specific point: this is what we should do, this is what we shouldn’t do, this is how this works. It’s astounding when I end up going off script and reading something like “Where the Wild Things Are”, and then suddenly all my usual prompting questions fail. I just end up asking: “…well, what do YOU think?” and just let them talk, because it’s not trying to make some specific, hamfisted point. It’s just wonderful.
We definitely need books in the former category but those in the latter are the ones they (and you!) will be forever changed by. I think that’s great
Especially loved the shoutout to the Redwall books, they were dear to me growing up and remain so–as I reread them with my 10-year-old nephew they hold up pretty well, though I will say that I find the way that Jacques splits the various types of animals into binary categories of "naughty" or "nice" quite troubling.
Lol I absolutely feel you on that. Feels like he tried to sort that out some in Outcast and in Taggerung, but such are the limits of anthropomorphized animals