"Readicide" and Other Teaching Thoughts

Merry Christmas, all!

Today I finally read the book Readicide by Kelly Gallagher (highly recommend it for all educators!). It was recommended to me by a fellow Lang. Arts teacher with whom I had some excellent discussions about the purpose of teaching and what's going on in our schools today. Basically the premise of the book is that the hyper-focus on testing and test preparation now prevalent in our schools is not only ineffective but is actually killing budding potential readers (hence the read-icide). I found myself frequently "amen"-ing throughout this book.

The main reason I wanted to write about it here is that I really felt affirmed in my instincts as a teacher after reading this book. As those of you who have been reading along with me this year may have noticed, I've been struggling a lot with feeling uncertain and discouraged about teaching. This whole test-prep thing is disheartening for me, since what I really love is books and learning, so it feels really encouraging and affirming to see suggested in an excellent book the very same framework and ideas for teaching books/reading/learning that I have been wanting to do all year long! Examples include spending almost as much time on "leisure reading" as academic reading, having reading time in class (even though we have SSR during our advisory) and having kids read as much and many types of reading material as is humanly possible.

Feeling reenergized for the new semester. I WILL make this work; I WILL teach in a way that embodies my love of books and learning; and I WILL ensure that my kids leave my classroom knowing more than just how to pick a theme off a four-item list.

~Rebekah