Ravenwood - 12/13/04 07:30 AM
Maryland teachers are going to start using comic books to try to get kids to read.
Several more Maryland counties will begin using the comic book-based curriculum in the spring, though officials have not determined which books it will use. The rest of the state's school districts will introduce the curriculum at the start of the next school year.When I was in school, teachers would try anything to get a kid to read. Some were even known to hand a kid a book and give him a week or two to come up with a 10 page report on the subject. In the really extreme cases, they would surprise a kid by quizzing him on the subject at the beginning of class.Officials said the project will target students from kindergarten to high school, including children who speak limited English.
"You see kids reading comic books, buying comic books, and they seem totally engrossed," State Superintendent of Schools Nancy S. Grasmick said. "It looks like there's really some potential here." She said comic books are not meant to replace traditional reading materials but rather to be used as a supplement.
"When I was in school, teachers would try anything to get a kid to read. Some were even known to hand a kid a book and give him a week or two to come up with a 10 page report on the subject. In the really extreme cases, they would surprise a kid by quizzing him on the subject at the beginning of class."
But today that would harm the child's self-esteem, and his parent (usually there's only one) might sue the school.
Posted by: Kevin Baker at December 13, 2004 8:04 AMThis sounds eerily like a natural progression for the public education system as currently administered. Feed the children even more utopian socialist fantasy using a popular format (which is already familiar to most as a vehicle for fantastic stories) and pass it off as "education".
One might wonder, "who will be the heros in these publications?" Certainly not anyone mentioning "God" or the rights of the individual.
Posted by: Steve Scudder at December 13, 2004 8:08 AMStop living in the past, willya? Jeez, before you know it, you'll be regaling us with stories of how, when you were a kid, you had to walk 10 miles to school in the snow, and it was uphill both ways.
No, wait...that was me.... ;0)
Posted by: Jack Cluth at December 13, 2004 8:11 AMIt kind of depends on the books they are replacing. What I've seen used most in elementary schools are horrible things written by a committee of educrats, good for nothing except teaching kids to hate reading. Marvel comics definitely beat that. They might even have a larger vocabulary and more complex sentence structures.
If you need comics at high school level, you should send the kids back to elementary school - but they're still better than The Catcher in the Rye.
Posted by: markm at December 13, 2004 9:20 AMHeck, back in my school, they even used the self-esteem crushing red pens.
I've still never fully recovered.
Posted by: roger at December 13, 2004 12:40 PM(c) Ravenwood and Associates, 1990 - 2014
