On the role of teachers helping (or not) cultivate the habit of reading. The referenced sample is small but possibly indicative. Doing the calculation implied at the end of the quote, only 5% of students believe teachers know what books students like.
In fact, 35 percent of the seventh grade students in a survey that one of my former students conducted said that they couldn't recall a single teacher ever recommending a book of any kind to them, and 60 percent recalled only one teacher who had ever done so (Cararini). And if their teachers did recommend books, it was usually classics that the teachers had read in college, books that were written for well-educated, leisured adults and that don't have a single teenage character in them. In that same survey of kids in a medium size city middle school, only three out of fifty-seven eight graders surveyed checked the statement, "Teachers know what books students like."
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment