Alice Kuipers's Blog: Book Club, page 54

Hey John! I live right outside of Dallas and a few school districts in the area have been pressured to suspend books from the 10th grade curriculum (fortunately not my district). We were assigned an article to read about these suspensions for a class, and

This case seems especially enlightening to me because there are so few “dirty” or “controversial” parts in An Abundance of Katherines. I mean, it’s a buddy novel about two best friends who literally use the word “fug” in lieu of the word “fuck,” and who when they curse, do so mostly in Arabic or German. Is the non-English cursing the issue? It it the book’s abundance of abstract mathematics? Its misplacement of the tomb of Archduke Franz Ferdinand? The fact that one of the central characters is a Muslim?

I really don’t know. And it’s not clear to me that the school districts that have banned the book have a particularly good handle on the “why” of it either. 

I’m sorry if I sound a little exasperated here, but I’m frustrated because we train and pay teachers to teach, and then we don’t trust them to teach. 

Some parents seem to feel that public school exists solely for the benefit of their children and that everything in the curriculum must align with their value systems. But that’s ludicrous: Public schools exist for the benefit of the PUBLIC, so that we as a country might have a better educated population capable of critical thinking. We decided centuries ago that this was good—that education in childhood leads to more informed and engaged citizens, and that education also helps people to grow the economy through innovation and increased productivity. 

So my frustration isn’t with Katherines or any other book. It’s about what schools should do: Should schools tell you only what your parents think they should tell you? Or should that stuff be decided by the educators who’ve been trained explicitly for that purpose?

Hey John! I live right outside of Dallas and a few school districts in the area have been pressured to suspend books from the 10th grade curriculum (fortunately not my district). We were assigned an article to read about these suspensions for a class, and

This case seems especially enlightening to me because there are so few “dirty” or “controversial” parts in An Abundance of Katherines. I mean, it’s a buddy novel about two best friends who literally use the word “fug” in lieu of the word “fuck,” and who when they curse, do so mostly in Arabic or German. Is the non-English cursing the issue? It it the book’s abundance of abstract mathematics? Its misplacement of the tomb of Archduke Franz Ferdinand? The fact that one of the central characters is a Muslim?

I really don’t know. And it’s not clear to me that the school districts that have banned the book have a particularly good handle on the “why” of it either. 

I’m sorry if I sound a little exasperated here, but I’m frustrated because we train and pay teachers to teach, and then we don’t trust them to teach. 

Some parents seem to feel that public school exists solely for the benefit of their children and that everything in the curriculum must align with their value systems. But that’s ludicrous: Public schools exist for the benefit of the PUBLIC, so that we as a country might have a better educated population capable of critical thinking. We decided centuries ago that this was good—that education in childhood leads to more informed and engaged citizens, and that education also helps people to grow the economy through innovation and increased productivity. 

So my frustration isn’t with Katherines or any other book. It’s about what schools should do: Should schools tell you only what your parents think they should tell you? Or should that stuff be decided by the educators who’ve been trained explicitly for that purpose?

Hey John! I live right outside of Dallas and a few school districts in the area have been pressured to suspend books from the 10th grade curriculum (fortunately not my district). We were assigned an article to read about these suspensions for a class, and

This case seems especially enlightening to me because there are so few “dirty” or “controversial” parts in An Abundance of Katherines. I mean, it’s a buddy novel about two best friends who literally use the word “fug” in lieu of the word “fuck,” and who when they curse, do so mostly in Arabic or German. Is the non-English cursing the issue? It it the book’s abundance of abstract mathematics? Its misplacement of the tomb of Archduke Franz Ferdinand? The fact that one of the central characters is a Muslim?

I really don’t know. And it’s not clear to me that the school districts that have banned the book have a particularly good handle on the “why” of it either. 

I’m sorry if I sound a little exasperated here, but I’m frustrated because we train and pay teachers to teach, and then we don’t trust them to teach. 

Some parents seem to feel that public school exists solely for the benefit of their children and that everything in the curriculum must align with their value systems. But that’s ludicrous: Public schools exist for the benefit of the PUBLIC, so that we as a country might have a better educated population capable of critical thinking. We decided centuries ago that this was good—that education in childhood leads to more informed and engaged citizens, and that education also helps people to grow the economy through innovation and increased productivity. 

So my frustration isn’t with Katherines or any other book. It’s about what schools should do: Should schools tell you only what your parents think they should tell you? Or should that stuff be decided by the educators who’ve been trained explicitly for that purpose?

Hey John! I live right outside of Dallas and a few school districts in the area have been pressured to suspend books from the 10th grade curriculum (fortunately not my district). We were assigned an article to read about these suspensions for a class, and

This case seems especially enlightening to me because there are so few “dirty” or “controversial” parts in An Abundance of Katherines. I mean, it’s a buddy novel about two best friends who literally use the word “fug” in lieu of the word “fuck,” and who when they curse, do so mostly in Arabic or German. Is the non-English cursing the issue? It it the book’s abundance of abstract mathematics? Its misplacement of the tomb of Archduke Franz Ferdinand? The fact that one of the central characters is a Muslim?

I really don’t know. And it’s not clear to me that the school districts that have banned the book have a particularly good handle on the “why” of it either. 

I’m sorry if I sound a little exasperated here, but I’m frustrated because we train and pay teachers to teach, and then we don’t trust them to teach. 

Some parents seem to feel that public school exists solely for the benefit of their children and that everything in the curriculum must align with their value systems. But that’s ludicrous: Public schools exist for the benefit of the PUBLIC, so that we as a country might have a better educated population capable of critical thinking. We decided centuries ago that this was good—that education in childhood leads to more informed and engaged citizens, and that education also helps people to grow the economy through innovation and increased productivity. 

So my frustration isn’t with Katherines or any other book. It’s about what schools should do: Should schools tell you only what your parents think they should tell you? Or should that stuff be decided by the educators who’ve been trained explicitly for that purpose?

Hey John! I live right outside of Dallas and a few school districts in the area have been pressured to suspend books from the 10th grade curriculum (fortunately not my district). We were assigned an article to read about these suspensions for a class, and

This case seems especially enlightening to me because there are so few “dirty” or “controversial” parts in An Abundance of Katherines. I mean, it’s a buddy novel about two best friends who literally use the word “fug” in lieu of the word “fuck,” and who when they curse, do so mostly in Arabic or German. Is the non-English cursing the issue? It it the book’s abundance of abstract mathematics? Its misplacement of the tomb of Archduke Franz Ferdinand? The fact that one of the central characters is a Muslim?

I really don’t know. And it’s not clear to me that the school districts that have banned the book have a particularly good handle on the “why” of it either. 

I’m sorry if I sound a little exasperated here, but I’m frustrated because we train and pay teachers to teach, and then we don’t trust them to teach. 

Some parents seem to feel that public school exists solely for the benefit of their children and that everything in the curriculum must align with their value systems. But that’s ludicrous: Public schools exist for the benefit of the PUBLIC, so that we as a country might have a better educated population capable of critical thinking. We decided centuries ago that this was good—that education in childhood leads to more informed and engaged citizens, and that education also helps people to grow the economy through innovation and increased productivity. 

So my frustration isn’t with Katherines or any other book. It’s about what schools should do: Should schools tell you only what your parents think they should tell you? Or should that stuff be decided by the educators who’ve been trained explicitly for that purpose?

Hey John! I live right outside of Dallas and a few school districts in the area have been pressured to suspend books from the 10th grade curriculum (fortunately not my district). We were assigned an article to read about these suspensions for a class, and

This case seems especially enlightening to me because there are so few “dirty” or “controversial” parts in An Abundance of Katherines. I mean, it’s a buddy novel about two best friends who literally use the word “fug” in lieu of the word “fuck,” and who when they curse, do so mostly in Arabic or German. Is the non-English cursing the issue? It it the book’s abundance of abstract mathematics? Its misplacement of the tomb of Archduke Franz Ferdinand? The fact that one of the central characters is a Muslim?

I really don’t know. And it’s not clear to me that the school districts that have banned the book have a particularly good handle on the “why” of it either. 

I’m sorry if I sound a little exasperated here, but I’m frustrated because we train and pay teachers to teach, and then we don’t trust them to teach. 

Some parents seem to feel that public school exists solely for the benefit of their children and that everything in the curriculum must align with their value systems. But that’s ludicrous: Public schools exist for the benefit of the PUBLIC, so that we as a country might have a better educated population capable of critical thinking. We decided centuries ago that this was good—that education in childhood leads to more informed and engaged citizens, and that education also helps people to grow the economy through innovation and increased productivity. 

So my frustration isn’t with Katherines or any other book. It’s about what schools should do: Should schools tell you only what your parents think they should tell you? Or should that stuff be decided by the educators who’ve been trained explicitly for that purpose?

Hey John! I live right outside of Dallas and a few school districts in the area have been pressured to suspend books from the 10th grade curriculum (fortunately not my district). We were assigned an article to read about these suspensions for a class, and

This case seems especially enlightening to me because there are so few “dirty” or “controversial” parts in An Abundance of Katherines. I mean, it’s a buddy novel about two best friends who literally use the word “fug” in lieu of the word “fuck,” and who when they curse, do so mostly in Arabic or German. Is the non-English cursing the issue? It it the book’s abundance of abstract mathematics? Its misplacement of the tomb of Archduke Franz Ferdinand? The fact that one of the central characters is a Muslim?

I really don’t know. And it’s not clear to me that the school districts that have banned the book have a particularly good handle on the “why” of it either. 

I’m sorry if I sound a little exasperated here, but I’m frustrated because we train and pay teachers to teach, and then we don’t trust them to teach. 

Some parents seem to feel that public school exists solely for the benefit of their children and that everything in the curriculum must align with their value systems. But that’s ludicrous: Public schools exist for the benefit of the PUBLIC, so that we as a country might have a better educated population capable of critical thinking. We decided centuries ago that this was good—that education in childhood leads to more informed and engaged citizens, and that education also helps people to grow the economy through innovation and increased productivity. 

So my frustration isn’t with Katherines or any other book. It’s about what schools should do: Should schools tell you only what your parents think they should tell you? Or should that stuff be decided by the educators who’ve been trained explicitly for that purpose?

Use this image to write about endings and new beginnings.

Use this image to write about endings and new beginnings.

From The School Library Journal

Violet Small is determined to write the most amazing book ever. She requests the help of her twin, and though Victor would rather mess around with his pet worms, her fervor soon pulls him into the project. As the siblings collaborate on The Best-Ever Bookworm Book(Little, Brown, 2014; K-Gr 4), ideas are shared, a plot percolates, and an enchanting tale evolves. Alice Kuipers hands the narrative reins over to her protagonists, who convey their first-person accounts in color-coded text—violet for Violet of course, and peach for Victor (the children wear corresponding T-shirts). The unfolding tale is presented on loose-leaf backgrounds of violet or peach, cleverly indicating which young author contributed each segment. The book makes a beguiling read-aloud, but youngsters will also want to take a close look at Bethanie Deeney Murguia’s inventive artwork. Sketched in graphite pencil, the winsome round-faced siblings take center stage in the realistic scenes; whimsical collages assembled from embossed book covers, antique prints and maps, and well-worn library pockets and check-out cards depict fantastical in-story moments. This charming exploration of the creative process will inspire young writers.

booksandpublishing:My book pile at work seems to grow every...

booksandpublishing:

My book pile at work seems to grow every time I look away. That’s the only explanation I have.

I have the same problem at home….