The Dumbing-Down of the Summer Reading List

I'm not 100% certain what the specific books assigned as summer reading by the high school I attended were, but I do know that they were serious literary works. I remember senior year we got to choose from several options but I don't recall what the options were nor which one I ultimately picked since that was the summer I spent preparing for the Advanced Placement Literature exam. I do remember my best friend picked Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton because she absolutely HATED the ending of it, LOL! I believe that A Separate Peace by John Knowles may have been 9th, Great Expectations by Charles Dickens may have been 10th, and an Arthur Miller anthology may have been 11th but I'm not totally sure about that.

Anyways, I was reminded of this today when I read an article in the Christian Science Monitor called "High School Reading Lists Get a Modern Makeover." What I found particularly interesting was the comparison between the assigned reading lists of the 1960's vs. the 1980's vs. today:

"Of the nine most commonly taught books in public high schools in 1963, only one (the 1938 play Our Town) was written in the 20th century. By 1988, the 10 most commonly taught novels in public schools included four books from the 20th century: The Great Gatsby (1925), Of Mice and Men (1937), Lord of the Flies (1954), and To Kill a Mockingbird (1960). Today, staples in summer reading lists include: Life of Pi by Yann Martel, The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini, Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon, Monster by Walter Dean Myer, and The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold."

Now, it's certainly possible that 50 years from now, certain of these recently-published books will be considered "classics". The Kite Runner in particular I've heard is an excellent book. However, shouldn't we be waiting to see which modern books stand the test of time before deciding to replace an actual classic on school reading lists? If we're going to have children read Alice Sebold rather than Jane Austen or Edith Wharton, shouldn't we be confident that Ms. Sebold's book has a lasting impact such as Miss Austen's or Mrs. Wharton's novels?

The CSM article quotes Arizona State University professor Alleen Nilsen as applauding the modernization trend:

"It used to be, no matter where you were in high school, you got this list of classics that the value was to talk about them with other people, not to read them yourself," she says. "We're taking this lesson from the [physical education] teachers. Rather than making kids do these things they hate, they're letting them choose what they want to do, so that when they're adults, they'll keep exercising. Summer reading is the perfect time if we want to get kids to read the rest of their lives without us sitting over their heads and telling them what to read. Let them ... just lose themselves in a good book."

Actually, the value of reading classic literature is not just for cultural literacy purposes, though that's certainly important. As Tracey Lee Simmons discusses in his excellent book Climbing Parnassus, the value of reading literature, attending the symphony, or viewing a museum exhibition is to improve ourselves by exposure to the highest achievements of the past (emphasis in the original):

"[Great works] did not merely entertain; they exposed us to something better than we could find elsewhere. And we hoped that such exposure would make us better as well- healthier intellectually and emotionally....Classical education was thought to improve the learner, not simply to make him more knowledgeable or tolerant or mentally skillful, but better and stronger, just as there survives today a residual belief that one who has, say, read and digested all of Shakespeare is better, more insightful, than one who has not."

Besides, many literary works are great stories that are enjoyable to read. Dickens and Shakespeare specifically wrote to entertain popular audiences. There's no reason why students can't "lose themselves in a good book" as Dr. Nilsen puts it while reading classic literature.

Teacher Nick Senger has several excellent blogs, and one of them is called "Teen Literacy Tips". In it, he writes about how to get reluctant teenagers excited about reading. His list of "30 Must-Read Classics for Teenage Boys" includes a ton of books with great narratives to interest both boys *and* girls (or at least this female, LOL!)