Thumbs up for audiobooks
Posted by: Mary
Yay! Lisa Von Drasek takes on Kristof of the NYT on summer reading in her EarlyWord post Summer Reading? Good! Assigned Reading? Bad. The Horn Book’s Roger Sutton anticipated this debate last week with his Twitter question, “Topic for my class today: why does required reading feel more difficult?”
My response? The automatic reaction of “You’re not the boss of me!” Call me Mary, Mary, quite contrary, but if it was assigned, I entered the literary relationship with a chip on my shoulder. I was past age 50 before I could read and enjoy The Great Gatsby, so mercilessly taught-to-death in my high school language arts class. But from the time I could toddle, if you put me down in a library or book store, I’m like a kid in a candy store. Booklist’s Media editor Sue-Ellen Beauregard will tell you that I will only review audiobooks that I love. For me, life is too short to spend time with literature that doesn’t make a personal connection. So many audiobooks, so little time!
July 6th, 2009 at 4:26 pm
This is so true. My nine year old daughter signed up for a summer reading program and she’s just barely keeping up with the minimum reading schedule. But she’s reading voraciously on her own. She just finished the first four books of the “I Freddy” series by Dietlof Reiche in a week (about 200 pages each) and the week before she finished the Books of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau. She really enjoyed the books on the reading schedule and it was her idea to sign up for the program but it’s interesting how the structure of the program inhibits her natural enthusiasm.