Week 05: Boys and Reading

Week 5: Boys and Reading
February 23-March 1

This week really gave some things to think about with boys and reading.  The many issues that seem to be a commonality are that boys approach reading differently because they lose interest in reading at a very young age.  This problem may arise from the fact that there seems to be more “female teachers teaching female books” (St. Jarre, 2008) than male teachers.  Will “male teachers s role models” (Watson, Kehler, Martio, 2010, p.358) make the difference?  But, even if there were more male teachers do they continue to treat boys as masculine figures; “hegemonic approach” (Watson, Kehler, Martio, 2010, p.360)?  Then, as boys climb higher and higher in grades, the interest level is further discouraged because of the girly type reading list of materials; and continues to follow them all throughout their education.  This further attributes to the “school is stupid and they (boys) don’t like to read” (Sax, 207, p.42) trend, and that reading is for girls.

Out of all the articles I really thought, The boy problem, by Leonard Sax, provided insightful information about how all boys may increase performance in reading attention and interest by rethinking the overall picture in the approach.  Sax explains that we need to grab boys’ interests in reading at a younger age and when they are ready, try same sex classes and to provide less rigid behavior rules.   One of the things mentioned in the article that really stood out was the study on brain development between boys and girls.  This study showed that a male five-year-old brain is developmentally comparable to that of a three and a half-year-old female brain.  Have you ever tried to teach a three and a half year old girl to read?  No, I haven’t either, but I could agree with Sax that it would probably be just as hard as trying to teach a five year old boy; I’ll say it would probably drive me crazy trying to achieve this.  Why?  Because the brain isn’t usually developmentally ready to achieve this.  This makes me wonder about the program, “Your baby can read” showing toddlers reading at very young ages.  According to their research:

“A baby’s brain thrives on stimulation and develops at a phenomenal pace…nearly 90% during the first five years of life! The best and easiest time to learn a language is during the infant and toddler years…when the brain is creating thousands of synapses, or connections, allowing a child to learn both the written word and spoken word simultaneously.” (Your Baby Can, LLC., 2011)

So how can libraries and we as future librarians help in this matter?  I think that it is a point of making sure that our collection of reading material(s) are balanced, for both sexes interests, and continue to provide the ever important “entry point books” (Farris, et al., 2009, p. 182) that will appeal to and hopefully hook those male reluctant readers.

I have to admit that I don’t acutally work with tweens, a school library or a pulbic library so all that I can compare my experiences about this weeks reading is from articles and journals.   I do work in a special library designed just for school teacher’s so it isn’t that I don’t really know what types of materials would be useful.  My collection of materials come from those “reading lists” provided by the state deparment of education as well as professional journals and other review sources from vendors.   Our recent purchase of library books were selected specifically for the male market in junior high and high school level.  The idea was to provide a wider selection of materials to choose from for their reading ‘free reading” time.

References

Don’t Blame the Boys: We’re Giving Them Girly Books. Kevin R St Jarre. English Journal; Jan 2008; 97, 3. pg. 15

Farris, P. J., et. al., Male Call: Fifth-Grade Boys’ Reading Preferences. The Reading Teacher v. 63 no. 3 (November 2009) p. 180-8.

Sax, L. The Boy Problem. School Library Journal v. 53 no. 9 (September 2007) p. 40-3

Watson, A., et. al., The Problem of Boys’ Literacy Underachievement: Raising Some Questions. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy v. 53 no. 5 (February 2010) p. 356-61.

“Your Baby Can Read® .” Your Baby Can Read® . Version 2011. Your Baby Can, LLC., 1 Jan. 1997. Web. 26 Feb. 2011. <http://www.yourbabycanread.com/&gt;.

Readings for week 5

Do you know about citation linker? If not, check it out: http://sfx.calstate.edu:9003/sanjose/cgi/core/citation-linker.cgi  (very handy little tool)

Let’s dig a little deeper into the boys and reading issue:

  • Watson, A., et. al., The Problem of Boys’ Literacy Underachievement: Raising Some Questions. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy v. 53 no. 5 (February 2010) p. 356-61.
  • Farris, P. J., et. al., Male Call: Fifth-Grade Boys’ Reading Preferences. The Reading Teacher v. 63 no. 3 (November 2009) p. 180-8.
  • Don’t Blame the Boys: We’re Giving Them Girly Books. Kevin R St Jarre. English Journal; Jan 2008; 97, 3. pg. 15
  • Sax, L. The Boy Problem. School Library Journal v. 53 no. 9 (September 2007) p. 40-3
  • Visit Jon Scieszka’s Guys Read websitehttp://www.guysread.com/

Possible reflections:

How do the recommendations and studies presented in these readings square with your own experience? What seems counter-intuitive? What do you see as the key factors in promoting boys’ reading? What common threads run through these readings?

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