A year and a half ago, we read four of the Mercy Watson books-Mercy Watson to the Rescue, Mercy Watson goes for a drive, Mercy Watson fights crime and Mercy Watson as a princess. Sunlight boy loved the silly stories. Ballet girl not so much. The big cousin boy really liked when Mercy caught a robber. Yesterday, I wanted to read to the kids a funny story, something very silly, something which is not an informative text, which is not part of a more elaborate text; and then I remembered Mercy. You should have seen the excitement in the house. Fireworks were everywhere and when Mercy went to the rescue did not disappoint. I ordered all of the books from the library, so we will read these instead of Babe, the gallant pig which I read and found utterly dull.
While I was looking at other books by the same author, I came across this new book which is to come in August 2014 and is on pre-order for around $9 on amazon.com. I have to confess, I did read The tale of Despereax by the Kate DiCamillo, a book which is very popular among homeschoolers, and I found it very complicated and not suitable for the age groups to which homeschooling parents were reading it (kids my kids' ages).
Speaking of homeschooling parents I have to mention this. A lot of stay-at-home moms are plain obsessed with exposing their children to 'great literature' which is literally a bombardment of their kids with read-alouds. One of the things I absolutely disliked about literature class in school, both in the US and in Bulgaria, was that we were expected to read books at the speed of light. While I understood it at the time, I fully realized it when I experienced it as a member of the work force with long commute- namely, that enjoying literature requires time and patience, otherwise it is not an experience but a race. So, of everything, I'd rather expose my children to less, but good literature and attach to the exposure ample room for experience of the books we read-reenactment, pondering, drawing, questions, solutions, alternative, opinions. None of this can be accomplished in the time frames kids are given these days. And with the speed and the rate of reading, kids are inevitably going to mix and match the stories and the authors and the narrative techniques and richness. Less with more is more. Please read, but not as a conveyor belt, read to experience the reading. There are too many books in the world. You will not be able to read them all. And what was 'classic' three hundred years ago is not 'classic' today, and this is completely fine. The books had their impact in their time, now it is time for new books to impact us in new, relevant ways. With this I confess that I do not like:
Greek Mythology which I view as soap opera ancient Greek style, the archaic styles of Charles Dickens, Jane Austin, Shakespeare, Victor Hugo, and the boring contents of Lord of the Flies, Catcher in the Rye, To kill a mocking bird, Frankenstein, The great Gatsby, Of Mice and Men, MobyDick which is the alternative spelling for extremely boring, and of course let's not forget that all Dostoyevski books are over-rated. Plus none of these books were written for kids as the intended audience, they were written for bored aristocrats and adults who found discussing and reading aloud literature a good pass-time. Literature is taken out of context in the classroom and bears no meaning to the students, it is just another hurdle to hump over. Oh, sigh!
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