Creating Wild Readers part 2

Chapter 2 of Reading in the Wild embodies the importance of choice within the wild reader. It begins with a quote from Neil Gaiman that I thoroughly enjoyed:

“Read. Read anything. Read the things they say are good for you, and the things they claim are junk. You’ll find what you need to find. Just read.”

From this quote I got a sense of whatever you choose to read is fate. When you pick up a book it’s because it spoke to you. When someone suggests a book to you, maybe you’re supposed to read it, or when someone doesn’t suggest a book to you maybe you’re supposed to read that one, too. Reading is a freedom we have, and choosing what to read is almost like the manifest destiny of literacy. Children should explore their “new world” and the only way to do this is to pick up a book and start reading — just read.
This freedom of choice can be a difficult concept for students to grasp and they probably will become overwhelmed with so many different books they can chose from. This is where the teaching comes in. Students need to start developing their literacy identity! and one way to do this is to have a strong identity yourself (as the educator). This way you can role model for your students. However, Miller keeps a significant prominence on teaching students how to chose their own books. I believe this is extremely important — kind of like the Chinese proverb “give a man a fish and he will eat for a day, teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime”. It is easy as a teacher to give them a book you know they will enjoy, but they won’t always have someone there to put great books in their hand. We must show them how to do this themselves so they can carry this trait with them for the rest of their lives.

Miller outlines how to teach students this skill in a very sequential way. First, we must give them the knowledge they need about books. She goes into a lot of detail on this step: author information, genre, how to navigate a library, how to build a reading community (my favorite). Once they gain this knowledge they can then make a good choice on their own. Then, when they make a good choice, and enjoy a book they chose, it builds their confidence. They gain a positive reading experience and begin to trust their own intuition. Once they trust themselves, they become wild readers!

Now I would like the bring up something I thought was sceptical in Miller’s second chapter. Not that I don’t agree or am spiteful, I just thought it was an “out of the blue” abstraction. On page 66 she is talking about readers in her class that are at a higher level of reading and to make sure you have books in stock that register with them. Then she jumps to this statement: “If a parent or administrator questions a particular book, I can justify why the book sits on our shelves”. It seems as if Miller might have had this kind of problem before. As future teachers, we are constantly reminded of the horrors of parents like they’re some crazy beasts of no nature breathing down our backs, staring at us through the eyes of their children, and haunting our every move. Believe me, I am sure there are going to be parents like these, and I’m all for contacting the administration of Chico State for the possibility of adding “Concepts in Psychopathic Parental Actions” in our liberal studies pathway. I guess what I am saying is I wish I knew more about what Miller dealt with and how she handled these circumstances — how these situations can affect not only the students but her career. As teachers we are going to be walking on eggshells, and having a classroom library can open up opportunities for parents/administration to judge our teachings as wrong. Miller states that if “parents disapprove of a book their children bring home, encourage students to chose something else”, however for some reason I don’t think it will be that simple.