Unpopular opinion, high schools should be highly selective about what’s age-appropriate to teach kids.
@moonman people underestimate what's "age-appropriate" though. I think required reading should prepare high school students for the concept that the outside world is an unfair and often ugly place.
I was never given any reading restrictions at all and as a result i was reading at an adult level around 10 years old and had far outstripped "age appropriate" reading lists by the time i was 13. I had to get special permission to read books like "Lord of the Flies" and "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" for book reports in school because these were considered "too advanced" for a 13-year-old mind. The real reason was prudishness; each had an extremely euphemistic scene that might be considered sexual in nature even though there was no sex, only hints. The scenes were more about violence, of which there was plenty in the "age-appropriate" books of the time.
In theory it's a nice idea, but in practice, the Karens of the world keep kids from reading perfectly acceptable books for the simple fact that they didn't like them.
I was never given any reading restrictions at all and as a result i was reading at an adult level around 10 years old and had far outstripped "age appropriate" reading lists by the time i was 13. I had to get special permission to read books like "Lord of the Flies" and "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" for book reports in school because these were considered "too advanced" for a 13-year-old mind. The real reason was prudishness; each had an extremely euphemistic scene that might be considered sexual in nature even though there was no sex, only hints. The scenes were more about violence, of which there was plenty in the "age-appropriate" books of the time.
In theory it's a nice idea, but in practice, the Karens of the world keep kids from reading perfectly acceptable books for the simple fact that they didn't like them.
@Grandtheftautism @realcaseyrollins @moonman
When I was a kid I learned to read when I was still in diapers. I was never forbidden to read anything. I would sit on the living room floor with 5 or 6 encyclopedias open in front of me. My father was a pharmaceutical salesman and we had tons of medical books. My favourite was the dermatology book that was full of colour pics of oozing sores, tumours, rashes etc.
When I was a kid I learned to read when I was still in diapers. I was never forbidden to read anything. I would sit on the living room floor with 5 or 6 encyclopedias open in front of me. My father was a pharmaceutical salesman and we had tons of medical books. My favourite was the dermatology book that was full of colour pics of oozing sores, tumours, rashes etc.
@Creepella @Grandtheftautism @moonman The only thing I wasn't allowed to read were superhero comic books, and even then that embargo was lifted in my mid to late teens
@realcaseyrollins @Grandtheftautism @moonman My father would yell at me sometimes if he caught me with his medical books, but it was mostly if he caught me looking at graphic photos which he deemed "unsuitable"
@realcaseyrollins @Grandtheftautism @moonman
Of course, my enhanced reading skills came back to haunt me when I was old enough to go to school. None of the other kids could understand me because I knew a lot of "big words". I overheard them calling me "that scientific kid". So in kindergarten I'd sit in the corner all day reading the books. Then when the teacher read stories to the class I'd cut in and tell the kids how the book ended, just to be a bastard.
Of course, my enhanced reading skills came back to haunt me when I was old enough to go to school. None of the other kids could understand me because I knew a lot of "big words". I overheard them calling me "that scientific kid". So in kindergarten I'd sit in the corner all day reading the books. Then when the teacher read stories to the class I'd cut in and tell the kids how the book ended, just to be a bastard.
@realcaseyrollins @Creepella @moonman my mom just refused to buy them because we blew threw them in 10 minutes. If we wanted to save up and buy them ourselves, it was allowed. We figured out pretty quickly that she was right, there was more entertainment value in other things.
@Grandtheftautism @Creepella @moonman I was homeschooled so most my books came from the library.
@Creepella @moonman @realcaseyrollins when i think of how many times i had to get a signed permission slip to read a book i wanted, it makes me mad. If the kid doesn't understand it, they can ask about it, and learn.
Take, for instance, The Egypt Game; a supremely fucked-up book about kids larping about Ancient Egypt while hiding from a serial killer who eventually finds them. The only reason I can think of that The Egypt Game was allowed and Lord of the Flies was that The Egypt Game had a Newbery Medal of Honor and Lord of the Flies did not, being wriiten by an English author (although it did win a Pulitzer Prize). Parents were somehow convinced that every book on the Newbery Medal list was a good and wholesome book that one could give to their children without question, and certainly without going to the trouble of reading it oneself.
For comparison
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Egypt_Game
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_of_the_Flies