Every single DPS teacher gets a pink slip

[DetroitTeacher]

Don't forget the VC Andrews books! Incest, inter-racial romance, sex, all forbidden fruits of the time n[[at least in literature for a young adult). My mom and I actually traded books back and forth.

I have a bracelet that says "I read banned books" and it has about 10 titles on it. To Kill A Mockingbird has been banned in many places! One of my all time faves! I must have read that in 4th grade on a cross country trip in the family wagon! Mom always kept a stack of books in the car. I was never told that I couldn't read something [[except that darn Wifey book) so I try not to tell my kids what to read and what not to read. If I tell them not to read it, that just makes them want to read it all that much more...maybe I should change my MO in getting them to read??

[English]

OMG! V.C. ANDREWS???? You have just taken me back to middle school!!! I think my friends and I read everything that she wrote! Wow, was that ever an adolescent rite of passage...

Do the kids today read her? I was a child of the 1980s [[born in the mid-70s), so my youngest years were completely free of Jerry Springer-style confessional talk shows and reality TV. They still bleeped out curse words on TV until I was well into my teens. But my baby sib, nearly a decade younger than I, grew up during a very different time. I was also much more sheltered than my younger siblings and cousins were, because I was the oldest and my parents were younger and more energetic. Things that were -- and are -- huge shockers for me are passe for them. I've found that to be true of most of today's teenagers. Would they find Flowers in the Attic boring?

Yes, English teachers and librarians will never agree with people censoring, banning, or burning books.

[DetroitTeacher]

Kids around my son's age [[24) read VC Andrews [[well his former g/f and all her friends did). I don't think he younger kids do. I couldn't ever put down one of her books. Right now, I am recommending Jodi Piccoult [[My Sister's Keeper) to my students. I really like her style of writing and her stories are based on real events [[Columbine, for example). She tells the story through each character's viewpoint...each character gets a chapter to tell their version of what happened. She's great to show point of view, narrative [[which is in the Michigan Standards for High school). I really wish there were money in our budgets for novels. The kids read the screenplay of To Kill A Mockingbird [[it's what DPS bought) and it's just not the same as the novel. I think EVERY kid should read that novel!

DPS really needs input from teachers as to which novels to buy. We have about a zillion copies of Don Quixote floating around DPS. It was a horrid choice for a book for the kids! It's about 4 billion pages long and teenie tiny print. Not one teacher wanted to tackle that book with the kids. I don't think we ever unpacked them from the shipping boxes. Now, they did buy "Tuesdays with Morrie" and the kids enjoyed it so much they stole them. Who knew? I used to work with such tattered copies of Lord of the Flies and Animal Farm it was sad. We used those books until we couldn't use them anymore [[they just fell apart to the point of no return). The kids liked them, comprehended them [[with the background info and historical ties included as part of the reading), and they were great for cross-curricular lessons. The history teacher and I would work together from them, so the kids were getting a double whammy from the books. They enjoyed the tie in between the two classes and really came up with some great projects about themes and other topics in the books. I wish I could do more things like that and less focus on testing.