There is something a bit odd about setting reading as a punishment.I was covering a class today when another teacher poked her head round the door and asked if she could dump a disruptive pupil on me. The class I had was particularly small and deeply engrossed in what they were doing so I said it would be ok.
She brought him in, set him at a desk, gave him a novel and a sheet of questions and said “Read that chapter and answer those!”
I don’t get it - in much the same way I don’t get it anytime a teacher sets reading a story or writing something as a punishment for bad behavior.
Surely, as people trying to encourage enjoyment through reading and writing, we are being a little self defeating if we then use reading and writing as a punishment.
I love both - always have done. Perhaps that’s why I allowed myself to get detention so often when I was a school kid. But I know not everyone does. I know there are people for whom R&W is a necessity rather than a luxury. Personally I think it’s hard enough encouraging reading for enjoyment without throwing in reading for pain at the same time.
1 comment:
Agreed. What was she thinking?
How can we foster the love of reading in some kids when it's used as a punishment?
A better punishment would have been to sit him facing away from the rest of the class with NOTHING TO DO. Then he'd be begging for a bit of something to read.
One of my daughters loves to read, and the other one doesn't. She'd rather DO than READ. Still, I feel she's missing out on the huge enjoyment one can get from becoming deeply immersed in a good book. It makes me sad.
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