Mr. Odle's Big Bad Book Blog

When I started this blog, I merely wanted to talk about the books I’ve been reading and get some feedback from other readers.

However, I also realized that this as good a place to discuss issues students and teachers face in the English/Language Arts classroom — apart from the books themselves. Which books do we want to read, have to read, ought to read? Why is there this distinction? How big is that distinction? How does technology affect our approach to literature? Does it create a new access to literature, or does it reduce literature to a product to be consumed? What of larger pedagogical issues? Is there value in having an entire middle school class read the same text (and answer the same questions about it)? Is student choice the way to increase literacy? Most importantly, why do English teachers (well, all teachers, really) tend to teach the way they were taught, rather than in a way that research suggests is a much better option?

So yes, I will explore some of these pedagogical issues, along with technology issues. I invite teachers to drop in and participate. But I am issuing a special invitation to students to talk about these issues as well. What do you, as students, make of technology in the English classroom (if you even have it)? And what do you think of the way that English/Language Arts is taught? (Just don’t mention your teachers by name.)

And yes, I tend to get off track. So you will probably see a few other things here as well.

But my main purpose was, and remains, to encourage people of all ages to read great literature of all sorts, and to share their thoughts and opinions on it. I was recently going through my library and came across Madeline L’Engle’s “Time Quartet” (the one that stars with A Wrinkle in Time) and I was immediately envious of all those who will read them for the first time as well as my future self who reread them again (for the fourth — or is it the fifth? — time) in the near future. After all, part of the joy of living with literature is encountering new books and making new friends with them, as well as rereading old favorites and greeting them like the old friends that they are — and at the same time being surprised and delighted by how much both of us have changed during our time apart.

As a result, I have decided on a slightly different format for the book reviews I post here, because I don’t want to give just a brief synopsis plus my thumbs up or thumbs down. I will start with a brief synopsis (somewhat akin to the blurb you’ll find on the jacket flap), plus my own gut reaction to the book: did I like it, love it, or loathe it? (And I’ll include an age recommendation, if it’s available, although you should see what I think of age recommendations first.)  For a lot of books, I’ll leave it at that.

But for a lot of books, I’ll go beyond that, because once I start talking about books, it’s pretty difficult to shut me up. And some books present issues that I can’t help but talk about. (Actually, all books do this, but I’ll make an effort to restrain myself.) So I’ll just keep talking about them, and whether what I say about them amounts to something fancy like “analysis,” or something simple and straightforward like “commentary,” be aware that anything past the recommendation may include spoilers. If I’m on top of things, I’ll try to indicate boldface red type like this:

Warning: The rest of this post contains spoilers!

(The butler did it. Sorry to spoil it for you.) So if you haven’t read the book, and you want to, you better stop right there and dive into that book.

Comments are allowed on posts — just click on a post title to view, and then navigate to the end of the articles. Comments must be approved before they appear online, so don’t enter multiple comments. (This allows me to make sure that comments are g-rated.)

Thanks for stopping by and reading so far. Welcome aboard.

If you want to send me a message, visit my “official” contact page.

–Ken