Motivating Teen and Preteen Readers: How Teachers and Parents Can Lead the Way

283 Pages·2011·3.9 MB·English

by  Jeffrey Pflaum

Motivating Teen
and Preteen Readers
How Teachers and
Parents Can Lead the Way
Jeffrey Pflaum
Rowman & Littlefield Education
A division of
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD PUBLISHERS, INC.
Lanham • New York • Toronto • Plymouth, UK
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Published by Rowman & Littlefield Education
A division of Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
A wholly owned subsidiary of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.
4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706
www.rowmaneducation.com
Estover Road, Plymouth PL6 7PY, United Kingdom
Copyright © 2011 by Jeffrey Pflaum
“The Voice You Hear When You Read Silently” from NEW AND SELECTED
POEMS, 1975–1995 by Thomas Lux. Copyright © 1997 by Thomas Lux. Reprinted by
permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any
electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems,
without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote
passages in a review.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Pflaum, Jeffrey, 1945–
Motivating teen and preteen readers : how teachers and parents can lead the way /
Jeffrey Pflaum.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-1-61048-032-1 (cloth : alk. paper)—ISBN 978-1-61048-033-8 (pbk. : alk.
paper)—ISBN 978-1-61048-034-5 (electronic)
1. Teenagers—Books and reading. 2. Preteens—Books and reading. 3. Teenagers—
Education—United States. 4. Preteens—Education—United States. 5. Reading—United
States. 6. Parent-teacher relationships—United States. I. Title.
Z1037.A1P48 2011
028.5'5—dc23 2011016173
™
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper
for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
Printed in the United States of America
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We are now in want of an art to teach how books are to be read rather
than to read them.
—Benjamin Disraeli
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Contents
Preface for Educators, Parents, and Readers of All Ages vii
Preface for Students ix
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction 1
The Mini-Lesson with All Its Parts 11
How to Answer the Questions on Reading and Reading Life 25
Not-for-Parents-Only Guide to Motivating Teen and Preteen Readers 35
Skimming the Four Books of Questions 57
Why Won’t Michael Read? One Solution . . . 65
Book 1 79
Book 2 103
Book 3 137
Book 4 181
Final Three Discussions and Conclusion to the Books of Questions 241
Epilogue 243
Bibliography 265
About the Author 267
v
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Preface for Educators, Parents,
and Readers of All Ages
HELLO READING LIFE, WHEREVER YOU ARE
Do you read to your children? Did your parents read to you as a child? Do you
read before going to bed at night? When is your time to read? Where do you like
to read? What are your favorite books?
Is reading an illuminating solitude? How is reading an escape from everyday
life? Does the outside world fade away after reading the first word of a book? Has
a book ever been your mentor or coach? Do you think of books as loyal friends
living inside your mind?
Does reading life affect real life? Has reading changed your awareness? Is
reading about open-mindedness? Do you experience freedom while reading? Do
you feel like you’re inside an imaginary reading bubble when reading? How can
reading be a return to your self?
Are sad and depressing books worth reading? Do you read poetry for enlight-
enment, pleasure, and to your kids? Do you read fantasies just to trigger your
imagination? Do you remember reading boring textbooks in school? Can you
recall taking standardized reading tests? What early reading experiences are
fondly remembered?
Is reflection part of your daily reading-life experiences? Do you contemplate
thoughts and ideas while reading? Can reading also be described as an entertain-
ment center in the mind? How is reading all about self-communication? Why is
reading a magical, mysterious process?
How important are words to you? Do you ever ponder or meditate on a word?
Are words your friends or enemies? What do words trigger in the mind? Can you
recall the last time a word took you on an adventure ride through your imagination?
Can reading and books inspire and change lives? Can reading bring peace?
What are reading’s “lonely pleasures”? How much energy and passion do you
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viii Preface for Educators, Parents, and Readers of All Ages
bring to reading? What attitude is communicated to your kids about reading,
books, and words? Are you a lifelong reader? Is reading fun for you?
So, discussion leaders, where are you? What responses ran through your mind
as you read this laundry list of questions on reading life? Did you, while reading
the questions, take a moment or a side trip to: stop, recall, reflect, and think about
answers? This is what Motivating Teen and Preteen Readers is about: jumpstart-
ing the brain with diverse, mindful, challenging questions that need answers to
reconnect readers of all kinds—the struggling, reluctant, and outstanding—to a
new vision that reenergizes reading life and creates a passion for reading.
The list of questions touches upon some key topics and ideas featured in Mo-
tivating Teen and Preteen Readers. Examples are:
• reading as an enlightening solitude;
• reading as a counselor and friend;
• connections between reading and real life;
• reading books and changing awareness;
• reading and the feeling of freedom;
• reading as a return to the self;
• the effects of early reading experiences on reading life;
• the reflection-contemplation connection to reading;
• reading and intrapersonal communication;
• reading as a magical, mystery voyage through the mind;
• the significance of and creativity in words; and
• passion as an attitude toward lifelong reading.
By asking diverse questions and receiving many different written responses,
and then continuing the dialogue with expansive, follow-up questions into read-
ing life, you develop in adolescents, as discussion leaders, an intrinsic motivation
to read. Kids will read because they want to read.
The four books of questions in Motivating Teen and Preteen Readers will:
• make young people aware of their reading lives;
• help them reflect on their reading experiences and worlds;
• generate inner or self-motivation to read and write;
• impact reading and reading life in meaningful ways; and
• empower adolescents to take responsibility for their reading.
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Preface for Students
Dazzling Your Mind with Reading
From the first moment you hear a new CD or song, or see the awesome image on
the latest DVD you bought, or the videogame that pops up in front of your eyes
on the monitor, you get hooked, all lit up, ready to rock ’n’ roll. The mind and
body tune into sights, sounds, and blazing action—whether it’s a great song, an
amazing movie, or your best game, you’re coming home, rambling down the road
of chills, thrills, and spills, reveling in that instant lightning flash of excitement.
Everything’s buzzing, and yes, you’re definitely going to fry those brains tonight
and have a lot of fun doing it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you’re far into that dream world,
the wonder-world that keeps you feeling good, going faster, faster, zoom, zoom,
zoom—and why shouldn’t you feel good?
But what about reading and books—where do they fit in this sweet picture of
fun and games? How do they connect with the speeding electronic, technologi-
cal, and outrageous visual world that’s firing up your brains right now? Do they
belong to the same universe and operate on the same channel?
Think about it: the second you open up a book and your fingers touch its
pages, a feeling triggers your inner life as you beam down on the first word,
and then it’s blast off, or really, blast in, to your reading world. Almost magi-
cally, you leave the outside world behind and you’re off to another reality, the
virtual reality of reading.
Your reading self takes over quickly: it has been waiting along with an imagi-
nary inner or mind’s eye to help scan, find, and create pictures from words. And
don’t forget the imaginary narrator who tells or reads the story as images dart
across an imaginary TV screen in the mind’s magic reading theater, where shows,
plays, dramas, and documentaries take place.
Characters, settings, conversations, and facts (data, knowledge, and news)
bombard your imagination. This visualized, make-believe, invisible dream
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