Context and Comprehension

Recently, I did a craft program at one of our libraries that had a mix of kids, tweens and teens in the room. In order to ease the process, I had created a list of the materials each participant needed to complete their project, went over it before I had each table come up to get the materials, then stood at the table helping them pick out their supplies. Here is what they needed:

1 large wood bead

1 whole pipe cleaner

1 half pipe cleaner

28 pony beads

1 bell

felt

So I helped the kids get their materials and it wasn't working. It was like they were ignoring what I was saying. Okay, I'm used to this, but something was kind of poking me in the back of my brain and about half an hour into the program I realized that they weren't ignoring me--they just had no idea what I was talking about. They did not know what felt or a pipe cleaner was and they couldn't distinguish the round jingle bells I had brought from a bead. As a crafter from the time I was three years old, this freaked me out completely, but then I started thinking about the big picture and I REALLY freaked out.

Reading is more just than just being able to sound out or recognize words and say them aloud. It requires comprehension, probably the hardest thing to both learn and master. What comprehension requires (among other things, I'm sure) is enough contextual knowledge of the world to be able to grasp or figure out meaning.

So using the kids in my craft program (who were wonderful, btw; this isn't a dig at them by any means) as an example, if they were reading a paragraph and it said something about a pipe cleaner, they don't have the contextual knowledge to know what that is, so that image is a hole in their comprehension.

This happens a lot, especially in as diverse a world as we all live in. I was in one of my classes a few weeks ago and the professor and several of the students had an in-depth conversation about whether Lil' Kim or Nikki Minaj was the reigning queen of hip-hop and I was lost after the first thirty seconds because I don't have strong contextual knowledge of hip-hop. My husband and I went with my stepson (age 14) to see Hairspray at LaGuardia High School and my stepson didn't get half the jokes. Again, lack of knowledge.

Here's another example. I was reading a book this weekend to review for VOYA and came across a couple of sentences that really jumped out at me in the context of this post:

"The angle grinder was a small hand held tool with a diamond wheel like a miniature circular saw used for cutting anything from concrete to tile."

So to fully comprehend that sentence, the reader needs to know what a circular saw is, and that a diamond wheel is a special kind of saw blade that has diamond on it to cut through hard-to-cut materials. As a teen, I would have understood this because I watched a lot of "This Old House" and spent a good deal of time in home improvement stores with my brother; but would the average teen girl for whom this book is written know this?

Here's another example in the same vein:

"We'll need . . . Some heavy-duty extension cords, a decent socket set, what else?"

See what I mean? How many teen girls know what a socket set is?

And when the texts young people are most expected to comprehend show clear bias toward the experiences of the dominant social group, those outside of that group are not only at a disadvantage when it comes to comprehension, they are getting the not-so-subtle message that their own context is not as important.

So again, I am making my pitch that one of the most important things we can do as librarians is to broaden the knowledge of the teens we work with so that they have a better understanding of the context in which they live and read. You don't necessarily have to bring in a socket set (although I am suddenly struck with the need to do wood craft programs--another initiative for 2011 to balance out the sewing programs--sweet!! Details TBA.) but think broadly about what you're doing for and with teens.

Examples: there have been so many really cool science discoveries in the news (my favorite is the one about the arsenic-metabolizing bacteria discovered in a lake in California) that could easily be made into a display, an impromptu trivia game or an online scavenger hunt.

Or what about the project ABC News is doing about simple, personal things we can all do to "save a life"? (I admit I didn't watch the special but I did see a clip about how Stanford University students developed warming suits for premature babies born in villages without electricity which is pretty cool.) The premise is to take a problem, focus on it and come up with solutions. We could do lots of things like this in the library, local problems, world problems, social problems, health problems. You get the idea.

Bottom line: if you want to help your teens be better readers, open up the world to them!

Cash in the Coffee Can: $180

A Christmasy (ish) Thought

I am not a religious person. I don't belong to any particular spiritual tradition or practice and I have ongoing internal debates about all of the big issues surrounding religion. But ever since I was a kid, my favorite part of doing the Christmas decorations was setting up our Nativity.

It wasn't a fancy one, but the manger had a loft and at some point my mother had bought a little bag of straw, so I was very excited to pad the manger floor with it. I don't know what happened to the original Wise Men but they were replaced at some point before my memory with three plastic Wise Men in a slightly smaller scale the Family. This freaked me out (even as a child, I had the librarian's need for precision and order) so I always set them far enough away from the Family so that their diminutive stature was not so noticeable.

Even now, far removed from those days, I still love Nativities. There is a church on Staten Island a block or so away from the Staten Island Zoo that does a live Nativity the first three weekend in December and driving by is one of my favorite holiday traditions (especially last year when they had an alpaca in the little petting zoo with the sheep and donkey! While it's factual inaccuracy irked me [librarian!], I figure it was acting as a substitute for a camel and let it go since I was just so excited to see an alpaca.). And as if I needed another reason for "Raising Hope" to be my favorite show on TV, they did a (twisted) live Nativity episode a few weeks ago that made me spit coffee out my nose. So you get the idea.

I took me a long time to figure out WHY I love Nativities so much. I was already working as a children's librarian at the time when it hit me.

To me (and this is my own sense of it, not at all grounded in any theology and I mean no offense) the Nativity represents the love and promise into which every child should be born. All children should be viewed as such a precious gift to the world.

Years ago, I was processing library card applications for the girls' detention center I was working with and I noticed one of the girls was named Precious. And I had to stop and think for a moment about the series of events that had to happen for a baby to be born, given the name Precious and fifteen years later, for the girl that baby became to be in jail. Without even knowing the real story, the idea of it broke my heart.

So I write all of this as a reminder (as much to myself as anyone else) that children (teens included, and adults, too--we were all children once!) are precious. And as much as they drive us crazy, they are each a gift of hope to the world.

This holiday season, be thankful for your own precious gifts and the gifts of those around you. May they bring our world peace in the coming year.

:)

Cash in the Coffee Can: $166

Non-Readers

Early this week, I continued my adventures with the boys' residence where my new pal Billy resides. Monday was a rough day for the young men there. Actually, it was a rough day all around (well, I know for me it was). I think it was the snow and the abrupt drop in temperature. Or maybe something cosmic. Who knows. All I know is that several of the boys had meltdowns and the phrase "I hate the library!" was uttered so many times it broke my little librarian heart.

But I've been thinking about this all week and here's what I came up with.

First, I understand where that reflexive "I hate the library" response comes from. As I talked about last week, I get that for many of these young men (and many, many more like them throughout our borough, city, state and nation), reading is a difficult and painful activity that they associate with shame, failure and humiliation. I get this, I know this. It saddens me because, as I have said, reading has always been a source of joy to me. So I don't push, I don't try to convince them of anything that they are not ready for because I am not looking to devalue their experience. They get enough of that already. What I want them to know (and often the staff is not quite on the same page as me on this) is that the library is there as an option and an opportunity for them should they want or need it.

Second, and this was my big "A-ha!" moment this week: who says everybody has to be "a reader"? I'm not debating being literate; I'm talking about this idea that seems to be held as sacred by youth services librarians that if we just find the right book for them, every kid and teen will become a reader (meaning someone who reads books for fun). So here's the thing, again, says who, and why?

There are lots of things I do well that I would not want to do for fun. I'm pretty good at cleaning a toilet but it's not how I like to spend my Friday nights. I'm a whiz at whipping up a quick dinner but I don't really enjoy it (now baking . . . that's a whole different story). But my point is, there are lots of things we know how to do, do well, but really don't enjoy. And for lots of people, reading is one of those things. And that's okay!

I've had two conversations in the last week about what public libraries should be and in both of them, I said that I don't know if the future of libraries is going to be books on a shelf. Now don't get me wrong, I love books on a shelf. But books on a shelf are not necessarily always what our communities need or want (which I guess we will learn given the materials freeze).

INFORMATION comes in many forms and formats. We provide information when we teach a teen how to play Boggle or how to knit or how to understand their rights. We provide information when we show someone where to apply for food stamps or where the closest food pantry is. We provide information by having a place people can use a computer for free. Over the years, I've heard people say (with such scorn!) "They're only here to go on the computers!" ONLY?! That's HUGE. Think about what your life would be like if you didn't have a computer available when you need it. Our providing that is VITAL.

So, to all the "non-readers" out there, I say, come on in! We have lots to offer and we won't ever force you to read a book.

Cash in the Coffee Can: $152

Reality

The reality is that some teens hate to read. Some teens would literally rather have a tooth pulled than have to read anything, especially in front of other people. It is deeply, personally sad for me to think that one of the things that has brought me the most joy in my life could be so painful and shaming to a young person. But that's the reality for too many of our teens, especially the boys.

I met a young man last night named Billy. He is a resident at a group home for boys with severe enough emotional disabilities that the DOE has washed their hands of them. When we were introduced and he found out I was from the library he announced that he hated the library, he hated to read, he had never been to a library and he never would. Billy is 17.

I was able to get him to fill out the application for his library card without too much drama, begging or bribery. It was only after he had filled out the application, signed his card, started to examine it that he realized what he had done and demanded we take the card away because he would not touch it again. He also announced that he couldn't read; when I pointed out that he had filled out the paperwork with much less difficulty than many people I have met, Billy admitted that he reads just fine, he just hates to do it.

We have all heard this from teens, yes? There are lots of ways to respond to this and it was interesting for me to watch how the activities director and another young resident (a library user) both responded to Billy's histrionics.

Me, I played it cool. We will be taking the boys on a "field trip" to the library after the new year and while Billy swears he will be someplace else (another part of Queens, the Bahamas, anywhere but the residence), he did get his first library card. There were other boys there who refused to even come into the room to do that. So I'm pretty sure Billy will be on the van with the rest of unit, the staff and me, who just hopes she doesn't get car sick.

I'm pretty sure we'll win him over to our side on the visit, especially since he paraphrased my favorite t-shirt when I told him this ("I'd rather go over to the dark side," he said. "They have cookies."). After all, sometimes, we actually do have cookies. And we can certainly help him find out everything he could want to know about cookies, the dark side, dark matter, Star Wars, Wookiees, etc..

Score 1 for the librarians.


Cash in the Coffee Can: $138

A Rant

We interrupt this blog for a brief rant.

It's called Summer READING! It's not Summer Avatar-building or Summer Social Media-using. It's Summer READING!

Reading, people. We've seen the studies, year after year, that show that kids and teens need to READ during the summer to maintain the literacy gains they made during the school year and not lose ground for the next year. READING does that. Not watching movies. Not listening to music. Not, to quote Weird Al, "Posting 'Me, too!' like some brain-dead AOLer.'" READING.

So when planning a summer READING program or a summer READING website, it might be nice, for example, to make reading and literacy the focus. Just saying.

Cash in the Coffee Can: $124