You've all probably heard that set of instructions before. Maybe you were asked to read To Kill A Mockingbird, or 1984. Or maybe your teacher allowed you to choose the book, as long as it met length and reading level requirements.
Think of a time you had an assignment like this. Did you enjoy it? What did you learn?
Even if you didn't particularly enjoy having to read a book and write a paper about it, you most likely did learn SOMETHING. Right? Maybe by the time you were finished, you felt like you really knew the main characters. Or maybe you felt like you understood the conflicts in the story.
MAYBE.... you drew a connection from the story to your own life. And because you had to do all that analysis, you really began to think more deeply about some serious issues that literature can bring up.
So speaking of you... Have YOU ever had a hero in your life? Have YOU ever thought about why you look up to that particular person?
Have you ever stopped to wonder if YOU are a hero to someone else? Or have you ever thought about what kind of hero YOU could be?
Every story has some type of hero right? Think back to that assignment you had in the past, the one where you had to read a book and write an analysis. I'm sure you figured out who the hero was in that story. Why did he or she do certain things? What was so heroic about his or her actions? What type of hero was he or she? Superman? Spiderman? Probably not.
That character you're thinking of was probably more like... YOU.
Watch this:
Now think about all of those books that your past teachers have asked you to read and analyze. What were the issues in the lives of the characters? Why did there need to be heroes in those stories?
Maybe these books you have been reading throughout your school years have been saying something a little more than you've realized. Or maybe you have realized things they are saying, and just don't know what to do with that information.
And just what IS the point of reading these stories?!
Maybe... just maybe... they are a lot like our own stories.
So think of YOUR stories. What makes up your life? Are there things you have seen or heard about in your world that seem wrong? Things that need fixing?
"What are you not okay with?"
Listen to the words of Martin Luther King Jr.
What was he "not okay" with?
Did he change the world?
Can YOU change the world?
Ready? Read, Write, CREATE.
Reading really does help me understand real issues in my own life, and in the world. I never really liked how in school we would have to read books that "they" considered "classics." Who are "they" anyway?! And why did they think that some of those old boring books were more interesting and important than Harry Potter??
ReplyDeleteNow that I think about it though, I realize that a lot of those boring books had lots of historical things in the plots. They deal with real issues faced by characters and even though the characters are fictional, the contexts are very realistic.
And of course, Harry Potter has some good stuff too! Yeah maybe Hogwarts isn't a real place (sadly), but the characters still face challenges like we do! They have to choose right from wrong in nearly every case. They have to stick up for people being discriminated against. And so much more.
So yeah, I love thinking about the issues in the books we read. We can learn a lot from them! And I do think that reading helps us/causes us to think about our own stories, the ones we live out every single day. I want to be some type of hero!
What am I not okay with? I'm really not okay with the fact that some kids don't have a good chance at life simply because of the circumstances they were born into. Maybe I can help change that a little...