Disturbing Assigned Reading

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DD is a Senior and is currently reading an assigned book that takes place in Afghanistan and is very violent. She told me she is having nightmares but is only half way through. I have read the book and the treatment and brutality towards women is horrifying but I don’t know what to advise my DD to do.

If your DD has been diagnosed or if you suspect she’s having diagnosable psychological issues, etc, talk to a professional and disregard my advice. But if this were my daughter (I have 2 teens), I’d encourage her to read it. Sheltering near-adults from the brutal, uncomfortable truths of the world doesn’t benefit society or your daughter in the long run. Ignorance about abhorrent, brutal reality is not bliss. I’d concurrently offer her tons of opportunities to talk about the book and her feelings and would try to remind her how safe and loved she is at home, though. And I would encourage her to follow that book up with something light (which is what I like to do after I read an emotionally tough book).

This.

If it was just pleasure reading, setting it aside is one thing. However, in the context of an ELA or Social Studies course, there’s an opportunity to learn more about the context of the violence and hopefully apply what she learns from the book to her actions as an adult. That might be how she votes, where she donates, even a career field.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DD is a Senior and is currently reading an assigned book that takes place in Afghanistan and is very violent. She told me she is having nightmares but is only half way through. I have read the book and the treatment and brutality towards women is horrifying but I don’t know what to advise my DD to do.

If your DD has been diagnosed or if you suspect she’s having diagnosable psychological issues, etc, talk to a professional and disregard my advice. But if this were my daughter (I have 2 teens), I’d encourage her to read it. Sheltering near-adults from the brutal, uncomfortable truths of the world doesn’t benefit society or your daughter in the long run. Ignorance about abhorrent, brutal reality is not bliss. I’d concurrently offer her tons of opportunities to talk about the book and her feelings and would try to remind her how safe and loved she is at home, though. And I would encourage her to follow that book up with something light (which is what I like to do after I read an emotionally tough book).

+1. I'd also look at what other media she may be consuming that could be causing nightmares.

Her nightmares might also be because the novel is surfacing her feelings about how our society brushes off sexual mistreatment of adolescent girls and young women. Why do you think so many teenage girls have depression and anxiety?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When I taught AP Literature I assigned The Bluest Eye, which includes child sexual abuse. I had a student and their parent complain that it was too upsetting. The school was prepared to back me up . . . these were seniors in a college level course being assigned Nobel Prize winner Toni Morrison, etc. But ultimately as a human being I had to say, you know what, I get it . . . this is a tough book. The student was more than willing to read a different book, so that's what we did.

I would encourage my child to talk to the teacher and ask if she can read an alternate book.

I just wanted to give some additional context . . . I chose which books to assign out of the few that the school had already purchased. At a public school it's not as though each teacher can have the school purchase whichever books they want. And in preparing students for the AP Exam, Toni Morrison is pretty important.

[Anonymous]

On the classics question, there is more to being educated that just reading books a bunch of old dead white men wrote.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:On the classics question, there is more to being educated that just reading books a bunch of old dead white men wrote.

The classics are such a narrow range of human experience. They are best addresses in a history class as a way to study the values of the time periods in which they are written.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why don’t HS kids today read the classics?

For example, Of Mice and Men, which includes killing pets by mistake, murdering a woman by mistake, and murdering a man on purpose?

[Anonymous]

It is really important that you support her rejection of this material. Some people are just more sensitive than others and they don’t become more resilient by torturing themselves with triggering content.

She may not be able to watch outlander with her friends either, and that also needs to be okay. And this does *not* mean she can’t be an advocate for or ally of victims or persecuted populations. Her sensitivity may actually lead her to that type of role—but only if she protects her mental health first.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why don’t HS kids today read the classics?

They do read the classics. Romeo and Juliet commit suicide. The Odyssey is full of violence! I think what you mean, though, by classics is books about white people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DD is a Senior and is currently reading an assigned book that takes place in Afghanistan and is very violent. She told me she is having nightmares but is only half way through. I have read the book and the treatment and brutality towards women is horrifying but I don’t know what to advise my DD to do.

If your DD has been diagnosed or if you suspect she’s having diagnosable psychological issues, etc, talk to a professional and disregard my advice. But if this were my daughter (I have 2 teens), I’d encourage her to read it. Sheltering near-adults from the brutal, uncomfortable truths of the world doesn’t benefit society or your daughter in the long run. Ignorance about abhorrent, brutal reality is not bliss. I’d concurrently offer her tons of opportunities to talk about the book and her feelings and would try to remind her how safe and loved she is at home, though. And I would encourage her to follow that book up with something light (which is what I like to do after I read an emotionally tough book).

+1. I'd also look at what other media she may be consuming that could be causing nightmares.

Her nightmares might also be because the novel is surfacing her feelings about how our society brushes off sexual mistreatment of adolescent girls and young women. Why do you think so many teenage girls have depression and anxiety?

This. My DD has read a number of books assigned by school that have significant plot lines that have to do with sexual assault, prostitution or other forms of misogyny. The Pearl (in 7th grade) is about a concubine. Kite Runner, Bluest Eye, Persepolis, etc. All of it resurfaces trauma that girls currently experience - by MS IME girls are experiencing forms of sexual assault and by HS knowing someone who has been raped is sadly common.

It’s compounded by the fact that teachers don’t address these issues and don’t control discussion that goes off the rails (like peers saying that depicted was unimportant or deserved). My DD literally sat through a discussion in a health class where the boys in the class talked extensively about how the girl, depicted in a video speaking about having been raped while drunk), deserved her rape because she was stupid enough to get drunk.

I’m not saying kids shouldn’t be reading these books, because I think it’s important to know the world and know history, but it made me realize that I had to talk early and often to my DD about racism, sexism, trauma and mental health and her rights. In the end, that has been for the better.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is it Kite Runner? My child had to read that in ninth grade and found it extremely disturbing.

Mine had to read it in 6th but they never said anything about it or led me to believe it was violent.

Your child read the Kite Runner in 6th grade?? I find that incredibly hard to believe.

[Anonymous]

Don’t read it at night before bed.

In college I took some classes on the holocaust and can say that the nightmares go away if you’re not reading about horrific things as you drift off.

[Anonymous]

Teach her how to skim/skip the violent parts.

I'm in my 50s and I still do that all the time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is it Kite Runner? My child had to read that in ninth grade and found it extremely disturbing.

Mine had to read it in 6th but they never said anything about it or led me to believe it was violent.

Your child read the Kite Runner in 6th grade?? I find that incredibly hard to believe.

Yes, and Romeo and Juliett in 5th. Yes, just MCPS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is it Kite Runner? My child had to read that in ninth grade and found it extremely disturbing.

Mine had to read it in 6th but they never said anything about it or led me to believe it was violent.

Your child read the Kite Runner in 6th grade?? I find that incredibly hard to believe.

My child read Animal Farm and Things Fall Apart as assigned reading in 6th grade. Which, ok, but even at the time, I wondered what they thought an 11-year-old would get out of it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:On the classics question, there is more to being educated that just reading books a bunch of old dead white men wrote.

I take it you've never read Jules Verne. You missed out. The classics are classics for a reason. It is a shame you don't appreciate them or recognize their value.