So I missed Musing Monday this week due to hospital and the random question was something I actually had things to say about so I’m just going to randomly post it because, who cares, it’s my blog.

The Question:  What do you think of required reading in school?

My thoughts:

While I loved the idea of reading novels for credit, and fully appreciate how important a part of the curriculum it is, I never could quite enjoy required reading no matter how much I wanted to.

My problem with required reading was always the way that the books were taught. I mean yes, there were always some boring ones (Animal Farm can die, honestly), but even the good ones were often made boring just by the way they were taught to us.

No original thought allowed, no discussion of the literary impact of the books, no appreciation of their impact on popular culture of the times they were published, no analysis deeper than “can you spot the foreshadowing” was allowed. We weren’t even allowed to voice displeasure with the text. I got kicked out of class for saying that I didn’t like Lord of the Flies. (Literally just that, nothing more, nothing inappropriate.)

It was just ridiculously unenjoyable, almost intentionally so.

I also always thought it might be fun if they would let us vote as a class to pick one book a year (from a list of acceptable books) so that at least once we could be reading something we chose.

I’d love to know what you guys thought of required reading in schools and what made you feel the way you do!