In February, two professors of
literacy sent
a letter signed by more than 500 educators to The New York Times
asking the paper to add three children’s nonfiction bestseller lists to
parallel the current lists, which focus on fiction.
The letter was also published on more than 20 blogs that serve the
children’s literature community and amplified on social media as part of the
#KidsLoveNonfiction campaign.
A few weeks later, The New York Times
responded, saying they weren’t interested in adding nonfiction lists
at this time. Many people were disappointed by this decision and expressed
their frustration on social media. I asked some of them to write essays
explaining their point of view and describing their own experiences with and
relationship to children’s nonfiction.
Today, fourth-grade teacher Kate Narita shares her story. Thank you, Kate.
My biggest aha moments in life have happened when I’ve become
aware of
an implicit bias that
a few months earlier I would have told you I
didn’t have.
At
the end of last year, I would have told you with 100
percent certainty that I embrace and support nonfiction readers as much as
fiction readers.
I would have told you about knowing that 42 percent of young
readers prefer expository nonfiction and another 33 percent enjoy expository and
narrative text equally.
I would have told you that I’ve celebrated professional books like
Nonfiction
Writers Dig Deep and 5 Kinds
of Nonfiction on my
podcast.
And I would have told you about the thousands of dollars I’ve
spent building my nonfiction classroom book collection.
All that’s true, and yet, I also would have told you my husband
and younger son weren’t readers.
I hadn’t seen my younger son, who’s now a 19-year old college student, read anything other than school assignments, since sixth grade.
Before he entered middle school, I had some success finding fiction series he liked, such as Warriors by Erin Hunter and The Land of Stories by Chris Colfer, but after he became a smartphone owner in seventh grade, he
was only interested in the screen. It never occurred to me that maybe he
was reading articles there as well as playing video
games and using social media.
When my husband, a physics professor, picked up a novel
like Harry Potter, he’d read a few pages in the beginning, a few in the
middle, and a few at the end, and say he was done.
“That’s not reading,” I’d say.
When my sons and I discussed Harry
Potter, my husband would say, “I don’t remember that part.”
I would reply, “That’s because you didn’t read it.”
Then, in January, my son mentioned a book he had read, Infinite Powers: How Calculus
Reveals the Secrets of the Universe by Steven Strogatz. “Oh,” I
said. “Sounds interesting. Did you read it for your calculus class?”
“Yes,” he said. “And I really enjoyed it.”
Did his statement about enjoying a book wake me up to my implicit
bias? No. But I did feel a shift inside me. I was pleasantly
surprised and excited because I love talking about books. If he had read
something and was excited about it, I could read it and discuss it with him,
even if he had only read it because it was a class assignment. Here was a way I
could deepen my relationship with him as an adult. Even if it was just a
one-time occurrence.
I asked if I could read the book when he was done, and he brought
it home the next time he visited.
Fast forward to February break. As my husband and I were packing for
a trip to Maui to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary, he spotted Infinite
Powers in
the pile of books I was sorting through on our ottoman and picked it up.
“What’s this?” he asked. When I explained, he asked if he could
take it to Hawaii, and I nodded. I hadn’t read it yet because, to be honest, reading a whole book about calculus
felt too daunting. Instead, I packed and
read three books from Kate Messner’s History
Smashers series and Rukhsanna Guidroz’s Samira Surfs.
I also spotted a copy of Kristin Hannah’s Fly Away
in our condo.
Since I had watched Hannah’s Firefly
Lane on Netflix and was listening to The Four Winds on Libby, I couldn’t resist
picking up Fly Away, and I devoured
it in a day.
As my husband
and I sat side-by-side reading on the beach, we
talked about Infinite Powers. He told me that while he was enjoying the
book, the author gave way too much credit to calculus and not nearly enough to
physics.
He was kind of cranky about it. Actually, he was truly
irritated. I was surprised that he was having an emotional response to the book,
a nonfiction book. It had stirred up passion inside him, even though it wasn’t a
novel.
Did his passion wake me up to my implicit bias? Not yet. But I did feel
another shift. He was expressing emotion about a book, and I was listening. In
the past, it had almost always been me expressing emotion about a novel and him
listening.
In our almost thirty-year relationship, I could only
think of one other time when he had emoted about a book. It was Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman! by Richard
Feynman, which I read because he had read it multiple times and was so
excited about it.
When we got back home, I spotted this
petition
(which you can still sign) on Twitter. Two professors
of literacy, Mary Ann Cappiello and Xenia Hadjioannou, had
written a letter asking The New York Times to add three children’s
nonfiction bestseller lists—one for picture books, one for middle grade, and
one for young adults. I signed it because, of course, I fully supported
nonfiction writers and readers!
A couple of weeks later, I saw on Facebook that, even though more
than 2,000 people had signed the petition, The New York Times had
refused to add children’s nonfiction bestseller lists. After a full day of
teaching, I was tired, and reading this unfortunate news made me angry. I looked up from my phone.
Across the room, my younger son, who was home on spring break, was
reading The
Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the
Ultimate Theory by Brian
Greene for
fun because he had liked Infinite Powers so much and wanted to keep reading and learning. Next
to him, my husband was reading an article about the Green Bay Packers on the
internet.
In that instant, a lightbulb clicked on in my mind, and an
awareness of my implicit bias washed over me like a tidal wave.
My husband and younger son are readers. They have always
been readers.
I just didn’t realize it because narratives and fiction aren’t
their jam. But give them nonfiction on topics they find fascinating—math,
physics, sports—and they’re all in. They’re curious people who read to learn.
They want to know about the world, how it works, and their place in it.
The decisionmakers at The New York Times obviously have
their own implicit bias against children’s nonfiction, and as long as they
refuse to include lists highlighting these books, they’re refusing to
acknowledge the 42 percent of our youth who crave true texts. They’re also
refusing to open the eyes of adults who raise those kids, thinking they’re not
readers.
Maybe we should petition The Wall Street Journal next.
Kate Narita teaches fourth
grade at The Center School in Stow, Massachusetts. She’s also the author of 100 Bugs! A
Counting Book and hosts the
podcast Chalk + Ink: The Podcast for Teachers Who Write and Writers
Who Teach. When she’s not teaching, writing, or podcasting
you can catch Kate and her handsome hound, Buck, running or hiking on Mount
Wachusett.
This essay first appeared on NCTE’s Children’s Literature Assembly blog.
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