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Originally Posted by MSWallack
Personally, I think that the best thing that teachers can do is find books that speak to the issues that kids are facing today, preferably in settings that the kids recognize and understand, and using language that is familiar rather than archaic. If the point of literature is to make people think, especially about the so-called "human condition" then we need to ask kids to read books that will engage them not turn them off. We have generations who don't read because all that most of them were taught was material that didn't speak to them (and often taught be those who couldn't really make the text come alive or address current issues and concerns). I would say that much of the best literature these days is probably to be found either in the form of science fiction by authors who push the boundaries of what it means to be human or look into questions of existence and morality and so forth or young adult fiction that, while perhaps not written at the complexity that some might want, does speak to youth and to their fears and concerns. Kids will have plenty of time to read Shakespeare and other classics as they grow up, but they never will broaden their horizons if all that they are taught is to hate reading.
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I guess it depends what you consider the purpose of English Lit. classes to be. Personally I regard their purpose to be what their name says: to teach at least some of the great works of literature that are our cultural heritage. To my mind it's a parent's job to instil a love of reading in their children, not the school's.
Reading for pleasure does not necessarily have the same purpose as reading to learn. If you want to read SF for pleasure (as I did as a teenager, and still do today) that has a different purpose to reading the classics.