For the Love of Books: Why Read YA Lit?

Throughout the term, we have considered many factors that make YA lit important in fostering a love of reading for young adults. I believe that it comes down to the following four characteristics: YA lit is relatable to young adults, it shines light on teenage struggles, it deals with contemporary issues, and it does all of this within a fast-moving and engaging plot.

Here’s a look at the benefits of YA lit in the classroom from teachers’ perspectives:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gFBQiShb1c 

YA lit has the power to generate a personal connection between a book and its young adult reader by utilizing teenage narrators and content that is meaningful to the young adult audience (Herz & Gallo, 2005). Many YA novels, like Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson or The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, deal with high school experiences—the good, the bad and the ugly. What makes these novels so powerful is their inclusion of all the good, bad and ugly aspects of high school, with great friendships, exclusion, bullying, sexual and physical abuse and depression being some of the topics breached. Novels such as these are not sugar coated, just like a student’s high school experience isn’t going to be sugar coated. These novels are realistic and students can identify with the characters. If you brought either of these novels into a high school classroom, I believe you would be hard-pressed to find a student who can’t relate to these books on some level. By allowing students the opportunity to personally connect with YA lit, you’re fostering a love of reading within them because those connections will keep them coming back for more. 

 

As Herz & Gallo (2005) argue, YA lit holds immense value “because it deals with real problems and issues that are central to [young adult] lives…. [Aiding them] in their search for understanding” (p. xvi). Young adults have a lot of pressure thrust upon them to grow up quickly in today’s world, and the desire is there for students to read literature that relates to their lives and the concerns they have. In essence, often young adults read “to find out about themselves” (Nilsen & Donelson, 2009, p. 14), seeking answers to their questions through the words on the page. Growing up is marked with a multitude of experiences, peer pressures, sex, love, abuse, bullying, parental relationships. The list could go on and on. Classics such as Jane Eyre and Pride and Prejudice aren’t going to give students the type of guidance they’re craving in contemporary times (Herz & Gallo, 2005).

The following quote by Nilsen & Donelson (2009) emphasizes reasoning behind resistance to the classics:

Each generation [is] scrambling to find its own way to be unique, which is one of the reasons that literature for young adults tends to be a contemporary medium. Each generation wants its own stories (p. 1).

            Students want to read about current topics that they can relate to on a personal level or that they can relate to the world around them, and that’s a difficult thing to do when forced to read about something you have no experience with (Nilsen & Donelson, 2009). The ability to make intimate connections to a novel helps “make the work personally significant to the students” (Bushman & Haas, 2006, p. 54) as well, further nurturing a love of reading in young adults. 

13 Reasons Why by Jay Asher is one of those YA novels that focuses on difficult contemporary issues, issues that many students unfortunately have to deal with. With the main theme of the novel being teenage suicide, 13 Reasons Why has the ability to ring true in the ears of many young adults. About two years ago in my hometown, there were two teenage suicides within a few months’ of each other at the same high school. Both victims were under the age of 15. Teenage suicide has become a very serious problem in today’s world, and it’s something that we need to be talking about. It’s a very real concern for many young adults, along with many other contemporary tribulations, and novels such as 13 Reasons Why can help bring attention to these harsh realities. 

Lastly, the fast-paced plots of YA lit hold appeal for wide-ranging reading levels. “People at any [reading level] need to experience pleasure and profit from their reading” (Nilsen & Donelson, 2009, p. 16), and YA lit allows for this. A short novel with a concise yet dramatic plot can cater to many reading abilities, motivating more students to read. Even slightly longer YA novels like The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins and The Book Thief by Markus Zusak hold the interests of young readers because their plots are so engaging and they move so quickly. YA lit draws readers in and gets them hooked. It is a powerful instrument for fostering a love of reading in young adults, as it “help[s] students take pride in their reading and [helps] them develop into confident, critical readers” (Herz & Gallo, 2005, p. xvi). 

References

Bushman, J., & Haas, K. (2006). Using young adult literature in the English classroom. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.

Herz, S. & Gallo, D. (2005). From Hinton to Hamlet: Building bridges between young adult literature and the classics. (2^nd ed.). Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group.

Nilsen, A., & Donelson, K. (2009). Literature for today's young adults. Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.

rightlinemedia. (2011). Young adult literature in the classroom [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gFBQiShb1c

Surviving in a Digital World: The Hunger Games

           The number of affordances associated with today’s technology is indescribable. I’ve been told that supposedly I’m part of the so-called “digital generation,” yet I couldn’t possibly tell you even half of the opportunities that are presented to youth online. Blogging, virtual realities, Facebook, Twitter, chat forums, email, YouTube, Shmoop…and that doesn’t even scratch the surface. Although many English teachers have chosen to maintain the traditional view, that technology has no place in the classroom, many disagree. Many teachers argue that it does deserve a place in the classroom because “digital literacy practices are more participatory, collaborative, and distributed than conventional print-based literacy practices” (as cited in Curwood, 2013, p. 417).

Does this mean we should steer clear of print-based books? Of course not! But finding books that also allow for digital interaction seems to be the way to go these days. As Tarasiuk (2010) describes it, “the combination of reading, writing, and technology presents unique opportunities to improve and address the contemporary literacy needs of adolescents” (p. 543). Today’s students “have grown up in a world where cyberspace is not new, but rather another space for them to live in, learn from and communicate” (Tarasiuk, 2010, p. 544). So why not use it? Technology is so ubiquitous in our society now; you can’t just kick it under the rug and expect it to go away. It’s clearly here to stay. Instead of shoving it aside we can utilize it to help students actively engage in their learning. So, the question is: is The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins surviving as a book in our digital age? The answer: it’s not just surviving, it’s thriving.

This dystopian story of Katniss Everdeen’s fight against the government in post-apocalyptic Panem has become so wide-spread that one might say it’s really caught fire (cue laughter from the audience). Note to readers: if you don’t get it, please do yourself a favor and read the book. Trust me, it’s great YA lit. Not only is The Hunger Games part of the dystopian genre, which is currently all the rage, it has a number of online opportunities and affinity spaces associated with it. In fact, the entire trilogy does. It also helps that the trilogy is currently being adapted to film, with The Hunger Games and Catching Fire already released and both films triumphing as global hits. However, that doesn’t mean that the good old paperback novel has gone out of style; over 50 million copies of The Hunger Games trilogy have been sold since it began in 2008 (Curwood, 2013).

When I did a brief Google search on The Hunger Games, each post I looked at described either how great it is in general or how great it is to teach to students. Personally, I believe it’s a great book to be teaching in our digital world. As of 2013, there were “over 50 fan sites [with] a combined total of 30 million page views” (Curwood, 2013, p. 420) for The Hunger Games trilogy, and many of these “offer venue[s] to share fan-created work, play role-playing games, or access teaching resources” (Curwood, 2013, p.420). Regarding reader-response activities in our digital age, the possibilities seem close to endless when it comes to The Hunger Games and so many of these possibilities involve student-centered learning. There are such wonderful and interactive ways for students to respond to The Hunger Games in our digital world. Students could create collaborative novel study group blogs and post those to online audiences, allowing them more than just teacher feedback. They could create online collages representing their favorite character or most-despised character (President Snow perhaps?) or they could create picture poetry on related themes in the book. They could produce their own movie trailers or invent movie scenes that were in the book but not in the film adaptations. They could research current events and investigate the similarities and dissimilarities between our society and Panem. What’s great is that students could do all these things while analyzing the text, developing their comprehension skills and making “text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to-world connections” (Gainer, 2012, p. 14). 

Still not convinced of The Hunger Games success in the digital age? When I racked my brain for the challenges of teaching The Hunger Games in the digital age, I honestly couldn’t come up with any. Where I see challenges is in having the technology readily available. Is it feasible for every classroom to have a set of 30 iPads or video cameras? It definitely isn’t, and not every student has the privilege of owning their own. However, most schools have computer labs and I believe that teachers can find a way to make it work. Despite these limitations, I don’t see challenges in teaching The Hunger Games in these digital times. The amount of multimodal opportunities for teachers to experiment with the relationship between literature and technology with The Hunger Games is incredible. The best part is, it’s book that students would enjoy and by providing students with opportunities to develop proficiency with technology we’re equipping them with the tools “to meet the demands of 21^st-century literacies” (Gainer, 2012, p. 14).

The Hunger Games Movie Trailer:

References

Curwood, J. (2013). The hunger games: Literature, literacy, and online affinity spaces. Language Arts, 90(6), 417-427.

Gainer, J. (2012). Critical thinking: Foundational for digital literacies and democracy. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 56(1), 14-17.

Tarasiuk, T. (2010). Combining traditional and contemporary texts: Moving my English class to the computer lab. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 53(7), 543-552.