U.S. English Classes Are Failing Us
I’ve always had a love/hate relationship with my English classes, especially in K-12. I love analyzing texts, roundtable discussions about themes and symbolism, writing essays, all that jazz; I hated what I had to read.
The first book I enjoyed reading for school was in seventh grade (FYI it was The Outsiders). That wouldn’t happen again until high school. Out of the three to five books we read per year, I usually only liked one — if I was lucky. They were old and typically written by old white men. Worst of all, I seldomly felt engaged, not by the material and not by my teachers.
Going to college has shown me how many gaps there were in my previous education, and being the type of person who gets absolutely giddy at the sight of a multi-floored library, the holes in my English education feel especially obvious.
*Side Note: Why wasn’t I taught about Byronic heroes? Batman, Edward Cullen, Jaime Lannister?! They’re all Byronic heroes. How fun would it be to have a discussion about the similarities between these three?
I’m not the only one that feels this lack. There are a lot of issues with the American education system, but this one feels personal. Even the most enthusiastic teachers can’t force disinterested and unmotivated students to learn; that shouldn’t stop them from making resources available. If teachers don’t teach their students about the abundance of reading options available, who will?
This question keeps me up at night. It makes me question my own potential to learn and grow. Have I — have we all been stunted?
I genuinely believe there’s a time and place for all literature. I love the romantic era of classic literature; outside of an academic setting, I don’t think most classics get enough exposure. Still, the most recent book I read between both middle and high school was published in 2003 (for context I graduated high school in 2017). Some teachers have added more recent books like The Hunger Games, The Hate U Give, and The Perks of Being a Wallflower to their reading lists, but it’s a minority. Kids, tweens, and teens will be more likely to engage with books that they can relate to.
Reading lists should be more diverse. At this point, it feels negligent. The hero’s journey (AKA the monomyth) can be taught through thousands of books. To take it even further, one of those books could be written by a person of color. Nnedi Okorafor’s Who Fear’s Death follows the hero’s journey just as The Hobbit does.
It always irritated me that every book we read that was written by a person of color was about their experiences. Like classic literature, there’s a place for these kinds of personal stories too. English classes are absolutely instrumental in teaching empathy and exploring the human experience. However, speaking as a Black woman who has attended predominantly white schools her whole life, it’s exhausting to only read about characters that look like you when they’re suffering at the hands of inequality.
There are so many classroom-worthy stories if only teachers are aware of them. At eighteen I had no idea literary magazines still existed. Submitting to one could be an exciting opportunity for students who enjoy writing creatively. For teachers, literary magazines produce countless short stories and poems to discuss in class.
Speaking of poetry, like many others, I can honestly say K-12 permanently damaged my relationship with it. I’ve only begun to change my feelings because my best friend loves it and often asks for my feedback on her poems. It feels like poetry in schools is slowly being tossed to the wayside, and while my feelings are less than cuddly toward it, it’s still upsetting to see it join cursive as another subject that’s seldomly taught in detail.
Reading my friend’s poetry has given me a bit of a refresher course in its complexity. Poetry, like visual art, has its place in schools despite its challenges. It’s incredibly subjective which means it’s difficult to grade for a “right answer.” But it does have its merits. It’s great for strengthening pattern recognition and problem-solving skills. Students who are taught different styles of poetry will eventually be able to memorize and recognize syllabic patterns and rhyme schemes in different texts, and writing poetry provides a creative outlet with the added structure (or problem depending on how you look at it) of meeting specific criteria. If the number of Richard Siken quotes I’ve seen across Tumblr has proven anything, it’s that there are still poets out there that entice young people.
At the end of the day, students need to be aware of the gaps in their education. Most teachers don’t have the funds or time to do hours of extra research, lesson planning, and reading. They’re overworked and dishearteningly underpaid. Being transparent about the limitations of the classroom is one way to foster creativity and give them some agency over their education. They won’t know what they’re missing until someone tells them. A link to a video or article, a question, a suggestion, can make all the difference.
