On the Shelf – Introducing the Classics
On the shelf posts feature my thoughts on books and nurturing a love of reading in my son.
In a random conversation the other day, I mentioned to a former teacher that we were introducing our son to some of the classics of literature. There was a moment of silent shock at which point I added, “I don’t mean War and Peace, I mean The Three Bears and Henny Penny.”
I’m a voracious reader, and always have been. Currently, I’m on track to read about 50 books in 2009. Are they all “great LITERATURE“? Nope, but they are enjoyable romps through various lives and times and situations – some that make me cringe and some that make me laugh outloud and read far too late into the night.
It is with that nearly insatiable love for the written word that I’ve spent the last 4 years reading to my son. We’ve bopped our way through Boynton Board Books (Barnyard Dance remains a favorite); we’ve quacked our way through Doreen Cronin’s Click Clack Moo and all of the adventures with Farmer Brown, Duck and their barnyard friends; given all manner of things to Mice, Pigs, Moose and Cats in the If You Give series, and have a deep affection for Wong Herbert Yee and the Small books. We visit the library regularly and check out all manner of books – we’re on quite a run of books from the science section on sea life currently.
At some point, the husband and I started to think about and discuss stories we enjoyed as children and began to include those in the rotation (anything to break up the seventeenth night run of Sabertooth!), which brought us to the point of asking if anyone read the “classics” anymore or had some of what we would consider classics been pushed out of the way by newer popular children’s lit. There began quiet whispers in the back of my head about literary allusion, cultural literacy and English idiom.