2024-08-26 14:26:26
Long descriptions and lack of illustrations in the “obligatory” titles can turn a child away from books as early as 7
Who didn’t grow up with Pipilotta Victoalia Transparanta Mentolka Efraimova aka Longstocking? The freckled lunatic has been inspiring children around the world to adventure for a century.
But even Pippi’s stories today bore children, says Miglena Mancheva, the primary teacher at the capital’s 119th school, through which hundreds of children have passed.
How then to turn them into reading people. One of those “flyers” of Valeri Petrov, for whom words and the kindness in them are wealth. Wings for fantasy and
a bearer of knowledge that scrolling through screens cannot give them
The school has its answer – the summer book list familiar to generations of their grandparents. Isn’t it time to change it, parents worry, however, who have found out with what pain and annoyance the little ones flip through these books.
The truth is that children’s summer vacation reading lists include works that will both interest them and help them get through the school year. If they have read at least part of them first, it will be much easier to comment on them in class together with the teacher and their friends, to perceive and analyze them, both elementary teachers and specialists in Bulgarian language and literature are categorical.
But how to make a child who has just learned to read fall in love with the magic of books, instead of pushing him away because of topics that are distant and boring to him. Simply because the world is different, communication has long since left paper pages, and the vocabulary of even the youngest is “updated” daily.
Most schools, especially private schools, provide much richer recommendations for summer reading than the required curriculum requires. Precisely with the idea of capturing children’s imagination. Otherwise, the classic list is relatively short and pleasant. This summer, first graders were given Ran Bosilek’s “Kingdom of Patilan” and “Wizards” (Brothers Grimm), for example. On the recommendation of teachers and experts, the second-graders had to leaf through “Fairytales” by Ran Bosilek and “The Adventures of Lukcho” by Gianni Rodari on the beach. After the third grade, the recommended literature includes fairy tales by Nikolay Rainov and Svetoslav Minkov and “The Flying Classroom” by Erich Kestner.
But parents also have their role, say the specialists.
“Easy” books with large illustrations and large print captivate children, for “difficult” ones it is good to have mothers, fathers, grandmothers help
and grandfathers. The family environment naturally predetermines the attitude towards the book as well – a child who does not see his relatives open it, cannot burn with a desire for him to do it himself. And then the “boring” lists are not to blame.
“New books with large illustrations are coming out, which are very easy for children to read.
Those on the summer vacation list read slowly, though
There are many descriptions. It is an important role for parents to support children in this reading.
Often parents say that these books are very old. They wonder why children should read them. There are many unfamiliar words in them. This is true, but these words greatly enrich the children,” says Miglena Mancheva. According to the experienced pedagogue, every word they learn from the “difficult” books later helps the children a lot in the learning process, especially in the elementary school.
Imperceptibly, terms and concepts accumulate, which are superimposed in the child’s mind and “pop out” to help in a learning environment. And it does much better than those who have not read similar type of books.
And why is even Pippi bored? Because of the many descriptions,
explains Maneva. Because of television and smart phones, it is now very difficult for children to focus on books with long descriptions of situations and objects. They get used to receiving information very quickly. Reading such type of books requires effort because not all things are familiar to them. Some don’t know what a can or porch is. Of course, recommended works are usually short and easy to understand, but effort is still required.
How the modern parent can encourage their child. It can even use a story-tale or arouse curiosity by asking it to look up something on the Internet about the characters. One of them can present. If the child is extremely resistant and has no desire, he can put the book aside, pick up another one, because reading is still a pleasure. But to return to some parts – for example, with mom in the evening before going to bed.
The important thing is to have fun. After the initial course, it becomes a little more serious. Tsetsa Petrova, a teacher of Bulgarian language and literature, explains that in the 5th grade, the idea of literary education is to familiarize children with the first forms of artistic literature – myth, legend, folklore. They are an anonymous and multivariate word. Children must be able to distinguish the differences between them.
In the 6th grade, a more serious literary study begins
They introduce the children to the works of Bulgarian authors, who then participate in the exam after the 7th grade. There are several texts that do not fall into the exam version, but the main knowledge at this stage is that the children already begin to differentiate the texts they read by genre, both in terms of volume and as ways of building and constructing the work and the artistic images in it.
In the 7th grade, literary studies have already started in full force, says the teacher. It lays the foundations of concepts, methodology for working with an artistic text. They learn specifics of scientific and artistic text. They should already understand the ways of constructing the text. They are supposed to be able to recognize it, analyze it. Here they should already be able to indicate the ways of artistic construction of a text. Again, the emphasis is on Bulgarian literature and only on it with its classics, mainly Ivan Vazov. For several years, Dobri Chintulov has also been on the list, previously he was in the 6th grade.
Ivan Vazov’s texts, which are difficult for them, should be read in the summer, understood as much as they can, explains the specialist. It is good for children to use the dictionaries that have these texts, it is really very useful.
On the contrary, they enrich their vocabulary and see another form of existence of the Bulgarian language, more archaic. And it may even become much more interesting for them – we should not deprive them of this opportunity, Tsetsa Petrova is emphatic. And the first contacts in the summer with these texts are useful so that later situations during the school year are not stressful.
Otherwise, everyone can read what they like. “The more the merrier” as Winnie the Pooh says. No one has forbidden anyone to read their favorite books and does not want to put children’s fantasy in a “list”, all educators are unanimous.