Learning From My Own Reading Process, part one

I must credit Ellin Keene and Susan Zimmerman, and their brilliant Mosaic of Thought, for teaching me the power of reflecting closely on my own reading process to inform my reading instruction lo those many years ago. (The 2008 edition of Mosaic contains 70% new material and I highly recommend it also!) After Karen and Franki (in Learning to Read: Teaching Students in Grades 3-6) helped me to recognize book abandonment for the complex reading problem it is, I challenged myself to observe my own process in order to better help my students.

But I need to back up a little and set the stage. I am an avid reader. It is often difficult for my well-read book club to come up with titles I haven’t read. But in the past few years I have become increasingly impatient with fiction. When it comes to fiction, mama is a rollin’ stone. I have collected a stack of fiction titles, all with bookmarks permanently wedged somewhere before page 100. I am now in the habit of returning to the library bags full of the latest and greatest from the New York Times Bestseller list, overdue, but largely untouched. When I had this epiphany about my students’ abandonment issues, I was in the process of packing my bags yet again. The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery was my latest jilted lover.

Sure, everything started out all wine and roses. The Hedgehog was recommended to me by another avid reader, someone who is as close as they come to being my reading twin. Not only had she never steered me wrong before, she had recommended several books destined to become favorites. Recently, I ran into her at the grocery store and she couldn’t wait to tell me about this book I HAD to read. She insisted I would love it. I couldn’t wait to get to the bookstore. Full disclosure: I read an enticing review of the book long before running into my friend. I had picked it up, perused the accolades, and read the blurb several times already—without buying it. I just didn’t think it was for me. But after my friend’s recommendation, there was no hesitation. I trusted her that much, I simply had to read this book.

Once I got it home, my enthusiasm didn’t last long. There were two narrators, neither of which I cared about. Sure, I usually love gifted kids, but Paloma left me cold. And the other narrator was a stand-offish concierge in the girl’s exclusive French apartment building. I closed the book and set it aside, not having reached page 100. It was in that same week that I realized that observing myself as a reader at the edge of this precipice was a golden opportunity to better understand my students’ challenges.

My first step was to commit to reading it every day, at least a few pages. I knew that my attention would be even harder to engage if I didn’t keep the storyline fresh in my mind. It was hard enough without letting it get stale.

Step two was physically removing all other tempting fiction from my normal reading spots. I knew I could not fully engage with The Hedgehog while simultaneously reading some other tasty fiction morsel. With some books maybe I could have a little something on the side, but I just wasn’t that into this one. I had to be fictionally monogamous. (Of course I still clung to Still Learning to Read, but I had rationalized that in my own mind—it was helping me get through The Hedgehog, after all.)

Once The Hedgehog had my full and undivided fictional attention, I still wasn’t hooked. My attention wandered. I had to start mentally summarizing after each section to make sure I was getting it. It was painful. It took discipline.

True confessions: typically when I find myself in this quandary, I read the ending, and oh, was I tempted! Sure, that occasionally takes away any motivation I may have had to finish the book, but more often it re-energizes me. I’m no longer worried about who’s going to die and so I’m mentally free to step back and observe the author’s craft. (Thank you Katie Wood Ray for Wondrous Words!) But in this case I had more than myself to think of. What about the children?!

Reading the end is taboo. In my personal life I’m all too willing to violate social norms, but I’m usually careful not to model that in my role as a teacher. I feel an immense responsibility. I have learned that, even when I can’t see it, there are usually good, socially-important reasons for taboos. So if I read the ending I knew I would be opening up a whole can of worms. Alas, I was weak. I did it anyway… and it worked for me. So what now? Do I tell the kids? Do I tell the kids, but tell them it was wrong of me to do it, when I still don’t know if it is wrong? Do I lie? Help!