25th March Tolkien Reading Day

Tomorrow is a day to celebrate J.R.R. Tolkien, to encourage fans to celebrate and promote his life and works by reading favourite passages from his works.  A day that will remain a mystery to me as I have not read any Tolkien. I have been scarred for life! My Year 2 teacher who thought reading aloud should be part of her class's day and who also read aloud very well,  read us The Hobbit. I did not cope and I think I was one of the more capable children in the class. Maybe it went over their heads. It just disturbed me. I was seven years old and I had so many questions. 

Since then I cannot even attempt Tolkien or go to the movies of the books. I am not even keen on other fantasies where the characters are too far removed from normal people. I do love books and reading though and as a result of this I have always been very careful about matching my students to texts. I want to stretch them vocabulary and thinking-wise, but I don't want them to have their wellbeing disrupted.

I have been teaching for a very long time though and despite the fact that I am often surprised by what my young students have watched, their ability to visualise while being read to has changed greatly and what once worked as imaginary texts has changed too. I have been in the habit of sharing Jill Tomlinson books with classes. I find them humorous and each chapter stands alone well. The students I read it to recently laughed much less than those of other years. They liked the repetitions, but often did not think what a character did was unusual or funny. 

In a kindergarten class I thought I would share some poems for World Poetry Day. If it had any element of fantasy in it, they did not cope or laugh at all. When I read I've Never Seen a Purple Cow, they just kept saying 'no one would ever see a purple cow! That's not funny.' I read them a picture book version of The Owl and the Pussycat and they could retell the story. The consensus though was that it was silly and when I said that Edward Lear wanted it to be silly and to make you smile, it didn't make it any better. Just as I was despairing I finished with Hands by Julia Donaldson which they mimed aloud to and loved. When I told them who the poet was they rattled off a list of what she had written. The power of Julia Donaldson!

I did get to smile though, when a child asked to take home a copy of The Owl and the Pussycat for his mum. I'll ask him next week what mum thought. Meanwhile there is Bloomsday when we read Joyce, a day to read Tolkien,  a day to celebrate Roald Dahl, Dr Seuss and Eric Carle, so perhaps it's time to have a Julia Donaldson Day! I haven't always been a fan but the students I teach definitely are.