Reading is a Challenge...and a Cultural Imperative

How do parents and teachers encourage students to read? Not only for content and comprehension, but for enjoyment? It`s a tough question, one being tackled by some area schools that substitute newer, contempory fiction for the classics on required reading lists. This move is not without controversy. Some educatiors contend that dumping the classics is a mistake. A recent Plain Dealer article explored this topic. The reporter named Hawken`s Upper School reading list the most challenging in the area. Ninth-graders read Homer, Thucydides, Confucius, Sophocles and Shakespeare. Upperclassmen follow with Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Truman Capote, Dickens, more Shakespeare, Hawthorne, Thoreau and Toni Morrison. Literature can be a mirror, reflecting readers back to themselves, or a window into other worlds and cultures, said Steve Weiskopf, chairman of the English department. Hawken relies on the classics to be a window. \"We want the kids to understand the fundamental roots of culture around the world and think beyond themselves a little bit,\" he said.