can I challenge this with the class teacher?

[bananacarnival]

Year 4 DS is struggling every week with his reading focus. The teacher seems to be somewhat obsessed with Michael morpurgo books and a new book is set each week with utterly stupid focus targets like "write a bullet point to summarise each chapter " - and then DS is told off( for writing 2 sentences as opposed to 1 )to summarise the elongated, complicated, harrowing and completely morbid chapters.

Every book seems to heavily feature a dead parent. Without going into personal details, ds is highly sensitive and very anxious and there are problems with his attachment to a father who is not around a great deal. I don’t get on with his teacher particularly well and don't wish to go into personal family details with her.

However can I tell her that I'm not prepared to have my child unsettled any further by the same author every week? Apparently he's made to miss his playtime if it's not done.

Any advice appreciated, even if it's to say I'm being ridiculous.

Thanks

I would just ask when they are going to do a different author as doing the same one is not interesting for your son.

It sounds like one of those teachers you'll just be glad when the school year is over!

Are they reading the books as a class together? Not much you can do if that's the case although I really empathize with you. I think best not to rock the boat. A good school teacher would understand each child needs to select books that interest them. Sounds balmy!

I'm wondering if it's part of group reading too...I'll ask him in the morning.

Thanks for the replies ...
No getting away from this teacher, got to go through it all with my daughter too.

Oh dear, the choice of books doesn't sound great for your DS. It sounds like you don't want to go in and have a chat with her to explain how it is affecting him, but I'm not sure how else you can let her know the effect it is having on him.

Do you think she is doing a focus on him as an author for a period of time? A good teacher wouldn't stick with the same author all year, although if it is for group reading, she may be a bit constrained by what books are available as group readers.

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It doesn't sound good practice. I'm not sure why they are using a different book each week. Do they just look at extracts? Or why they aren't being introduced to a wide variety of authors.

I would explain that the choice of subject matter is making your child anxious. If they are just reading extracts there us no reason they shouldn't look at other books.

Thank you. That makes sense. I'll have a word with her then...

I don't think you need to "challenge" her, or tell her that you are "not prepared to..."

All of this is very confrontational language. Just go in and have a conversation with her, and as a previous poster suggested, ask her when the work on this particular author will finish as your ds is finding it unsettling.

Although I appreciate you might not want to go into detail with her, I think it would help if she had a rough idea of which of the themes are making him unhappy and why. Your ds spends a lot of time at school and if she doesn't have an understanding of what might be making him anxious and unhappy, how can she be expected to support him or provide more appropriate learning opportunities.

Slightly off kilter here but why are schools obsessed with Michael Morpurgo - my DD suffered this all through junior school. Constantly having to read his books and even doing a stage play of one of the dullest ones.

Having read a couple of his books he strikes me as an author who writes children's books for adults - i.e what adults think children should read as opposed to what they want to read.

Sorry - don't want to derail the thread but didn't want to start a thread about a thread either.

Bananacarnival - I hope you manage to sort something out for your child soon xx

Dalek I completely agree with you. It's beyond me.
Littlefish you're absolutely right. Totally agree with you about how to phrase things in a non confrontational way.
Thanks again

Good luck bananacarnival.

Michael Morpurgo is regarded as a must read author. Personally I'm not a huge fan and think there are plenty of alternatives out there but that means you need to make the effort to look.

How bizarre! Sure fire way to turn kids off reading!

We were having a similar conversation in the staff room last week about Michael Morpurgo. Apparently he managed to get himself heavily involved with National Strategies back in the day. Also something to do him being published by scholastic.

DD absolutely LOVED Michael Morpurgo and Adolphus Tips was her all time favourite book for ages!

Good Luck!

I like a lot of Michael Morpurgo's work, but they are very complex and can be hard going- especially for Y4. The idea of reading one each week I'd ridiculous, as is summarising each chapter in one sentence.

I would speak to the teacher nd explain your concerns in general terms- your DS is not enjoying the books and they are putting him off reading. You could also say that he's finding the amount of deaths unsettling, without going into more detail. See what the teacher suggests.

(And if nothing changes, try getting your DS to play MM 'bingo' while reading: 5 points for a mention of the war, 4 points for a farm, 2 points for each animal, 5 points for the sea, 10 points for a mysterious statement in the first chapter which won't be explained until at least chapter 6. 3 points for football, 5 points if it's Chelsea.... )

DDs teacher is similarly obsessed with Morpurgo!

DD finds them boring and depressing!

DS was not a fan. Too many animals and too worthy, in his opinion. Mind you, although we hsve a shelf of them in the school library, I don't think they read them in class.

I think some of the subject matter in MM's books is more suited to upset key stage two. I used to find Kensuke's Kingdom harrowing (but amazing) when I did it with year sixes, who loved it, but it's one of the better ones in my opinion. Quite a few of the others are a bit dry.
I agree with littlefish, explain to the teacher that your child finds the subject matter upsetting, which I would hope the teacher would understand. And yes, see if you can glean what they're actually doing, it would be very difficult to read a whole book in a week. Perhaps it's guided reading sessions?
Good luck.

*upper, not upset!

DD3 is also Year 4 and her class did Kensuke's Kingdom in the autumn term (which I think is actually one of his more upbeat ones!). She enjoyed it but also happy to move on - although the next book was also related to World War II!

ACtually, I think the summarising the chapter in a sentence is great. It helps the child to really think about the things they have read and decide what is the very most important part.

MM is amazing - he used to teach Y6 and tell stories to them, which kicked off his writing career. Both my dc liked his books - variety is important, though, so that your ds can discover passions of his own.

lol cosmic - you could be right on both counts!

Me and DR love his books. He has a fantastic way with language and is brilliantly descriptive. I think that if his books are used in the right way they are a wonderful tool for children's writing.

Summing up in bullet points though. You could do that with Beast Quest or Rainbow sodding Magic.

I don't know who 'DR' is! I tried to write DD but my stupid new tablet likes to correct everything

Agree with oakmaiden about succinct summarisation being a important skill to learn.