Swearing in school book

[ahundredtimes]

DS1's english teacher suggested a book he might like. He does like it very much.

However he said to me last night 'there's an awful lot of swearing in it'

I said 'is there? What?'

'Well' he said flicking through the pages, 'here's a piss off, oh and there's another piss off here and there's a bloody, and there are masses of shits. And why does dope make you paranoid?'

He's in Y5.

Are we cool with this? What do you think? I think I am. I just wondered. It is just a little bit alarming.

Ah for teenagers Roseylea? And they are good then?

I was just thinking that I should read the book tonight before I make any decisions about it. Perhaps he likes it because it is for teenagers and he feels exactly as you describe, and it's just thrown me because he isn't one yet.

dd (yr3) has brought home a book from her library with a reference to sex and peer pressure (1 girl goading the other about only having snogged her boyfriend and not gone the whole way to having sex).

Took a bit of explaining .

I don't think yr5 is too bad for swearing in books BUT BUT BUT there are SO many great books out there, you sort of hope they'll be guided towards those ones.

Also, I think there's no point reading books that they don't understand. They may be able to read the words (like sex, dope, paranoid) but they're probably not going to start understanding what they really mean till they are secondary school I'd think (hope!).

I was mildly shocked when Horrid Henry told someone to "Naff off"

Swearing isn't nice of course but the whole telling kids off for swearing thing is massively hypocritical by most people's standards.

Y5 is quite young on one hand but then it isn't like they haven't heard it so maybe it isn't such a big deal. This formalises swearing a bit maybe, or rather regularizes it.

My DD yr 5's teacher just asked me if it was ok for DD to borrow Anne Frank's Diary as they were covering aspects of it in class but not actually reading it. DD showed interest and asked to borrow it. I would not have been happy if she had been given a book like the OP without being asked first.

I skim read the book last night. On the first page some boy is complaining that his trousers are too tight and are hurting his balls

Yes, is a teenagers book for sure. However, and unfortunately, following brief conversation this morning it seems ds1 does understand it, does like it and no won't mention swearing to teacher in case he takes it off him.

Perhaps teacher knows this already? Perhaps he knew that ds1 would love a teenagers book? Sigh.

I'm going to let it go. There must be some thrill in all this for him I suppose.

Whatever will they give him next? Marquis de Sade?

At a similar age, I was reading all the Ian Flemmings of my dad's. Looking back at the content of some of them (especially The Spy Who Loved Me which was my favourite and pretty sexually explicit) I'm amazed my parents let me - my only conclusion is that my mother just didn't know the content

I don't think I've been harmed too much by reading adult fiction (let alone teenage fiction) too early . I just hope I can be as cool with reading material when the dses get old enough to start exploring our bookshelves...

The book does sound alittle... risque.

However, on the issue of children knowing when it is and isn't acceptable to swear, I do think they can pick that up very quickly.

DD1 hears a lot of swearing in teh playground, at th epark, etc and she occasionally swears herself but she would never EVER do it in front of adults, little kids.

The words I find children are most unsure about are ones like 'crap'. This is almost an acceptable word now. I have to tell my pupils to stop using it.'Bloody' is going that way too.

There are loads of good books for year 5 boys that don't have swearing in. Lots of people are offended by swearing, so a headteacher swearing within earshot of kids is wrong IMO. My head swears like a trooper,(not within earshot of kids) but he would go mad if a member of staff recommeded a book for primary kids with swearing in. Personally I hate to hear kids swear.

I don't think this book sounds that bad. Granted, my biggest child is only 6, but I'd be surprised to hear of a nine-year-old who didn't know some swear words, and didn't understand the contexts in which they were or were not ok.

(Then again, when I was 14 or so, I did a book report on Portnoy's Complaint . And the teacher didn't freak out. )

My ds's both know swear words, but I try to encourage them not to use them. Sometimes people swear on the TV when we're watching. Sometimes it's funny, sometimes it's not but it's appropriate. On the whole children don't know when it's appropriate to swear or not. Children swearing sounds awful IMO and I have friends who would be upset if my ds's swore in front of them. So I teach them not to swear at all. When they're adults ( or more likely teenagers)it'll be out of my hands.

Lol @ Twig having lived in the 1950s since having children.

I'm against the censorship and the book burning and all for the reading as widely as possible but I have to say I wouldn't be happy either. It sounds fine for a teenager, but not for a Year 5. And it must give him mixed messages - don't swear, but hey ho, here's a book with lots of the words you musnt't use in it.

I know my Year 6 ds1 knows swear words (he said one beginning with f the other day when he didn't know I was in earshot then wept with mortification when I appeared in the doorway, bless his cotton socks) but knowing them and being given a reading book stuffed with them are two different things.

How did I manage to write mustn't like that, then?

lol. I don't know martha, but it looks quite teenagery written like that, therefore very appropriate.

I think the Ian Fleming comparison is quite a good one.

There is a hypocrisy in all this, and it's one he might or might not get. I couldn't pretend to him that swear words don't exist, he knows they do. He has, I hope, understood that he can't swear infront of me or anybody else and there we go.

I don't know. I think this has something to do with having a reading age above your chronological age. It's a difficult balance to strike. Last year another teacher gave him a memoir about an abused girl in China! I wasn't happy about that either.

However, he'll probably grow up to say he loved this english teacher, who gave him great books, what a blessed relief he was, how interesting, how great to escape his mother's staid reading suggestions.

Definitely agree about loving his english teacher

I think a great book, even if it makes us feel uncomfortable, is one that challenges our world-view and how we feel about certain things - it's not just about the entertainment of the story, but of learning new things and forming our values. Even if your opinions about life stay the same at the end of it, you've strengthened your reasons why you hold those opinions.

Worst case scenario, you end up having some very interesting conversations with him about when certain language is appropriate and when it isn't at the end

hmmm. You see, I think children do know when it's appropriate to swear or not. Very much so.

So I'm not overly concerned at swear words in books.

(and in case my earlier post was unclear, my dds would NEVER swear in front of me and I wouldn't in front of them)