A Public Service Announcement! ;)

A Public Service Announcement! ;)

Friday, October 08, 2010

NY Times Article Overblows "Issues" Associated with Declining Children's Book Sales

"Picture Books No Longer a Staple for Children" reads the headline of Julie Bosman's article, which offers evidence that some parents are pushing their young children away from picture books and toward chapter books.

The article makes it sound like this phenomenon is widespread, though, and downplays the role that other media -- children's cartoons, video games, websites, digital books, etc -- could be playing on the declining sales. I can certainly see where someone could find parents so hell-bent on baby going to NYU that they'd pass judgement on books that are developmentally appropriate for their children and go straight for frustration-level reading. What a way to build success, as this quote so clearly illustrates!:

Now Laurence is 6 ½, and while he regularly tackles 80-page chapter books, he is still a “reluctant reader,” Ms. Gignac said.

Sometimes, she said, he tries to go back to picture books.

“He would still read picture books now if we let him, because he doesn’t want to work to read,” she said, adding that she and her husband have kept him reading chapter books.

Poor Laurence. Do you think his reluctance might be because he's being asked to read things he might not be ready to properly appreciate or enjoy?

Interestingly, the article mentions how well YA lit is doing right now and also mentions that graphic novels are part of that development. Are we at a point where parents see graphic novels as a sophisticated literature and are shoving off all those preconceived notions, once reserved for comics, onto children's books?

While I can list several children's literature scholars whom I'd pay to see squirm if this is the case, I hope it is not. If so, however, we might soon need to discuss the similarities in comics and picture books rather than focus on their differences.

2 comments:

mjhollman said...

This may be primarily a "New York thing," or a particular slice of parents in many regions.
In today's NYT, in an article a/b the "youthening" of mean girls, one mother said her daughter in K was taunted b/c she didn't read chapter books.
Egads!

Bucky C. said...

I thought it might by an NYC thing too....