Sunday, February 3, 2008
Are they boys or girls?
As I continued reading The Girl with the Brown Crayon, the students made many interesting discoveries about Leo Leoni and his stories. The students brought up gender. They wanted to know if the characters were girls or boys. As I was reading and learning about the stories, I never once stopped to consider the gender of the characters, yet a group of students in kindergarten absolutely had to know. When they realized that all of the characters in the stories they have already read were boys, they wanted to know the gender of the characters in the rest of the stories. They searched until they found one in which the main character was a girl. At such a young age, they already knew there was something wrong with the stories they were reading. Girls were excluded. They probably would not be able to understand why all of the characters were boys for a few years, but they knew that it should be different. I am amazed at the level at which these students are able to think. They are critical thinkers and do not accept anything at face value. They always want to know more.
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2 comments:
I read your comments on Sarah's blog at http://sjcteacherexperience.blogspot.com/ , "I am not sure if I have ever read any of his books, but some of them sound familiar....I would definitely like to read some of his books and try to pull out just as much meaning as Paley's class."
I will bring some of Leonni's books to class for your reading pleasure & for helping us understand the fascination which Reeny and the other student have developed with these books.
I also would never have picked up on the sex of the main characters. While reading through the stories today in class it still never dawned on me to try to figure out if the characters were males or females. It is amazing that something so obvious is overlooked by adults but is picked right up by a classroom of kindergardeners.
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