Let's Hear It For the Boys

If you're looking for some summer reading, consider Bruce Pirie's Teenage Boys and High School English (Heinemann, 2002).  Pirie's insightful book considers why boys are often resistant to literature and writing and what we can do about it.  Woven throughout are classroom-tested strategies that have the potential to make English a more palatable subject for boys (without making it any less interesting to girls).  They include using drama to tap into boys' need for active involvement, building essays "from the ground up" to provide boys the explicit structure they may crave, and using poetry writing activities that are linked to novels or other texts so that poetry seems more like a vivid, compact way to respond to literature than a way to create obscure messages about vague feelings.  You can order Teenage Boys and High School English from your local bookseller or by clicking here or here.