Never Say Newspaper...

Extra, Extra! Read All About It...

A few weeks ago my reading class was focusing on "Real World" Reading - which was basically learning how to read menus, recipes, mall directories, TV guides, movies, and finally, the classified ads. Doesn't sound too bad, does it? We read these things all the time...and for the most part, the kids did great...For the most part.

Every week my classroom has newspapers that are donated from various businesses around the community. It is a great program that is not always utilized. So, for the classified ads lesson, I decided to save newspapers for all of the students to use. The day of the lesson came around and I passed a complete newspaper to every student, told them to open it up, pull out the classified section, and put the rest of it to the side. The mass chaos that ensued after turning the students over to their newspapers cannot even be described. You would have thought that I had just asked every student to cut off a body part!

Overheard Comments: "The what section?" "What are we supposed to pull out?" "I can't find it." "Where do I find where the sections are?"

After we FINALLY got the classified ads away from the rest of paper, I had the students open their papers to B6.

Overheard Comments: "What is B6?" "Where do I find the page number?" "What is she talking about?" "Is that the name of an article?" OH MY.

Once all the students were on the PAGE NUMBER B6, I asked them to fold back the paper on itself, so we didn't have huge spread out newspapers on our desks. Not too hard to handle, right? I demonstrated how a simple twist of the wrist will do the trick...

Overheard Comments: "Ms. Maaaaay, I can't do it!" "My paper isn't wanting to go that direction" "Ms. May, can you come fold my paper back for me?" "How did you do that so easily?" "Do we have to do this? I can't figure it out" "My paper is wrinkling"

I don't even remember how many newspapers I had to fold back for students. They were literally freaking out that they had to fold back a paper! Now, granted, it is a skill that does take some practice, but it isn't rocket science.

I am all for technology and the e-book sensations (such as Kindle and the Nook), but it is a bit disconcerting when kids don't even know how to open a newspaper, find a newspaper page number, and fold a newspaper back on itself!

Sigh...I guess I'm honored that I can introduce students to these archaic artifacts that some of us still open, read, and fold back daily!

"All I know is what I read in the papers" - Will Rogers