My second grader, Iris, came home from school with a blank trifold poster board and a set of directions. Her class was participating in a reading fair, and each student had to select a book and graphically depict its essence on the poster while highlighting main points like characters, setting, problem and solution, and favorite part. It was a month-long project culminating in the fair, complete with refreshments and prizes. A true celebration of reading. Iris, whose teacher recently described as "that cool kid in the corner who loves wizards and always has her nose in a book," was thrilled. And, as a writer, former English teacher, and self-proclaimed picture book connoisseur (What? I took grad classes in children's lit! I presented on gender roles in picture books at a conference!), so was I.
Until I reached the last bullet point on the instruction sheet. The one that said, "Go to Pinterest and search 'reading fair posters' for ideas!"
Let me begin by saying that I understand that the second grade teachers had good intentions, that they included this pointer as a cool, current suggestion for how to kick start the project. I'm not saying these specific women are bad teachers. But, the suggestion made me sad nonetheless. If there's one thing that I hold truly sacred about children, it's their imagination. Children are fantastically, generously, intrinsically equipped with imagination. Even the ones who struggle at school. Even the ones with learning disabilities and behavioral issues and austere living conditions and lack of support. Children have imaginations that are incomprehensible to us, that open doors and skies and skulls and candy wrappers. Can we just trust that? Can we all just leave inspiration boards out of their homework assignments while they are seven and still breathing fairy dust and hearing sleigh bells? While they still believe in everything that matters?
But, curiosity got the best of me, and I decided to look on Pinterest just to see what was out there. I searched "Reading Fair K-3," and my vague sorrow for our evolving culture turned into something visceral and personal.
Why are we encouraging parents to do their children's homework? Why are teachers deeming exemplary these blatant bastardizations of an attempt to get children to think creatively about reading? Why should my kid have to feel like crap when she compares her age-appropriate poster to the unattainable work of an adult?
Guess what. Kids are messy. Their writing is crooked, and their sense of symmetry stinks. That's OK. It's not really the point of the project.
But.
I'd be lying if I said I wasn't tempted to interfere when Iris and I finally spread the blank trifold on the floor in front of us. I wanted to say, "Do it this way! Don't glue that there! My way makes more sense!"
In fact, I cringed inside when she insisted on doing the project on this crappy Scholastic book with a trite storyline and mediocre, forgettable illustrations. What about Stick Man? I pressed, thinking of the nice link to her British heritage. Maybe one of your Mo Willems books?? He's totally legit. We have shelves spilling over with Caldecott winners, for goodness sake! My kid wasn't gonna report on some throwaway puppy book!
"Mom!" Iris said, groaning. "I like this book! It's so cute, and it's all about Valentine's, and the reading fair is in February, so it's perfect." She looked at me like I was pretty stupid for not getting it.
And I was. So, I shut right up, and I let my girl take her idea and run with it. Sure, I helped her figure out how to make everything fit, and I traced dog bones, and I told her how to spell things. We did it together, but we did it the right way.
"What if I don't win?" Iris asked as we cleaned up the glitter and construction paper clippings. She has definitely inherited my perfectionist streak.
"Well," I said. "You might not. And that's OK. We'll just focus on how much fun we had working on this together."
She looked at me like I was stupid again. But this time, I knew it wasn't because I didn't get it.