Unfortunately, this is hardly new. When my now 44 year old was at Kammerer middle school, her advance program language arts teacher required the students to read an assigned number of books. Sounds good, except she told them it could be anything they wanted that she approved. Her criteria was only that they not be "too easy". With her approval, many of the kids decided that Stephen King books would be great. These were 7th graders. As you can imagine, my daughter joined with her classmates and chose one of his novels. I un-chose it. I had read a few and know that it was inappropriate. I gave her a reading list that I thought more worthwhile.
Thank you for this beautiful insight.
Unfortunately, this is hardly new. When my now 44 year old was at Kammerer middle school, her advance program language arts teacher required the students to read an assigned number of books. Sounds good, except she told them it could be anything they wanted that she approved. Her criteria was only that they not be "too easy". With her approval, many of the kids decided that Stephen King books would be great. These were 7th graders. As you can imagine, my daughter joined with her classmates and chose one of his novels. I un-chose it. I had read a few and know that it was inappropriate. I gave her a reading list that I thought more worthwhile.
It’s much worse now and deteriorating.
This mess has been decades in the making. I'm hoping the pendulum is swinging back in the right direction.