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I agree! We often have parents (and, less often, kids or teens) asking what they have to read to participate in our summer reading program. It's always the same answer--read what you WANT to read--be that books, comics, magazines, newspapers, cereal boxes--just read! Our library has tons of online lists & bookmarks and staff favorites areas, but if someone is insistent, I always like to point to the online reviews by teens (http://summerofreading.org/teens/reviews.cfm), which I tell them are what other kids their age are reading and liking right now, a great place to start exploring, but not the end!

Yay! I love the baseball analogy-- thank you for linking to it again since I wasn't here two years ago!

I've actually got a whole series of rants about required reading up on my own blog. It's not a fancy professional type blog or anything, more an online journal where I occasionally ramble about professional things, but it's at http://rockinlibrarian.livejournal.com/. I linked to you to round it out.

I open up my school library four times each summer so that students (and their parents) can come in to check out books. We are out in the country so it's a long drive for many of our parents. Nevertheless, we do get a few students who come in. Fortunately, we do not have a required reading list. The closest we come is our Battle of the Books list but we stress that the program is completely voluntary.=

This is a great point! Why can't we let kids make their own way? I'm of the mind that it's better to let them read a book they'll enjoy in the hopes of encouraging them to continue reading as compared to forcing something down their throats (I'm envisioning my parents standing over me forcing me to eat salmon until I was sick -- a food I'll never eat again, btw).

I do find myself wondering, though, if many parents look to these lists because they view them as "approved" by educators. Trying to get jump started on the next academic year.

Loved your baseball analogy. For 3 years now, I have refused to require my kids to complete the required summer reading list from their school. I tell my kids that if their teachers have a problem with that, they can tell the teacher to talk to me. Nothing like taking something that should be totally enjoyable and turning into *yuk* homework! I have the same problem with the reading logs that are now required in all my kids' LA classes. They have to write down how long they read each day and how many pages. What a way to discourage kids from picking up a book for a few minutes here and there - they feel obligated to write it all down and don't want to go to the bother so they put down the book instead of reading.

I'm so glad to know I'm not the only one that feels this way. The term "summer reading" to me always meant the books I read during summer vacation, not book picked out by someone else as "you should read this because it's summer now" sort of a thing.

I love this post. I heartily agree! Brings back distant memories of summer reading programs from when I was a kid--I don't remember having to read anything specified on a list, just some sort of library books.

The salmon is a great example also of the types of books kids like, or don't. I love salmon as a grownup; but never had to eat it as a kid and being a very fussy eater would have probably hated it (and hated it still) if forced.

What gets me is all the conflicting messages about reading that are sent. Summer reading is "for fun." But then "here is the list." So now the message is "no, it's not fun, it's the list". And if the kid doesn't like any of the books on the list? The message to the kid is "you're NOT a "reader" because you didn't like these books." Or, my favorite "what I read isn't good enough".

Ooh, summer reading lists! I'm a HS librarian, and our county supervisor made us put together a SRL. Several of us tried to argue against it, but she overruled us all. It was a waste of time - our teachers don't use it or encourage the students to use it, our admin does not think one is needed. But the county supervisor got her way. I feel bad for any student who has a parent who makes them read off the list I put together. I worked hard to pick books across a wide spectrum of levels and interests, but there is SOOOO much else out there. I'd rather our students find their way to something they want.

I really would like to comment on this when my brain isn't as fried from doing inventory as it is today, but with the end of school craziness I'll probably forget so here are my half-brained comments.

First of all, to your comments: ditto. Age banding would be used for parents to censor what their children are reading. I happen to believe that parents should be involved with what their children are reading, but that involvement should stem from actual knowledge of children's literature. My youngest is in 6th grade. I happen to have a lot of young adult fiction in my personal book collection. Many of these books I've encouraged her to read. Others, not yet, and if she picked up a book like Looking for Alaska from my collection I would tell her I didn't think she was ready for it. Would I take the book and hide it from her? No -- but I certainly wouldn't encourage her to read it right now. But I've read it and therefore can judge its appropriateness for her (I did, however, thrust it into my 11th grader's hands and tell her she would love it).

So on to my next point. Liz you are right -- too often it doesn't occur to people to go to a librarian for reader's advisory. We know which are the "harder" books that would be appropriate for the 7 year old. We also know how to match a child with the "perfect" book for him/her. Yesterday I did a survey with many of my 8th graders. The answer that most people gave to "how could my teacher or librarian encourage me to read more books" was "help me find books I would like." As a school librarian, I do as much of that as I can, but teaching research skills does interfere with my time to do reader's advisory. I've at times found my self at the bookstore recommending a book to a child and his/her parent when both appeared clueless as to what to pick out.

Ok these comments were long and probably rambled. Chalk it up to being tired and ready for summer vacation.

Valid points, all, Liz. As a parent, and not a librarian, let me weigh in here. I read a lot of the book blogs and have a pretty good idea what's out there - but I still don't know all the books in the library - nor have I read all the books my kids read.

When we go to the public library the books on the main shelves of the children's section range from advanced chapter books to Harry Potter and Treasure Island. It's not possible to know at a glance which books would be appropriate for a young grade schooler.

To be fair - although there is a "teen" section in the children's room - the main YA section is upstairs, so it's not like a pre-teen is going to be stumbling across something that is clearly directed at a much older audience.

Our library does not have a YA librarian. I'm not sure who is in charge of that section - but it is not a dedicated position.

The children's librarians have been very helpful. My kids were early and voracious readers and the main children's librarian has been very good about putting good books in their hands. But sometimes the librarians are not there (back room, or in a meeting) or are very busy. It is not always possible to get the reader's advice that I know they are qualified to give.

As far as school libraries go - When a class comes into the school library (at our school) for book exchange - they have 15 minutes to pick out a book. There is no way that the librarian could help each of 20 children find an appropriate book in that amount of time. And really, she's often just helping them find something they've thought of on their own: books on crafts, books in giraffes, whatever - not pointing a child toward a book and saying "this book would be a good match for you." She doesn't have the time to know each child to even have any idea what books would be good for each child.

So, does this mean I think age banding is a good thing? Not necessarily. You're right that it could cause people to eliminate some books as too old or too young or "I've moved past that age now".

But there are an awful lot of books out there - and not quite as many librarians. As a parent knowing that a certain book - that I may not have heard of - is considered appropriate for "13 and up" may make me pause and research it more before allowing my child to read it.

Just some thoughts from the other side of the library desk. :)

Great PhD program in Children's Literature: The Ohio State University.

As you know, I too consider myself a matchmaker between books and readers - of all ages - and I've posted multiple times about age appropriateness of content and real age vs. emotional age (aka the maturity of the reader). I don't want books to be restricted to X age and Y people. Basic sections are necessary for shelving and cataloguing, and age suggestions are sometimes a good thing, but sometimes, they are so very off. Readers are INDIVIDUALS - each with his or her own reading level and interests.

I had not heard of the age banding in the UK until I read this post and Fuse #8's. I think adults can get so caught up in what's the "right" book to read for their 3rd grader that they aren't even open to the librarian's suggestions sometimes. I know this happens to me, especially in the summer as the schools publish summer reading lists by grade. I just hate to see children's interests restricted in any way--and this banding could go both ways, with parents saying this is too easy or too hard for my child.

I agree that this is a terrible idea but I think people are missing the point in talking about it in the context of librarians and knowledgeable booksellers. This kind of marketing system is for shoppers at chain stores who have no knowledge of their own to draw on and no one to ask, since the employees are as clueless as they are.

I have a lot of faith in the anarchy of young readers' tastes to run roughshod over any system. But why not just get out of the way to begin with?

Hi Liz. It's Anastasia from Ypulse. Thanks for mentioning our Books pre-conference. In addition to Alli Decker, the editor of Ypulse Books, who is also a former literacy specialist and librarian (going back part time this fall), the agenda includes Walter Mayes, who happens to be a librarian at a middle school in Mountain View, CA. If this year's event is successful, we will definitely repeat it next year, and promise to include even more YA librarians as speakers.

Finally, for you or any of your readers who can make it out to San Francisco, we are offering a special $100 rate for librarians. All you have to is register for the Ypulse Books pre-conference only (the rate doesn't apply to the entire Mashup event), and enter the code "BookDeal" -- that's it! Our conferences are extremely interactive, so the more YA librarians who attend, the more your voices will end up being an integral part of the discussion. Hope to see you there!

Anastasia, I would love, love, love to go to the Ypulse preconference; I'm so jealous of those who are attending I could just spit. But alas, I live in NJ and it's just too far to go this year (having already committed to the YA Lit Symposium, and ALA, and the Kidlit Bloggers Conference).

I've written a couple of posts about this and signed up to the notoagebanding site when it first went live. I'm interested in what the US position is as we're told by the UK Publishers Association (the PA) that the US has had age banding for years and it works perfectly well.

The PA is doing this because it claims huge new swathes of adults will start buying books as gifts for children they don't know especially well, just because books will have recommended ages on their covers (I paraphrase!). Where these new buyers will come from and how they'll know about this change isn't clear.

Many children's authors are opposed because we say young readers develop at vastly different rates and it's not possible to be prescriptive, that weaker readers will be stigmatized if they are unable to read a book supposedly for their age group and that older readers (say 11+) will be put off reading a book labelled 7+ as that would be, like, totally not cool.

We think the cover, blurb and look and feel of a book is a much better and more inclusive way of indicating who would enjoy it.

It looks, from your entry, as though some US books come with 8-12 on their covers. Is this seen as helpful, restrictive or neither?

Thanks!

Keith, I'm going to have to check a bookstore or library to get a better sense of the frequency of the age/grade appearing. Based on my very small sample here at home, I'm seeing an ARC with the 8 to 12/gr 3 to 7 marking, and a paperback with "ages 7 +" on the back. Plus, other books that say nothing, esp. hardcover.

From the POV of a user, it's small, on the back of the book, where the the ISBN and cost are. It's barely noticeable, and I'm not sure how many times it is noticed/used, especially since it's not on all books and apparently varies by publisher. Did I read somewhere that the UK ones were going to be big & very noticeable on the front, in a colored circle? From what I have here, you wouldn't know it is there unless you went looking for it.

As for the age being helpful to an adult buying the book for a kid: since these books would already be in the area that is for children's chapter books -- so beyond early readers up to about age 12 or 13 -- it would be duplicating, really, what is already obvious.

I think that adults aren't always sure what level their kids are reading at and what they are interesed in. Buying books for someone who isn't there is hard --but I also think its hard for an adult buying for an adult!

So bottom line: sometimes it is there; it's not obvious or big; and it basically duplicates the chapter book age group anyway, so even when/if used by a parent as a guide, it wouldn't be that restrictive.

As a fun exercise - -check out some of the amazon.com us and bn.com (us) children book entries. The age rating Amazon uses comes from the publishers, I think; and both sites also contain professional reviews of childrens books. The ages can vary greatly; which to my thinking just proves how hard it to connect a firm age to a book.