{"id":10710,"date":"2015-05-16T00:01:33","date_gmt":"2015-05-16T04:01:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/?p=10710"},"modified":"2015-05-15T23:45:26","modified_gmt":"2015-05-16T03:45:26","slug":"youth-who-take-a-stand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/2015\/05\/youth-who-take-a-stand\/","title":{"rendered":"Youth Who Take A Stand"},"content":{"rendered":"

Children ask two types of questions when they approach the reference desk: self-imposed\u00a0<\/em> or those imposed<\/em> by others such as teachers and parents. As a children’s librarian I have answered hundreds, if not thousands of children\u2019s questions over the past 11 years. The excitement of a child with a self-imposed question is as apparent as the frustration of a child with an imposed question.<\/p>\n

But what about when a child\u00a0 wants to read a book, but her parents say no? I’ve seen it hundreds of times. For example, I just had a child today who wanted to read the next book in the I Survived <\/em>series. The title wasn’t available and he wanted to place it on hold. Mom said, \u201cNo, you’re not putting anything on hold.\u201d\u00a0 I don\u2019t think parents realize the devastating effect it has on their child when they are told, \u201cNo, you can’t read a book\u201d.<\/p>\n

I recently came across a news story that happened over a year ago. Sherman Alexie’s The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian<\/em>, which is a popular target for challenges, was banned from a middle school library in Idaho<\/a>. A student took a stand<\/a> against the parents who were blocking access to the book. She inspired fellow students to petition and when Alexie’s publisher caught wind of the situation\u00a0 they sent out 350 free copies of the book for the students. Talk about a HUGE impact that those youth had on rallying for one book they believed in. Kudos to all of them for their tenacity and bravery.<\/p>\n

If more kids were willing to stand up to the adults who tell them, \u201cNo, you can\u2019t read such and such book\u201d, perhaps we\u2019d have fewer book challenges. I\u2019m not saying that parents are wrong and I respect them for setting boundaries with their kids. As library professionals we need to find a way to help children come out of their shells and advocate for their own reading interests; with this skill they can be more successful readers and leaders in the future.<\/p>\n

Janet Weber is a member of the ALSC Intellectual Freedom Committee and is a Youth Services Librarian at the Tigard Public Library in Oregon. She was on the Notable Children\u2019s Recordings Committee when The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian<\/em> was named to the 2008 Notable Children\u2019s Recordings list and she thinks the audio is extremely hilarious.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Children ask two types of questions when they approach the reference desk: self-imposed\u00a0 or those imposed by others such as teachers and parents. As a children’s librarian I have answered hundreds, if not thousands of children\u2019s questions over the past 11 years. The excitement of a child with a self-imposed question is as apparent as the frustration of a child with an imposed question. But what about when a child\u00a0 wants to read a book, but her parents say no? I’ve seen it hundreds of times. For example, I just had a child today who wanted to read the next book in the I Survived series. The title wasn’t available and he wanted to place it on hold. Mom said, \u201cNo, you’re not putting anything on hold.\u201d\u00a0 I don\u2019t think parents realize the devastating effect it has on their child when they are told, \u201cNo, you can’t read a book\u201d….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":167,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[272],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10710","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blogger-intellectual-freedom-committee"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10710","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/167"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10710"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10710\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10710"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10710"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10710"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}