Elly Williams’ Weblog

A thought that occurred to me while wandering around the technology section of a bookshop…

A book on CSS/HTML/XHTML/other-web-design that doesn’t mention web standards is like a book titled “DIY Loft Insulation” where the first chapter is all about asbestos.

Dave Shea announced today that ‘The Zen of CSS Design’ is finished and off to the printers. And it should be shipping in time for my birthday too

There’s also a shot of the acknowledgements page with a list of all the people who’ve contributed to the CSS Zen Garden. If only I’d gotten around to doing a design (I will get around to it, honest), my name could’ve been there too. Too much time spent wondering if an architecture degree is enough to classify me as a ‘graphic designer’….

I haven’t really been able to get on the internet much recently coz Meri has been reworking our home network and I’ve just moved offices at work so it’s been a bit hectic there (to put it mildly.)

Anyway, I’ve just seen this post on mezzoblue and if anyone is looking for a present to buy me in the new year The Zen of CSS Design is a pretty good bet (hint hint).

In the mean time I will get around to reading Crypto, which I was recommended ages ago, The Cuckoo’s Egg, which Meri has just finished and Steal This Computer Book 3, which I’ve just bought at least in part due to the disclaimer on the back of the book stating

WARNING: This book is not to be used for hacking into government computers, shutting down AOL, cracking software, phone phreaking, spreading viruses or any other illegal activity

Might keep me busy for a while…..

I saw this in WHSmiths at Bristol Temple Meads Station this afternoon and nearly fell over. “Why?” you might ask.. because it appears to be an “I’m not a SciFi/Fantasy book, honest” cover for Equal Rites by Terry Pratchett.

I was somewhat upset by this. I would never have started reading the Discworld novels if they had been maskerading as “grown up” books. In the same way that I would never have originally read any of the Harry Potter books maskerading as “grown up”

Actually it appears that a number of the earlier Discworld novels have also been given a bit of a makeover – apparently to commemorate the 21st Anniversary of the Discworld. But I’m still worried.

These new covers do not portray the contents of the books. A number of them could easily be transposed onto school editions of Shakespeare (I can see candidates for Hamlet, Merchant of Venice, The Tempest, Anthony & Cleopatra and Taming of the Shrew just in the ones I’ve linked to… no doubt if Wyrd Sisters gets a makeover it could easily be used for Macbeth)

In this instance I feel this quote from Neil Gaiman is particularly apt

“I think kids, like adults, are very good at looking at a book, eyeing the cover, looking at the jacket copy, reading the first few lines and deciding if it’s a book for them or not. They may, like adults, miss out on a few things they’d really like if only they knew.”

And it’s quite possible the only people who’re going to know in this case are the ones who already own copies.

I was reading this article on the BBC about a week ago and it kinda seemed important (although obviously not important enough to write about straight away ). The Children’s Laureate has said many teachers are failing to enthuse their pupils with a love of reading. The main reason given for this is that the teachers do not love reading, or fail to show any enthusiasm for reading, literature of the material being covered.

I can see straight away how this happens seeing as it happened to me. In second year of secondary school (so, when I was 12) we had an English teacher who didn’t seem to care about teaching English – especially not English Lit. This became particularly apparent when she picked a book that she hadn’t read and didn’t intend to for us to study one term. And my grades plumetted (I still blame her for the fact that English was my worst subject at GCSE – by quite a way)

However there is another level to this, which was certainly employed at my school. For English class, before I hit about 15, one lesson a week was a “reading lesson”. You took in a book, and for that hour, you read it. And then, once a term you had to hand in reviews of the books you had read, and you had to have read a certain number of books. Which killed reading, because it became a chore. As soon as reading became a chore people started coming up with ways to cheat. One girl made up books under her own pen name, someone else would write up chapters of one book as separate books, other people just wrote up books that they had read at some point rather than recently.

I’m not quite sure where I’m going with this. On the one hand there’s the argument that if it’s a chore and not fun then kids will try and find a way out of reading, and on the other hand you have to have some system for checking that kids are reading or they won’t.

However, it’s quite noticeable how much worse English people’s English is than most people who’ve been taught English somewhere where it’s not necessarily the main spoken language (admittedly most of my experience is northern europe and I have no idea if this is exceptional or not, but it’s certainly noticeable) And we’re worse at learning other languages too. Meri can speak 4 languages fairly fluently and bits of a couple of others. I’m fairly sure Mili is fluent in at least 3 languages. And yet I’m exceptional (at my school at any rate) for attempting to learn both French and German at GCSE.

Anyway, I’ll leave you with a couple of quotes

“Two languages in one head? Who could do such a thing”

“Well the Dutch speak 4 different languages and smoke marijuana…..”

Eddie Izzard – Dress to Kill – ~1998

“If English was good enough for Jesus Christ, it ought to be good enough for the children of Texas.”

Texas Governor Ma Ferguson – ~1924

I found an article on the BBC website. Apparently, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix has been giving some kids headaches.

I’m not sure why anyone has found this particularly suprising. One of the main factors is that the kids refuse to take a break from reading the book.

If you spend all day staring at a computer screen you are encouraged to take a break. I can clearly remember being told, by various teachers, to take breaks in exam revision. So why should reading a book be treated differently?

So is it the books that cause the headaches?

Well, I can’t think of any other children’s books of that length. And I may not be eight years old, but I’m certainly gripped by the series.

So the problem is – it would appear – that chilldren have found a gripping, can’t-put-down-til-you’ve-finished series that happens to be a giant hype love-it-or-loathe-it debate.

So what’s the solution? Discourage children from reading? or just discourage them from reading anything long and gripping. I don’t think so. I wish I’d had something that enjoyable to read when I was a kid.