Kids Who Read Comic Books Become Proficient in English & Literature

[Squall]

How many kids across the U.S. had parents who discouraged the reading of comic books, perhaps regarding them as useless time wasters or, even worse, 'garbage'?

Well, in what should be regarded as common sense, some of the so-called experts in the education and literature fields are starting to realize that comic books make a wonderful bridge that takes non-readers into the world of readers.

Here's how it works: A non-reader is usually attracted to comic books initially because of good artwork or interesting characters. But, when they start their journey as comic book readers, they find that they need to improve their language skills & knowledge of literature in order to have a deep understanding of what's going on in the stories they are reading (and seeing). Over time, the comic book reader evolves into an academic who loves art and literature (and even science and math), with a large vocabulary and a self-propelled desire to learn more, and understand more.

Though the idea's focus has always been on kids, clearly it works just as well for adults. It's never too late to turn a non-reader into a reader!

I think the implication here is clear -- if schools in the U.S. want their non-readers to begin reading, they can't do it by forcing Shakespeare and Nietzsche down their throats in the beginning; you start off subtlely, with Justice League and The X-Men, and when questions like "How do satellites stay in Earth's orbit?" and "How is The X-Men a story about racism?" start to surface, then many kids (and adults) will start to research these things on their own. After all, as William Butler Yeats once said, "Education is the lighting of a flame, not the filling of a pail."

"Marvel-ous Stories"
In response to comic book snob John Podhoretz's Spiderman 2 review, blogger Dave Huber recalls how reading comics turned him on to words and storytelling.

Comics creator Stan Lee said on the Mike Douglas Show that he wrote his books with college-level vocabulary. “If a kid doesn't know a word and has to look it up in the dictionary, what's wrong with that?"

Huber writes:

I know I had my dictionary handy when I was reading Marvel comics. And it came in handy. In 6th grade, I won a spelling bee by spelling the word "grotesque" correctly. I remembered it in an issue of The Incredible Hulk where the green giant battled "The Grotesque Glob." Cool, huh?

...By reading Stan Lee as a kid, I became enamored with words and storytelling. I became an excellent speller. It also sparked my interest in reading things other than comic books, and as a result I now have shelves in my home teeming with books, with everything from science fiction to education to politics and history.

My parents wouldn't let us read comic books when I was a kid. I think they thought comics were too violent. So we went to the drug store and read them in the store, feeling like hardened criminals. I never liked Superman. He had too many powers. And I had to identify with poor, perpetually duped Lois Lane.

By the way, I highly recommend Michael Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, which is about comic book designers and their heroes. Chabon also wrote the screenplay for Spiderman 2.

Note: All underlined names & phrases are links to other websites in the actual article:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,125249,00.html

If U.S. schools want to improve the reading & writing skills of their students, they should start by putting comic books in the school libraries.

 

[The Frog]

I would completely agree with that. Hey, I read "The Picture of Dorian Grey" because they talked about it in Starman. The volcabulary thing makes sense too. There can be picture-word association that goes on as well that would help kids with vocab. Like the grotesque example, a kid might be able to figure out the it's like the word "ugly" because they were using it to describe the Hulk. The satellite example of learning is good too, but we might want to sray away from teaching kids some comic books science. "Teacher, if we run around something fast enough can we go back in time?"

 

[Matt-a-Tastic]

Yeah a lot parents belive that if there kids read comics it will be damaging for there abilty to read, which is retarded, because the kids are sill reading, just not as much as they would be if they were reading a book.

And come on, do parents really think that if kids instead of reading comics will be reading books? Hell no they wont, the be watching TV or going outside or playing video games

 

[Elven Moon]

I heartily admit I learned a number of things from Peanuts strips and Archie Comics, strange as that sounds

 

[Phantasm]

I still find myself learning a lot of vocabulary words from Batman comics. And have written a couple of 'analysis' essays on those for English class which my teacher loved.

 

[Chris Wood]

Well, of course there's the long-running comic series Classics Illustrated (starting in the 40s) that prints adaptations of great literary works, but I don't know how popular it is today. Would kids really pick up the Shakespeare comic instead of the Superman one?

 

[Squall]

...But we might want to stray away from teaching kids some comic books science. "Teacher, if we run around something fast enough can we go back in time?"

True! But, even the 'fiction' part of science fiction can get readers asking questions, and discovering answers about real science, even if it contradicts what the comic book writer came up with.

Would kids really pick up the Shakespeare comic instead of the Superman one?

Why can't they buy both?

Well, if the popularity of historical movies like Saving Private Ryan and Gladiator are any indication, then certainly, comic books about traditional literature and/or history have the potential to sell really well. Just make sure they have really good artwork!

 

[Ed Liu]

Howdy,

The Classics Illustrated series of comics is coming back, this time as a Puffin/Preiss series for younger readers. One of the highlights is probably Manga Macbeth, set in a far-flung sci-fi future. We'll see if they'll read Macbeth if he looks like Iron Man:



As time goes on, I think that simply suggesting that comics lead to reading "real" books sells comics short. I think there is a different sort of skill involved in reading comics. On a surface level, it's kind of like how you read a textbook differently than you read fiction, but you can dig deeper and start babbling Marshall McLuhan theories of media and how a story in comics is written and read in a fundamentally different way than the same story in prose. However, I'm not as up on McLuhan as I'd like to be, and I'm going to guess that you stopped listening a sentence or two ago and will stop babbling now .

The point that comics can, at their best, generate intellectual curiosity and a desire for learning and education would seem fairly obvious to anybody willing to open one up and read one, though. It also seems that you could apply the same argument to TV shows, cartoons, video games, or other elements viewed as "trash."

-- Ed/Ace

 

[Chad Bonin]

...

I remember I got points taken off in elementary school for using a conjunction I learned from a Sonic The Hedgehog comic ("I've a world to save!")...

 

[Cool Blue]

Well, I do know that I have learned quite a lot from the pages of comics. It has expanded my vocabulary and referenced other things that I look into. I still think it's a little crazy how people see comics as childish 'garbage' that doesn't expand the human psyche. Heck, it was from comics that I learned what telepathy was. It's also a fact that reading comics expanding vocabulary isn't exactly a great scientific discovery.You should expand your vocubulary just as if you were reading a book, common sense.