Sparknotes has affected the reading experience of many high schoolers. On a night where you have a paper to write, math homework and 50 pages to read, you tend to move the reading to the end of your list. By the time you finish the paper and your math homework, its about 10:30 pm. You lay down in bed, ready to read your book and you find yourself falling asleep after three or less pages. Instead of struggling for the next hour or more to keep your eyes open, you simply open up sparknotes and read the summary in five minutes.
Of course reading the online summary will help you get a decent grade on the quiz but there has to be more to reading for school than getting a good grade on the test. Majority of the books that we read in school are classics, so it is a shame that many people do not read them. Reading summaries online does not allow you to create emotional attachments with the character or feel any type of emotion while reading. Reading sparknotes takes away the voice of the author, which is only meant to make the reading better.
Now, lets say you have no homework except to read the 50 pages. It is expected then, that the student will pick up the book at the latest 8:00 and read the section. The next day a student, lets call her Sam, that sat down and read the 50 pages, goes to take the quiz and is completely lost. It is as if she did not read the book at all. She turns to her friends and complains, "that was the hardest thing I ever took, and I even read." Her friend then responds with, "Really? I just read a online summary and it wasn't too bad." Now Sam has no motivation to read again and for the next reading section, she uses sparknotes.
If online summaries are so well done, how can a student in high school have any motivation to sit down and read the actual book?
I completely agree with you Maria. Sparknotes is a very good friend of many people and becomes the first resort for many high schoolers. I have personally used it several times but I think it is better overall to just sit and read the actual book. You can read any summary whenever you want but to read a book gives you more insight and emotional connection to the characters and events occurring in the novel.
ReplyDeleteDearest Maria,
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with your blog. Being a high school student, I have found that Sparknotes is very convenient. Like myself, high schoolers have very busy schedules including sports, work, school, and homework. From this, having to read along with other homework takes up a lot of time. This is where Sparknotes come into play. Although I do enjoy reading, Sparknotes offers great analysis' of novels and character descriptions. Honestly, I feel bad just using Sparknotes because I feel like I'm cheating the system and not doing my work. Although, I prefer to use Sparknotes after I read to get a more detailed summary of the book from what I didn't understand. Spark notes has helped my greatly through my high school career however I strongly that students should still read the books.
- Willy Shake Dat A$$
I have the same view on this topic as you, Maria. Sparknotes are a very useful tool for when there is not enough time to finish a reading assignment. When you have homework from every other class plus after school sports or activities, its near impossible to get to bed at a decent hour when you have all that reading to do as well, and the only option is to read the online summaries. However, I also agree that actually taking the time to read and understand the content on your own is the better choice. With Sparknotes you lose that voice of the author that most of the classic books we read in during school are known for, and if you have the time, you get a lot more out of actually reading.
ReplyDeleteI agree Maria. I myself even use sparknotes when I cannot find the time to read a book. I agree that this takes away both the connection to the characters and the author's voice. Reading an online summary just gives the main plot events and leaves out all the detail the author worked into the story to give the reader insight into the world that the story creates. So many kids now are just looking on sparknotes instead of reading the actual book and they are missing out on reading some fantastic novels.
ReplyDeleteMaria, I couldn't agree more with you. I am a strong user of spark notes myself, It has gotten me through unthinkable times that I just can't think about anymore, because they're unthinkable. But if there's one thing I learned when being told not to use spark notes, is that it takes away the true magic in what possibly is a great novel. Not only that, but it doesn't allow you to have that connection with what you're reading, therefore your understanding of the novel is really screwed up! People need to learned how to unscrew what they're doing wrong and just read like there's no tomorrow!! (or read like spark notes is officially gone, because then you physically can't use it but I'm sure you understand that already) #SayNoToSparkNOte!
ReplyDelete