Engaging African American males in reading

Noted educator Alfred Tatum and award-winning author Walter Dean Myers shared the spotlight as Special Featured Speakers at the IRA Annual Convention on Tuesday afternoon, addressing issues involved in engaging adolescent African American males in reading. First, Tatum introduced Jonathan Thomas, a young man who spoke briefly but eloquently about his struggles to over come difficulties with reading.

Tatum focused his comments on the need to reconnect African American males with “textual lineages”—texts they find meaningful or significant or that affect their lives. “We have had a severing of textual lineages in our schools,” Tatum said. “Many students suffer an underexposure to texts they find meaningful.”

Speaking with passion, Tatum said, “We need to find a way to strengthen our ideology for educating African American males. It’s not just about students’ literacies. It’s about their lives.”

Next, Myers talked about his writing and his relationship with his readers. He said he writes books because “it’s the space I need to be in.” Likewise, he said, his readers are looking for a place to be.

“I’ve created places for these young people to be where they are comfortable,” he said. As an author, he said that he needs to give readers clues about why his books will speak to them and help extend them from where they are to other places they can be comfortable. He concluded by asking teachers to help bring meaningful literature into the classroom. The session ended with a question and answer session.