Don’t put age ranges on children’s books

Jean Hannah Edelstein Says Don’t put age ranges on children’s books: “Because of this life-shaping experience – and a later one when another teacher went into a panic that I was losing my innocence when I was caught reading Les Miserables – I particularly welcomed the news that authors at the Hay festival last week banded together to protest about an outrageous scheme to print recommended age ranges on children’s books. They wisely point out that slower readers would be dispirited that they were reading at the speed of children younger than them, while faster readers would continue to seek out the wild thrills of books meant for older kids or (shudder) adults.”

June 5, 2008 by Uncategorized 5

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5 Responses

  1. Chuck says:
    June 5, 2008 at 6:21 pm

    age ranges
    1) W/out a range on a book (maybe just in the vendor or catalog record) I don’t know if the book would be at the level for the audience.

    2) Want to do something horrible that will turn off teens to your YA collection and area? Have “kid’s books” over there. If three girls come in and want to get their Gossip Girl on and there’s stuff for ten-year olds all over the place they will be mortified.

    Reply
  2. sarahmae says:
    June 5, 2008 at 7:09 pm

    Here’s the website
    For the authors who are against age banding:

    http://www.notoagebanding.org/index.php?home

    “Everything is for the best in this best of all possible worlds”

    -Candide by Voltaire

    Reply
  3. Anonymous says:
    June 5, 2008 at 7:32 pm

    “an outrageous scheme to
    “an outrageous scheme to print recommended age ranges on children’s books”
    Maybe it’s outrageous in the UK. Not in the US – they’ve been doing it for years.

    Reply
  4. Chuck says:
    June 5, 2008 at 8:05 pm

    I see
    This is what happens when liberal arts degrees go bad.

    Reply
  5. webdoyenne says:
    June 6, 2008 at 3:28 am

    Is this STILL going on?
    I am…well…old-ish…and I still remember when they put strips of colored tape on the spines of books as an age indicator. My mother came to the library and threw a fit because they would only let me take out book with “yellow stripes,” and she and I both thought these were “baby books.”

    Ugh!!!

    And phooey to the 4th grade teacher who thought Lord of the Flies was “too mature” for Number One Son. In spite of you, he has grown into an articulate young man who reads voraciously.

    Reply

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