Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy DD8 reading Anne Frank at school

How old is she? She may not be that interested. So much of it is aimed at middle school age - getting her period, hormones (fighting with her mom and sister), and her relationship with Peter.

She's just turned 8--second grade. It's possible that it will not hold her interest, but actually I suspect that all the fighting with mom and sister will be VERY interesting to her. Also, I think she will be enthralled by the idea of the hidden world. The romance is likely to bore her, however. I need to look at it again myself--it's certainly been many years since I read it.

This year at school, she has studied the Trail of Tears, 9/11, and the African American experience in America. The Trail of Tears has been the one that's been hardest for her. I don't regret that she has studied these things, but I know she is struggling with some heavy subjects already. I had been intentionally holding off on the holocaust (there has been some WWI and WW II talk) because this is all a lot to take in the space of 6 months at age 7 (though she has known about the civil rights movement and slavery for a while now).

Even I worry (or perhaps should worry more), though I tend to forget about these issues completely since DS6 has been toughened up to such a degree. He's very interested in WW II, but I'd avoided specific discussions on the details of the Holocaust, but they came up when we watched "Band of Brothers" for the first time recently. He wasn't upset by the violent scenes in the miniseries, but learning more about the Holocaust upset him.

Yeah. My 9 year old is currently devouring the Hunger Games. It makes me uncomfortable, but I know all the other kids in her class have read it (she is accelerated), the next grade up read it at school this year, and the movie coming out soon... Well, I figured it was better for her to read it at home with discussion than be sheltered from it. We opted to do the audio book and listen to it together. Its interesting her dd thoughts about it.

I remember a pretty good recent film adaptation of Anne Frank aired on PBS Masterpiece a year or two ago that focused less on the sexual aspect of the book. Probably can watch online for free. It might be of interest...

My dd13 read the diary of Anne Frank when she, too, was eight. For her, the hardest part was trying to understand how people could have let this happen. That led to us reading Stanley Milgram's Obedience to Authority. I think that the search for justice among gifted kids makes understanding the "how" of WWII difficult as well.

It does sound like your dd is more sensitive to the "what happened" piece than my dd was/is, though. I haven't asked dd not to read books specifically but I have given her a heads up as to what she'll be coming in to with specific books and discussed them with her. There have been some she's chosen not to read following our discussions. For instance, Speak was one she passed on when she was 10 after we discussed that the main storyline was about a date rape. I think that she's going to pass on the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo after she and I discussed that it includes bondage and some weird sexual stuff.

Maybe talking with her about what she's in for in reading the book and letting her decide if she thinks she wants to try handling it would work.

My strongest concern is that she has some anxiety issues and may well get worried that this will happen again. She has expressed repeated concern that the African American kids at her school are going to feel scared by what they have learned about slavery and so on--"They might think it's going to happen again. I don't think that's good for little kids to have to worry about that."

(I don't care much about the sexual stuff, TBH.)

It might work out ok :hug: My dd10 read the book when she was 8 in school as her choice in a project assignment where the children were told to select an autobiography and then put together a timeline of events. She's a very sensitive kid in general - not necessarily easily scared, but very sensitive to other people's emotions and to the sense of justice etc. She was a-ok with reading the book even though I was not all that sure about it! And it did bring up some very good deep conversations at home.

polarbear

Hmm. I think that sounds a bit similar to my dd, then. Dd found some solace in better understanding how this could have happened and learning about what we have learned from this so that we can try to avoid this in the future. We saw it as a good learning experience about the mindset and political circumstances that can lead to genocide and how countries can be structured to explicitly allow disobedience when you disagree with the government. We discussed the checks and balances in our government, the dangers of overturning rights even when you strongly disagree with the minority whose rights are being protected, etc.

It helped that dd has seen in action policies that impinge on the rights of a minority being fought. For instance, my employer (a health care system) implemented a mandatory vaccination policy for influenza that didn't allow religious exemptions unless sanctioned by an approved cleric. As a vegan myself, I have always declined this vaccine as it contains chick kidney cells, is grown in eggs, etc. I successfully fought the policy using legal case studies and EEOC policy. They still get 95% of the employees vaccinated, but those of us with approved religious/moral objections don't have to get it and didn't lose our jobs.

I guess that where I'm going is that I try to show dds not only how bad things could have happened in the past, but also how we can avoid having them happen in the future and empower them to feel like they can make changes to things that infringe on the rights of others. That seems to help them feel better about sensitive topics than might just avoiding them.

Yes, I totally agree, and that is part of why I started this thread--to help me prepare for these conversations with her. My concern is that she can perseverate on worrisome subjects even when given ample evidence that there is little to worry about. FI, she's worried about an asteroid hitting earth and the sun burning out prematurely, no matter how many facts we present.